Game Server Hosting
Stop DDoS attacks
before players notice.
Game servers are the #1 target for DDoS attacks. Competitive griefing, ransom campaigns, and booter services hit game infrastructure around the clock. Flowtriq detects attacks in under 1 second, classifies the flood type, and auto-mitigates at every layer — from kernel-level firewall rules to BGP FlowSpec and upstream cloud scrubbing — keeping game ports open while dropping attack traffic. Your players stay connected. Your servers stay online.
The Problem
Game servers are under constant fire
Game server hosting is one of the most DDoS-targeted industries. Your customers rent servers for Minecraft, Rust, ARK, FiveM, Counter-Strike, and dozens of other titles. Every one of those servers is a potential target for disgruntled players, rival communities, or extortion campaigns.
UDP-based game protocols make servers especially vulnerable. There is no handshake to validate. Attackers can spoof source IPs and amplify traffic through open DNS, NTP, and memcached reflectors. A 500 Mbps flood can saturate a 1 Gbps uplink and take down every server on the node.
Players leave after 30 seconds of lag. Server owners file tickets. If the attacks keep coming, they churn to a competitor with better protection. The cost of undetected DDoS is not just bandwidth but rather lost revenue and reputation.
| Top attack vector | UDP floods (amplification + direct) |
| Average attack duration | 5–20 minutes (booter services) |
| Player tolerance | < 30 seconds of packet loss |
| Common targets | Minecraft, FiveM, Rust, ARK, CS2 |
| Attack motivation | Griefing, ransom, competitive advantage |
| Collateral damage | Entire node if uplink saturated |
14:22:02 Rust server ONLINE players: 31
14:22:03 FiveM server ONLINE players: 64
14:22:04 PPS spike: 241,000 BPS: 8.2 Gbps
14:22:04 ⚠ ALL SERVERS UNREACHABLE
14:22:05 Players disconnecting...
14:22:06 Support tickets: +12
14:22:35 Player count: 0
Without DDoS detection, you find out
from your customers. Not your monitoring.
_
Attack Landscape
Common attacks targeting game servers
Flowtriq classifies every attack by protocol and vector. Here are the five most common types we see targeting game hosting infrastructure.
UDP Flood
High-volume random UDP packets saturate uplinks. The most common game server attack because game traffic itself is UDP. Flowtriq distinguishes game UDP from flood UDP by port and pattern.
SYN Flood
Spoofed TCP SYN packets exhaust connection tables on the host. Flowtriq detects abnormal SYN rates via kernel connection tracking and flags the flood before the OS runs out of sockets.
Amplification
DNS, NTP, SSDP, and memcached reflectors amplify small queries into massive responses aimed at your server. Flowtriq identifies amplification by protocol ratio and source port patterns.
Application-Layer
Malformed game packets or query floods target the game server process directly. Slower volume but designed to crash the application. Protocol-aware detection catches these at L7.
Carpet Bombing
Traffic is spread across every IP on the subnet to avoid per-IP thresholds. Flowtriq monitors aggregate node traffic, catching carpet bombs that per-IP solutions miss entirely.
Multi-Vector
Sophisticated attackers combine UDP, SYN, and amplification simultaneously. Flowtriq classifies each vector independently and applies the correct mitigation rule for each.
How Flowtriq Responds
From detection to mitigation in under 3 seconds
The FTAgent runs on each game node, reading kernel-level network stats every second. The moment traffic crosses the dynamic threshold, the agent opens an incident, classifies the attack, captures PCAP evidence, and fires alerts across all configured channels.
Auto-mitigation kicks in immediately with a 4-level escalation chain. First, kernel-level firewall rules drop attack traffic on non-game ports while keeping game ports fully open. If the attack exceeds local capacity, Flowtriq escalates to BGP FlowSpec to surgically filter traffic at the network edge. For larger floods, RTBH (Remote Triggered Black Hole) routing diverts the targeted prefix. For attacks that overwhelm your uplink entirely, cloud scrubbing via Cloudflare Magic Transit, OVH VAC, or Hetzner DDoS Protection absorbs the flood upstream.
The entire escalation chain runs without human intervention. Each level is triggered automatically based on attack severity and your configured thresholds.
PPS=241,000 BPS=8.2Gbps
→ Incident opened · UUID: e7b1a4f9
→ Classification · UDP Flood · 97%
→ PCAP started · ring buffer flushed
→ Alerts fired · Discord · PagerDuty
14:22:04.540 AUTO-MITIGATION ACTIVE
→ Rule: drop UDP not in [25565,27015,30120]
→ Rule: block src port 53,123,11211
→ Rule: rate-limit ICMP to 100 PPS
14:22:06.810 SCRUBBING ACTIVATED
→ Upstream notified via API
→ Clean traffic re-routed
Attack mitigated · elapsed: 2.71s
Game servers: ONLINE · 0 players dropped
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Key Features
Built for game hosting infrastructure
Flowtriq was designed for environments where every second of downtime costs you customers. These features matter most for game server hosting.
Per-server monitoring
Deploy the FTAgent on every game node in your fleet. Each server gets its own baseline, its own threshold, and its own incident history. You see exactly which node is under attack, not just which subnet.
