Recovering from a hack attack

Alex Pepple · #1 05-02-2003, 01:08 AM

Dear Eratosphereans,

Early Wednesday evening, Able Muse/Eratosphere servers were hacked by criminal elements yet to be determined. This was the result of a trojan horse exploit that had been latent for some time and then attemtped to exert its full destructive force just now. The long and short of it was the network service provides pulled the Able Muse server offline & demanded a restore of the server software. Why all of this took this long was that automated tools that would have expedited recovery became useless in this case and I had to do it all manually. What's more, I also upgraded to a newer version of the server software which was incompatible with the previous release & it took more time to figure out what's where & then reload everything manually from backups.

I'm pleased to say that I've been able to restore everything to their normal state of operation. However, drop me a note if you notice any gremlins I might have overlooked. I'm still working on the server to enhance the security wherever possible, plus investigating the source of the attack.

Thank you all for your patience when everything seemed so unsure.

Cheers,
...Alex

Alex Pepple · #2 05-02-2003, 02:05 AM

One major problem has already been reported - Private Message is not working yet. I'm looking into it now - Thanks! ...Alex

Alex Pepple · #3 05-02-2003, 02:34 AM

PM should be fine now ... & hopefully, this is the last time I reply to my own post!

...Alex

Clive Watkins · #4 05-02-2003, 03:21 AM

Dear Alex

Thanks for the hard work you put in restoring the site.

Regards

Clive

Alex Pepple · #5 05-02-2003, 03:31 AM

Thanks Clive! - I believe everything should now be working as before, & there should no posting or data lost. Still, everyone, report any & all problems you come across.

Cheers,
...Alex

Terese Coe · #6 05-02-2003, 04:27 AM

Seems to be working A-OK, Alex! Whew. Thanks so much for your endless travails~~

Terese

Carol Taylor · #7 05-02-2003, 06:04 AM

Alex, thanks again for your long hours of work and vigilance keeping us going. What a shame that people with the talent to destroy other people's work can't use that talent to produce something good of their own.

Carol

Deborah Warren · #8 05-02-2003, 05:12 PM

Alex, we're (as alwayss) indebted to you. It can't be easy to have to put in unexpected hours dealing with something like this.

kday1 · #9 05-02-2003, 05:18 PM

Alex, so sorry to hear that--I knew something was wrong, because I couldn't get on the site with a dsl or my internet connect.

A few months back, I lived through a very nasty attack, and the work to fix it was incredible.

So thanks for all you do!

Alex Pepple · #10 05-05-2003, 06:55 AM

Thanks everyone for the support & kind words! The major items have now been taken care of. There are still several little details to work on ... And, yes, you're right Kay - it's an insane amount of work. Thus far, the perpetrator(s) have covered their tracks quite well.

Cheers,
...Alex