Tom Emmons is a data enthusiast who leads a team focused on machine learning and automation at Akamai. His areas of security expertise are in DDoS and application security. In our 2020 DDoS retrospective, we highlighted the twists and turns of a very, very active threat landscape. As a quick refresher, we mitigated some of the largest attacks ever seen ( 1.44 Tbps  and  809 Mpps ); saw more attacks on customers across more diverse industries than ever before; and observed the largest DDoS extortion campaign, which impacted thousands of companies globally. So, it came as no surprise when 2021 threat actors continued to double down on DDoS.  \r\n Let's look at several key trending observations:  \r\n Attackers pick up the pace and raise the bar.  In 2021 alone, we've already seen more attacks over 50 Gbps (as of 03/24/2021) than we saw in all of 2019.…