Word.ws English Dictionary

smurf attack

smurf attack noun: a largely obsolete form of denial-of-service attack, involving broadcasting ICMP packets with the intended victim's IP address to a large computer network, causing the victim's computer to be overwhelmed by the response packets from the network.

Noun

smurf attack (plural smurf attacks)

  1. (computer security) A largely obsolete form of denial-of-service attack, involving broadcasting ICMP packets with the intended victim's IP address to a large computer network, causing the victim's computer to be overwhelmed by the response packets from the network.

Forms of smurf attack

pluralsmurf attacks

Origin of smurf attack

In reference to the Smurf cartoon characters, suggesting a large number of small attackers overwhelming a larger opponent.

Questions about smurf attack

What does smurf attack mean?
Smurf attack means a largely obsolete form of denial-of-service attack, involving broadcasting ICMP packets with the intended victim's IP address to a large computer network, causing the victim's computer to be overwhelmed by the response packets from the network.
What part of speech is smurf attack?
Smurf attack is a noun.
What is the plural of smurf attack?
The plural of smurf attack is smurf attacks.

Words near smurf attack in the dictionary

  1. smuons
  2. smur
  3. smurf
  4. smurf account
  5. smurf accounts
  6. smurf attack
  7. smurf attacks
  8. Smurf tube
  9. Smurf turf
  10. smurfable
  11. smurfed

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: smurf attack (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “smurf attack.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/smurf_attack. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.