OK, basically things are a hell of a lot worse than originally thought.
The hacker managed to delete many crucial files and the database. This is bad. Our entire site (and team forums) is stored in that database. The only copy is the one on the server. So, apart from the interface - all the content on the website and posts on the team forums may have been lost. The hard drive is being sent to a specialist to see if the data can be restored - if not, I basically have to start again.
At the moment we can only hope that the data can be restored. But no-body is as pissed off over this as me. I have put months of effort into that website, and it will take me a hell of a long time to get it back to the state it was. Also, I imagine the team will be mighty pissed off that there is a chance all our 1000 or so posts on the team forum could be lost.
Please don't use this as a place to get angry or whatever. I just wanted to let you guys know there is a big chance the website won't be back for quite a while. The actual server is now back up - so I'll be putting up a temporary page soon, once our DNS resolves.
Thanks.
hope everything gets sorted soon man
What about files et all posted up on the site? theyre all gone too ?
they have no tape backup??? there should at least be an old tape of the database from a month ago or something, I mean who runs a huge website network based on databases and doesn't dump them to tape at least weekly?
us?
The hacker was a pro, and from what I understand, managed to delete the backups...
Anyway, I am actually thinking of sacking a database operated website and starting over with a new ultra cool design.
Well whatever you do decide to do, good luck :)
holy crap man....that really sucks...and it makes me wonder who would do that, and why? i just hope the data can be recovered and if not, then rebuilding goes quickly.
Don't worry, we're all still there!!! :)
The progress of the DFMOD is - if at all -
slowed down for a short period,
but in no way stopped.
It is self-evidentially a bad time for The_One
who has done extraordinary work on the website,
and I'm confident he'll do the same great job
with the new pages. :p
You guys already know how sorry I am about all of this...and I really hope this hacker is found and dealt with.
Good luck with trying to get the web site back up to speed...I know The_One will do a great job. I just wish there was something I could do to help you out, but I'm not a 1337 web designer.
Good luck, people. You rock. :cool:
I can't believe that something like that happened. That is insane. Is there any way to protect a website database from that kind of attack? This hacker f***** might show up again.
Good luck, The_One. Your mod team has a lot of potentional, and I am sure that you will bring back things up to normalcy.
Well, I was beginning to wonder what was going on...
...and now I wish I hadn't found out.
That's a total load of nerf waste. But we're still all here, and I know that we're all going to do what it takes to get back to where we were before.
MTFBWY. :stormmask
Yes... this website was very damn good!!
Well, according to this story on mixnmojo, the hacker didn't actually delete anything. It was the incompetant *staff* at the webhost who lost all the data in attempting to make the server hackerproof...
Mojo, what they have done to you: a short story. (
http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=101459)
One of our hosted sites was running the "YABBse" forum script for their site's web board (Why they weren't using LucasForums is beyond me, of course ). The problem with this, is that just a couple of weeks ago an exploit was found in YABBse, that when exploited would allow the user to gain root access to the server. Yes, so some Brazilian ankle-biter Googled around for sites running YABBse, found our server, and made himself a home.
Fortunately, as far as we know, he wasn't malicious. He wasnt interested in altering any of our sites, or deleting our files. He just wanted free space and thought that he could get it somehow just by getting himself root.
This was why the site was up and down for a couple days last week. We were shutting down web services, rebooting and shutting down the server to generally keep him off. That isn't why we're down right now though.
It was finally realized that we'd need to reinstall the operating system on our server with a couple of patches to beef up its security to keep him off for good. At this point things started to go wrong.
The logical way to reinstall an OS on a server, you'd think, would be to back up all of the files, format the drive, do a completely clean install, and then copy the files back over from the backup drive. That sounds logical, right? That way you have a fresh server, and if things go wrong, you have a clean duplicate of the server from before the changes on the backup drive.
Well, the guy who runs our server at the colocation facility had other plans apparently. I don't know exactly what he did, but when he was done with the fixes, the server came back online without significant security fixes, and without a backup drive made. He also told us that in addition to there being no backup, there might be some data loss on the drive, but we're not sure yet. How did this happen? We don't know. Regardless, the hacker got back in within 40 minutes, and we shut the server down again.
At this point we've generally decided that it's time to move to a new location entirely. A totally new server at a totally new facility with a totally new admin. That is why the server has been down for days and days, and why the hard drive is on a plane or in a truck somewhere heading back to ZeroXcape.
I say put the hacker in a room with an interigation droid! That'll teach him. :D
Originally posted by risnuff
I say put the hacker in a room with an interigation droid! That'll teach him. :D
...or a South Park anal probe.
:holosid:
Originally posted by JediStone
...or a South Park anal probe.
:holosid:
Even Better! :D
Originally posted by risnuff
Even Better! :D
i secound that
How long will the new site take to build? Is there any chance of a temporary version being put up until the new one is finished, so that we can still get some updates?
