Seven Days of Continuous Scans and Probes Target a Public Web Server – Malware Traffic Analysis
What Happened — Over a seven‑day period in October 2026, the author of Malware‑Traffic‑Analysis.net observed relentless scanning activity directed at their publicly‑exposed web server. The traffic, captured in a 14 MB PCAP (available as a password‑protected ZIP), shows a variety of automated probes: TCP SYN sweeps across common ports, HTTP GET requests for known vulnerable paths, attempts to retrieve server banners, and malformed packets designed to trigger error handling. The scans originate from multiple IP ranges, suggesting a distributed scanning botnet. No successful compromise was reported, but the volume and persistence of the traffic illustrate how attackers continuously map and test internet‑facing assets.
Why It Matters for Trust & Control Assurance — The episode underscores the control objective of continuous network monitoring and log retention, a detection requirement that maps to many frameworks (e.g., NIST CSF 2.0).
Who Is Affected — Any organization that runs public‑facing web services – SaaS providers, e‑commerce sites, cloud‑hosted applications, and small‑to‑medium enterprises.
Recommended Actions
- Deploy centralized log aggregation (e.g., SIEM) and retain raw network captures for at least 90 days.
- Enable IDS/IPS signatures that flag high‑frequency scans and known exploit probes.
- Conduct regular baseline traffic profiling to spot anomalies quickly.
- Map observed scanning patterns to your detection controls in the framework of record.
Technical Notes — The PCAP reveals:
- TCP SYN scans on ports 80, 443, 22, 3306, 8080.
- HTTP requests for
/admin,/phpmyadmin,/wp-login.php, and other common admin endpoints. - Use of malformed HTTP headers and fragmented packets to evade simple rule sets.
- No payloads beyond the probes; the zip file containing the PCAP is password‑protected (password disclosed on the site’s “about” page).
Source: Malware‑Traffic‑Analysis.net – Seven Days of Scans and Probes