Protocol-aware detection
Flowtriq reads TCP, UDP, and ICMP breakdowns from kernel stats every second. It knows the difference between a Minecraft player connecting on port 25565 and a UDP flood hitting random high ports. No false positives during player surges.
Auto-mitigation rules
Define rules that fire the moment an attack is classified. At the node level, drop UDP on non-game ports, block known amplification source ports, and rate-limit ICMP. For larger attacks, Flowtriq automatically escalates to BGP FlowSpec, RTBH, or upstream cloud scrubbing. Game traffic keeps flowing at every escalation tier.
Player-facing status pages
Give server owners visibility into attacks with read-only dashboard access. They see real-time PPS, bandwidth, active incidents, and attack classification without seeing your infrastructure details or other customers' data.
Deployment
Two commands per node. Five minutes total.
The FTAgent installs on any Linux server with a single curl command. No kernel modules, no recompilation, no reboot. It runs as a lightweight systemd service that consumes under 20 MB of RAM and near-zero CPU.
For game hosting fleets, deploy the agent via your existing provisioning system (Ansible, Puppet, or a simple bash script). Each node registers automatically with your workspace and begins reporting within seconds.
Configure game-specific mitigation rules once in the dashboard and they apply to all nodes. Define which UDP ports are game traffic (25565 for Minecraft, 27015 for Source, 30120 for FiveM) and Flowtriq will never touch those ports during mitigation.
Multi-workspace support means you can segment nodes by customer, location, or game title. Each workspace gets its own incident history, alert channels, and team members with role-based access control.
✓ FTAgent v2.4.1 installed
✓ systemd service created
✓ Configuration: /etc/ftagent/config.yaml
$ ftagent register --key YOUR_API_KEY
✓ Node registered: game-node-07
✓ Interface: eth0 (1 Gbps)
✓ Baseline learning: started
✓ Monitoring: ACTIVE
Resource usage:
RAM: 18 MB · CPU: 0.02% · Disk: 4 MB
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Real-World Scenario
Friday night, peak hours, 200 game servers
21:14:02 — Attack Begins
A disgruntled player launches a booter attack against a Minecraft server on node-12. The UDP flood hits 4 Gbps within 2 seconds, targeting random ports on the node's IP address.
21:14:03 — Flowtriq Responds
FTAgent on node-12 detects the PPS spike, classifies it as a UDP flood with 97% confidence, opens an incident, captures PCAP evidence, and fires a Discord alert to the NOC channel. Auto-mitigation drops all UDP traffic except ports 25565 and 19132 (Minecraft Java and Bedrock).
21:14:05 — Attack Mitigated
Attack traffic is being dropped at the kernel level. Game traffic on the Minecraft ports continues to flow normally. The 48 players on the server experience zero interruption. The other 199 servers on the network are unaffected.
21:32:00 — Attack Ends
The booter attack expires after 18 minutes. Flowtriq closes the incident automatically when traffic returns below threshold. The full incident report, including PCAP, attack classification, peak metrics, and timeline, is available in the dashboard. The server owner can see the incident via their read-only access. Zero tickets filed.
Comparison
Game hosting without vs with Flowtriq
Without Flowtriq
- Attacks detected by player complaints, not monitoring
- Entire node goes down, affecting all tenants
- Manual null-route kills the victim and their attackers
- No attack classification or forensic data
- Server owners have zero visibility into what happened
- Churn increases after every major attack
With Flowtriq
- Attacks detected in under 1 second automatically
- Per-node agents isolate which server is targeted
- Auto-mitigation drops attack traffic, keeps game ports open
- Full PCAP evidence and attack classification for every incident
- Server owners see real-time status via read-only access
- Proactive protection becomes a selling point
FAQ
Common questions from game hosting providers
Will Flowtriq add latency to game traffic?
No. The FTAgent monitors passively by reading kernel-level network statistics. It does not sit in the packet path, does not proxy traffic, and does not add any processing to individual packets. Your game traffic flows at full speed with zero additional latency. Mitigation rules operate at the kernel level via standard firewall rules, which add negligible overhead.
Can I protect individual game servers, not just the whole node?
Yes. Deploy one FTAgent per node and it monitors the entire server's traffic. Since most game hosting companies run multiple game server instances per physical or virtual node, each agent gives you per-node visibility. You see exactly which node is targeted and can configure per-node mitigation rules and thresholds.
Does Flowtriq handle UDP amplification attacks?
Yes. Flowtriq's protocol classification identifies amplification attacks by detecting traffic from known reflector source ports (DNS/53, NTP/123, memcached/11211, SSDP/1900) and abnormal protocol ratios. Auto-mitigation rules can block these source ports immediately while keeping legitimate game traffic flowing on game-specific ports.
Can server renters see attack data for their own servers?
Yes. Flowtriq supports a read-only role that gives server owners access to real-time traffic graphs, incident history, and attack classification for their assigned nodes. They see what is happening to their server without accessing your infrastructure, billing, or other customers' data. This transparency reduces support tickets and builds trust.
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