Calculating Your Organization's Risk Exposure

Accurate risk assessment requires analyzing your specific business model and attack exposure. Start by calculating hourly revenue across different business functions. Include direct sales, subscription fees, advertising revenue, and transaction commissions. Factor seasonal variations and peak period impacts.

Estimate operational costs using your staffing models and infrastructure expenses. Calculate overtime rates for technical staff and typical consultant fees. Review cloud scaling costs and bandwidth pricing. Include vendor rate cards for emergency services. Build comprehensive cost models for different attack scenarios.

Project customer impact based on your retention rates and acquisition costs. Analyze historical churn following service issues. Calculate customer lifetime values across segments. Estimate reputation recovery costs through marketing and public relations. Include competitive impact in market share projections.

Develop scenarios ranging from minor incidents to catastrophic attacks. Model costs for different attack durations and business impacts. Include probability assessments based on industry targeting patterns. Create expected value calculations weighing probability against potential impact. Use results to justify security investments and insurance coverage.

Understanding true DDoS costs enables informed security decisions. Organizations often discover that comprehensive protection costs far less than potential losses from successful attacks. The next chapter explores specific DDoS protection options for small businesses operating with limited budgets and resources.## DDoS Protection for Small Business on a Budget

Small businesses face unique challenges in defending against DDoS attacks. Limited budgets, scarce technical resources, and lack of dedicated security staff create vulnerabilities that attackers readily exploit. However, effective DDoS protection doesn't require enterprise-level investments. This chapter provides practical, affordable strategies that small businesses can implement to significantly improve their DDoS resilience without breaking the bank.