<![CDATA[TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link.]]>I shared a link from NPR Tiny Desk but there was no image preview or video embed. After investigating this I learned that when you do that, each instance picks up the link and individually retrieves the link preview nearly simultaneously. For gargantuan sites like YT or Reddit, this is a trivial amount of traffic and not a problem, but for smaller sites like NPR this results in a sort of botnet DDOS attack on the site's servers. More here. Another example here . For that reason, NPR has blocked Fediverse servers like Mastodon.

I have experienced this on my personal server as well (DDOS), but at the time didn't know why, exactly.

This isn't the end of the world, but certainly is not great and hurts engagement with the content. Is there a solution for this? Perhaps using some sort of webtorrent service like PeerTube where they just fetch the information from another fediverse server instead of the source server? Maybe fetching embeds client-side? At least that would stagger the requests.

E: Many people have replied comparing this to the Reddit "hug of death" or "The Slashdot effect". This is not the same at all. Those are legitimate site visits from humans that happen over the course of several hours. This is the result of several thousand servers all automatically fetching the same image simultaneously , and without any human involvement, and potentially next to zero human traffic to the site, which is why I compared it to a botnet or DDOS attack.

]]>https://citiverse.it/topic/ba2560b8-3b4e-478f-bac2-08a94be652cd/til-the-fediverse-basically-ddos-s-sites-when-you-share-a-link.RSS for NodeFri, 23 Oct 2026 09:08:47 GMTTue, 20 Oct 2026 02:10:23 GMT60<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 18:30:10 GMT]]>You're right, neither of them are known for providing thousands and thousands of distributed network connections to the same destination resulting in that same destination server running out of resources. They're clearly not the same thing at all, no, definitely not at all.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.ml/comment/28483664https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.ml/comment/28483664Thu, 22 Oct 2026 18:30:10 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 15:35:57 GMT]]>That’s why I specifically said “both of you” and took no action beyond asking you both nicely to stop. Keep being rude if you really want, but it’ll be a ban.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26467281https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26467281Thu, 22 Oct 2026 15:35:57 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 15:08:51 GMT]]>Having things in common does not make them the same thing. I explained this in the OP.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13411999https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13411999Thu, 22 Oct 2026 15:08:51 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 15:07:54 GMT]]>I'm going to continue being rude to people who are rude to me. Sorry, not sorry.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13411991https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13411991Thu, 22 Oct 2026 15:07:54 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 14:06:03 GMT]]>You're right, it's not like... thousands of network connections are happening to the same site in both cases resulting in resource exhaustion.

Oh, wait...

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.ml/comment/28479511https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.ml/comment/28479511Thu, 22 Oct 2026 14:06:03 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:44:40 GMT]]>Stop with the “you may suffer from” nonsense (both of you). You’re being rude to each other and it’s generating reports.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26465713https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26465713Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:44:40 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 12:09:58 GMT]]>There are ways around that. See my other comment replying to the same parent as your comment.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://slrpnk.net/comment/25007605https://citiverse.it/post/https://slrpnk.net/comment/25007605Thu, 22 Oct 2026 12:09:58 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 05:00:30 GMT]]>What 20 users visiting a site?

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.nz/comment/24251308https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.nz/comment/24251308Thu, 22 Oct 2026 05:00:30 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 03:12:50 GMT]]>Or get the preview on the first user seeing the post in that instance.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26459984https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26459984Thu, 22 Oct 2026 03:12:50 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 02:33:09 GMT]]>Well you can't really trust the original instance to be truthful with its preview.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://sopuli.xyz/comment/26312532https://citiverse.it/post/https://sopuli.xyz/comment/26312532Thu, 22 Oct 2026 02:33:09 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 01:05:13 GMT]]>For the fifth fucking time, this is not the same thing .

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13405670https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13405670Thu, 22 Oct 2026 01:05:13 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Thu, 22 Oct 2026 01:00:22 GMT]]>Heh. Ever heard of the Slashdot effect?

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26458764https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26458764Thu, 22 Oct 2026 01:00:22 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 23:04:21 GMT]]>Its not at all the same thing

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13404494https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13404494Wed, 21 Oct 2026 23:04:21 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 22:36:43 GMT]]>I added a rule in my .htaccess for their user agents to direct all requests to a static page on my domain.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://sh.itjust.works/comment/28050945https://citiverse.it/post/https://sh.itjust.works/comment/28050945Wed, 21 Oct 2026 22:36:43 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 22:27:31 GMT]]>Same thing used to happen with reddit giving sites the hug of death lol

It's unfortunate but kind of expected.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.ml/comment/28469567https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.ml/comment/28469567Wed, 21 Oct 2026 22:27:31 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 18:35:16 GMT]]>For sure there is more users than instances. So the amount of requests would be grater but at least they wouldn't happen at the same time.

But if fediverse ever grow to be as big as other social media, then a single post/link can be viewed by thousands of users at the same time causing the same effect.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26453307https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.world/comment/26453307Wed, 21 Oct 2026 18:35:16 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 18:14:31 GMT]]>Pretty much. The engineering teams ive worked in had maybe one actually good guy, and the rest were awful engineers. I'm not saying I'm super good but I grew up with Linux and networks at home, and was programming from a young age. So im pretty decent. But most engineers had no experience with computers and was in it for the money, obviously.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.today/comment/27310174https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.today/comment/27310174Wed, 21 Oct 2026 18:14:31 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 15:31:39 GMT]]>I think so. I've worked at bad, average and good places, but the bad places tend to be larger and far less efficient, so they have to hire more engineers to make up for the inefficiency.

And they don't necessarily pay well either. They see engineers as powerless cogs who have to do what they're told, so they get paid like that too. And then they complain they can't find seniors.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.zip/comment/29564973https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.zip/comment/29564973Wed, 21 Oct 2026 15:31:39 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:48:33 GMT]]>Why not have the users fetch the previews themselves. The user's browser, that is.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.asudox.dev/comment/5644872https://citiverse.it/post/https://lemmy.asudox.dev/comment/5644872Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:48:33 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:41:37 GMT]]>You may suffer from the dumbs, my friend. My questions were answered. Before you showed up.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13397362https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13397362Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:41:37 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:37:33 GMT]]>You may suffer from irritation of your ego my friend. Know that you are not your ideas or projects, you are more than that. I feel like all of your questions were previously answered sorry.

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://feddit.nu/comment/22532396https://citiverse.it/post/https://feddit.nu/comment/22532396Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:37:33 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 12:08:42 GMT]]>

Lots of normal traffic is instant

Not instant from a thousand different servers. That's what a botnet looks like. AKA DDOS. That's why I explained that. Why are you acting like you don't understand this?

Throttling must be handled by for in this instance NPR

No. It mustn't. AP servers can fix it on their end.

Yes that's why I included a solution

Which you then went on to explain wasn't a solution...?

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13396269https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13396269Wed, 21 Oct 2026 12:08:42 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 11:38:36 GMT]]>Lots of normal traffic is instant. Throttling must be handled by for in this instance NPR or its providers routers because even if hammering is a bad practice, we are participating in why it happens at all if we just build structures to mitigate it.

Yes that's why I included a solution, and explained explicitly that it can be solved but only temporarily

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://feddit.nu/comment/22530898https://citiverse.it/post/https://feddit.nu/comment/22530898Wed, 21 Oct 2026 11:38:36 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to TIL the fediverse basically DDOS's sites when you share a link. on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 11:35:12 GMT]]>Is that normally updated? If so, how often are they polling for changes?

]]>https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13395928https://citiverse.it/post/https://piefed.social/comment/13395928Wed, 21 Oct 2026 11:35:12 GMT