This topic describes how to use the intelligent protection feature provided by Anti-DDoS
Pro and Anti-DDoS Premium to protect website services. The intelligent protection
feature is developed based on the big data technologies of Alibaba Cloud. The feature
automatically learns traffic patterns and uses algorithms to analyze attacks. Then,
the feature apply accurate access control rules to adjust protection modes and to
detect and block attacks at the earliest opportunity. The attacks include malicious
bots and HTTP flood attacks.
Prerequisites
- A website is added to Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium. For more information, see
Add a website.
- Mitigation settings are enabled in the latest version of Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS
Premium.
Background information
After you add your website to Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium, the intelligent
protection feature is enabled by default. The intelligent protection engine automatically
learns traffic patterns and protects the website against web attacks by using accurate
access control rules.
Configure a policy for the intelligent protection feature
- Log on to the Anti-DDoS Pro console.
- In the top navigation bar, select the region where your instance resides.
- Anti-DDoS Pro: If your instance is an Anti-DDoS Pro instance, select Chinese Mainland.
- Anti-DDoS Premium: If your instance is an Anti-DDoS Premium instance, select Outside Chinese Mainland.
You can switch the region to configure and manage Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium
instances. Make sure that you select the required region when you use Anti-DDoS Pro
or Anti-DDoS Premium.
- In the left-side navigation pane, choose .
- On the General Policies page, click the Protection for Website Services tab. On the tab that appears, select a specific domain name from the list in the
left side.
- In the Intelligent Protection section, click Modify.

- In the Intelligent Protection dialog box, configure Mode and Level, and turn on Status.
- Mode: Set this parameter to Warning or Defense.
This feature supports the following protection modes:
- Warning: In this mode, when Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium detects malicious requests,
Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium records the attacks but does not block the requests.
You can use this mode to learn how the feature safeguards your website.
You can use this mode and the Log Analysis feature to query warnings recorded by the
feature and verify the protection capabilities of the feature. For more information,
see View attack warning logs.
- Defense: In this mode, when Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium detects malicious requests,
Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium applies accurate access control rules to block
the malicious requests.
Note The feature uses accurate access control rules to trigger actions. To make sure that
the feature works as expected, you must enable Accurate Access Control. For more information,
see
Configure accurate access control rules.
We recommend that you use the Warning mode and the Log Analysis feature to analyze
the attack logs. For this policy to take effect, enable the Defense mode only when
the feature works as expected.
- Level: Set this parameter to Low, Normal, or Strict.

If you enable the feature, you can select a value for Level based on your business
requirements. The following table describes the protection levels provided by the
feature.
Level |
Effect |
Scenario |
Low |
Blocks specific attacks and allows normal requests. |
Large websites that have high processing capabilities, and specific scenarios such
as sales promotions
|
Normal (recommended)
|
Does not process requests in most cases. When Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium detects
traffic that poses a threat to the protected website, Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium
protects the website and minimizes the negative impacts on the website.
|
Scenarios in which the number of requests does not greatly fluctuate and the servers
have additional resources other than managing normal network traffic
|
Strict |
Strictly and intelligently blocks attacks. However, normal requests may also be blocked.
|
Websites that do not have sufficient processing or protection capabilities |
After the feature is enabled, Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium automatically generates
accurate access control rules when Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium detects malicious
attacks. You can view the rules in the Accurate Access Control section.
View accurate access control rules
- Log on to the Anti-DDoS Pro console.
- In the top navigation bar, select the region where your instance resides.
- Anti-DDoS Pro: If your instance is an Anti-DDoS Pro instance, select Chinese Mainland.
- Anti-DDoS Premium: If your instance is an Anti-DDoS Premium instance, select Outside Chinese Mainland.
You can switch the region to configure and manage Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium
instances. Make sure that you select the required region when you use Anti-DDoS Pro
or Anti-DDoS Premium.
- In the left-side navigation pane, choose .
- On the General Policies page, click the Protection for Website Services tab. Select the required domain name from the list on the left side.
- In the Accurate Access Control section, click Change Settings.

- On the Accurate Access Control page, view the rules that start with smartcc_.
Accurate access control rules created by Intelligent Protection start with smartcc_.
Compared with custom accurate access control rules, the accurate access control rules
created by the feature have the following characteristics:
- The action of a rule may be warning. In Warning mode, the action specified in an accurate
access control rule that is created by the feature is warning. In this case, Anti-DDoS
Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium records attacks but does not block attacks.
- Each rule has a validity period. After a rule expires, the rule becomes invalid and
is automatically deleted.
- Rules cannot be manually deleted. If you disable the feature, rules created by the
feature are immediately deleted.
View attack warning logs
After the feature is enabled for your website, the Log Analysis feature records detected
attacks that trigger the accurate access control rules. You can query the attack warning
logs that are associated with the accurate access control rules on the Log Analysis
page. This allows you to check the performance levels of the feature.
Prerequisites
- The Log Analysis feature is enabled for your website. For more information, see Overview.
- The intelligent protection feature is enabled for your website and is set to the Warning
mode.
Queries
Log on to the Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium console and choose . On the page that appears, select a domain name and enter the following query statement
to view the attack warning logs related to the intelligent protection feature:
Note Replace aliyundoc.com
with the actual domain name of your website.
matched_host:"aliyundoc.com" and cc_action:alarm
Modify the policy for the intelligent protection feature
In the following business scenarios, we recommend that you modify the policy for the
intelligent protection feature. This helps the feature learn traffic patterns to prevent
false positives.
Scenario |
Optimization method |
Before you add your website to Anti-DDoS Pro or Anti-DDoS Premium, your website is
configured with common throttling policies, or a large number of clients frequently
reconnect to your website at the same time. Even if your website service is running
normally, a large number of 4xx or 5xx HTTP status codes are returned.
|
- On the Protection for Website Services tab, click Modify in the Intelligent Protection section.
- In the Intelligent Protection dialog box, set Mode to Warning.
- After three days, set Mode to Defense.
|
You want to launch a promotion event or stress test on your website, but the origin
server of the website returns a large number of 4xx or 5xx HTTP status codes.
|
- In the left-side navigation pane, choose . On the page that appears, click Create Policy in the upper-left corner.
- In the Create Policy dialog box, configure Policy Name and Validity Period and click Confirm.
- Find the created policy in the policy list and click Configure Policy in the Actions column.
- In the panel that appears, select websites or IP addresses that you want to protect.
|