While new cybersecurity threats emerge all the time, some long-standing basic threats have never gone away. The humble brute-force security attack, the distributed denial of service (DDoS), came back with a vengeance during the COVID crisis. Amazon experienced the largest DDoS attack of all time in February 2020, and there were large attacks on gaming and media sites and servers, as well as an onslaught of ransom-driven DDoS attacks. 

While not classified as a traditional cybersecurity method, an origin shield can help mitigate the effects of both malicious and non-malicious traffic overloads and DDoS attacks. Origin protection can play an important role in the overall security picture without explicitly or exclusively being a security feature. 

An origin shield is a protective measure that shields your origin server(s) from overload, ensuring high availability, performance and uptime. While no one size fits all in terms of how a company should structure their origin shield strategy, an origin shield is always a good idea to reduce the load on your origin server and maintain high-performance content delivery.

Higher-ed was already experimenting heavily in hybrid and completely online learning before Covid-19, with extensive investment in edtech leading development both in terms of curriculum and technology. Online and flexible learning options were already key to universities’ long-term growth strategies.