I have good news!
Data recovery has been possible. The data will be transferred to the new server tonight ;) But we are still re-designing the site. Hopefully the new site will be ready in just over a week's time.
All we have to wait for now is our domain to be sorted out, which is taking a little bit longer than I thought (currently, it's still pointing to the old server).
But you can expect everything to return to normal over the next few days. I'll give the team a shout when the team forums are back up :)
<Meh, double post>
Still...
Great news!
I hope you'll get online soon. :)
I can't live without that mod! :D
Do you know something about the hacker? Who made this mess?
good to see yous back up soon
Originally posted by reaper1576
good to see yous back up soon
uhhh... we're not up yet.
What kind of faggy little nerd would hack a mod site? They should have there computer completly destroyed.
Hellfire may I enquire purley out of curioisity how old you are?
Judging by his grammar, spelling and use of the word "gay", I'm guessing he's about the same age as me.
Could you please refrain from the use discriminative remarks on this forum Hellfire. Also, if you bothered to read the explaination provided by jp-30, things would be much clearer.
The site recovery is taking quite a bit longer than expected. I honestly can't tell you when it will be back - just hang in there ;)
*waits and twiddles thumbs in the corner patiently*
Take your time. I'm not going anywhere. ;)
hope you are able to get the site back to the state it was in before
...any update on the staTus of the website?
[edit: fixed the spelling goober...]
Hehe I didn't know you can write German, recombined.
Indeed there are lots of staus (= traffic jams) regarding the web site update.
The new server still not seems to be linked in the DNS entries.
"I know a little German..."
"You do?"
"Yeah... he's sitting right over there."
- Top Secret!, 1984.
:D
Time passes...
So... where do we stand NOW on this issue, since it's been down about a MONTH now???
Should we be exploring other alternatives???
Not having that site up is having an extremely negative impact on the project and the team, and therefore it should be PRIORITY ONE to either get the site back up with the current host, or find another location - free or otherwise.
:holosid:
Darth_Linux & The_One guys if its taking time to get everything back up like team forums ur welcome to share our new ones i just got up in the weekend i can make you your own section till u get all up and running let me know guys on icq or email me think u got my email Darth
finally you made the move reaper! the website looks nice for starters, just not much on it yet. cant wait to see some progress!
I agree with Evan here, not having the site up its having a negative impact. And if theres no subtancial signs of recovery in the next 2 weeks or so I say we make a move to some other place, maybe even go back to the gaming union.
Originally posted by ImmolatedYoda
finally you made the move reaper! the website looks nice for starters, just not much on it yet. cant wait to see some progress!
yeap about 4-5 weeks ago after out site got hacked we got a webmaster a few weeks ago Ackehallgren whos working on the site we lost a lot of stuff when the old site was screwed but once the sites done you should see out new public forums over here
Well, I have been very patient with the admins - earlier this week they said that if the DNS was not sorted out by Friday, they would set us up a temporary location.
They will be holding to this, and as soon as I see an admin online, I will get them to set it up for us...
Looks like the DNS issues have been resolved!!!
Hey, at least we have a splash page!!
Do we have a time estimate for the new content and private forums, The_One?
:holosid:
Originally posted by recombinant
Looks like the DNS issues have been resolved!!!
Hey, at least we have a splash page!!
Do we have a time estimate for the new content and private forums, The_One?
:holosid:
Well, the hard drive is now back in the correct hands. But it will take some time to set it up - as many sites have updated since the HD went down, so it's not a simple case of replacing the data - each site will have to be handled individually.
hey The_One, perhaps you could post a link on the temporary splash page that leads to the forums? so newcomers will know where to go for new in the meantime?
read carefully and you will find...
:p :p ah, sorry Frac, i didnt see that little, tiny bold word that says "here". :)
Originally posted by The_One
Well, the hard drive is now back in the correct hands. But it will take some time to set it up - as many sites have updated since the HD went down, so it's not a simple case of replacing the data - each site will have to be handled individually.
So it sounds like they're attempting to restore the original site files that existed before the crash, is that correct? If so, then yes I can see where it would take time to rebuild that.
However, I'm just wondering if that's what we need at this point.
Might it be better to start from scratch and just move on from here?
Either way, keep us posted. At least we're a bit closer to the finish line now...
:holosid:
Well basically the "site" you see now is not on the "proper" server - it is a temporary setup until they have got everything sorted.
The sites on the "proper" server want all their original material as well as what they have added since - which will take a fair bit of time.
The content from our website was stored in the mySQL database on that hard drive. Foolishly, I hadn't made a back up of it for a long time - so all my HTML content for multiple pages is on that HD - therefore, I need the data off that HD before I can finish our new site.
Also, the team forums database is stored in that database.
One final thing - I am now working full time this Summer (9 till 5 and beyond - 5 days a week). Therefore my time is limited, and you won't see as much of me as usual. Just so you know ;)