Hello to all the Guests! - Page 4

Elf Girl · 07-03-2003, 06:11 PM

I won't be here for the 6th. Tell me if anything happens, ok?

Elf Girl · 07-03-2003, 06:20 PM

Hey... it says some of them are reporting posts. Admins, have you gotten post reports? And it says they're registering, except there aren't any new members.

jerseydevil · 07-03-2003, 06:27 PM

This possibly supports my theory that these numerous guests may be hacker bots....

Quote:

...Homeland Security, notified companies that it received "credible information" about the planned attacks and already has detected surveillance probes by hackers looking for weaknesses in corporate and government networks....

New York Office of Cyber-Security and Critical Infrastructure Coordination warned Internet providers and other organizations that the goal of the hackers was to vandalize 6,000 Web sites in six hours.

...monitoring underground chat rooms and other Internet activity detected a drop in the numbers of vandalized Web sites recently and an increase in the types of surveillance scans that typically precede computer break-ins.

"It's kind of a sand-bagging period," said Rouland, who predicted that hackers were quietly breaking into computers and waiting to vandalize them on Sunday....

If the goal is to vandalise websites - there is almost no better way to bring down a message board than to have a program that creates garbage threads, posts, users, etc. In order to do that - they need to know what the weaknesses are with the messageboard. They need to know how to get around any security. They need to test and poke around. This is my concern with the number of guests that have miraculously popped up last night.

Static page websites are just vandilised by replacing the pages with new pages, or with redirecting the site to somewhere else.

Coney · 07-03-2003, 06:29 PM

http://www.inktomi.com/slurp.html

They gather statistics for a search engine.

jerseydevil · 07-03-2003, 06:47 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Coney
http://www.inktomi.com/slurp.html

They gather statistics for a search engine.

Search bots don't gather statitstics - they index the site. But I haven't seen a bot run like this before. There are thousands of bots out there that do this - and there have never been so many guests registered on entmoot. A bot which creates 50 users is not very well behaved in my opinion. I've had tons of bots index my sites and they generally only hit it a couple of times, move on and then come back. This seems to be very persistent.

Also - the IP only tells where the user is coming from - not that that is actually who is accessing the site. A hacker would hide their ultimate location by hacking into one computer - in order to use their IP address to hack into another. I did try calling Inktomi to find out if this could be their search bot doing this - but all the lines are busy.

Elf Girl · 07-03-2003, 06:59 PM

*worried* What would they be trying to accomplish? Will anything happen to the board in the long run if they are succesful? Should I save all the content from my favorite threads?

Coney · 07-03-2003, 07:01 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by jerseydevil
Search bots don't gather statitstics - they index the site. But I haven't seen a bot run like this before. There are thousands of bots out there that do this - and there have never been so many guests registered on entmoot. A bot which creates 50 users is not very well behaved in my opinion. I've had tons of bots index my sites and they generally only hit it a couple of times, move on and then come back. This seems to be very persistent.

Also - the IP only tells where the user is coming from - not that that is actually who is accessing the site. A hacker would hide their ultimate location by hacking into one computer - in order to use their IP address to hack into another. I did try calling Inktomi to find out if this could be their search bot doing this - but all the lines are busy.

Then inktomi must be hacking the site then.........first hack attempt that I've witnessed that takes 12+ hours

Disconnect your lines folks...........hack attack is a'coming

Elf Girl · 07-03-2003, 07:04 PM

Don't you spoil the first Moot adventure since April first! This is fun! *copies all the data on Entmoot into hard drive*

jerseydevil · 07-03-2003, 07:05 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Elf Girl
*worried* What would they be trying to accomplish? Will anything happen to the board in the long run if they are succesful? Should I save all the content from my favorite threads?

The board is backed up nightly. Unless hackers got to the backups or something happened to them - entmoot would be able to be restored. There would be some lost posts or threads that got posted after the backup, but it wouldn't be too bad.

Also - hopefully if anything were to happen the hosting company would be monitoring net activity. If they noticed anything unusual on Sunday - they should pull the plug on the server and have some plan of attack against any hackers.

Being prepared is one of the reasons why the lights didn't go out in 2000. It wasn't because it was a false alarm - it was because computer programmers and system managers worked their butts off to make sure everything went smoothly and nothing catastrophic happened.

jerseydevil · 07-03-2003, 07:09 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Coney
Then inktomi must be hacking the site then.........first hack attempt that I've witnessed that takes 12+ hours

Disconnect your lines folks...........hack attack is a'coming

I didn't say they're hacking. But a search bot does NOT spend 12 hours on a site. Also - search bots don't go over and over the same pages like this one seems to be duing - unless there is an error in it's program.

I also never said that what IS going on right now is a hack attack. Khamul and I were aware of it last night and looking into it. It may or may not be a hacking attampt - or preparation for a hacking attempt. But it something that is very unusual - especially the timing of it.

Elf Girl · 07-03-2003, 07:10 PM

But how would they hack into inktomi? It must be pretty well protected, yes?

jerseydevil · 07-03-2003, 07:14 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Elf Girl
But how would they hack into inktomi? It must be pretty well protected, yes?

Microsoft has been hacked into tons of times, NASA has, other major companies and government agencies. For every defense - there is always a way to get around it.

Coney · 07-03-2003, 07:15 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by jerseydevil
I didn't say they're hacking. But a search bot does NOT spend 12 hours on a site. Also - search bots don't go over and over the same pages like this one seems to be duing - unless there is an error in it's program.

I also never said that what IS going on right now is a hack attack. Khamul and I were aware of it last night and looking into it. It may or may not be a hacking attampt - or preparation for a hacking attempt. But it something that is very unusual - especially the timing of it.

*shrugs* So maybe they-who-must-be-obeyed should do something about it then

*content behind his proxy server

*

Elf Girl · 07-03-2003, 07:16 PM

Ah. *enjoys paranoia* AAAAH! *leads Mooters to crude shelter and copies every thread*

Coney · 07-03-2003, 07:19 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Elf Girl
Ah. *enjoys paranoia* AAAAH! *leads Mooters to crude shelter and copies every thread*

Ach, we should be alright..........I'm sure Ben has a mirror site somewhere

(at least I hope he has

)

jerseydevil · 07-03-2003, 07:23 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Coney
Ach, we should be alright..........I'm sure Ben has a mirror site somewhere (at least I hope he has )

There is no mirror site - it just gets backed up nightly. He doesn't have a commericial site so I doubt Ben would want to go through the expense of having a mirror site.

Entmoot crashed a couple of months ago - all that had to be done was the hosting company restored entmoot from the backups.

Coney · 07-03-2003, 07:32 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by jerseydevil
There is no mirror site - it just gets backed up nightly. He doesn't have a commericial site so I doubt Ben would want to go through the expense of having a mirror site.

Entmoot crashed a couple of months ago - all that had to be done was the hosting company restored entmoot from the backups.

Backups?? How many copies does V5hosting keep? (might have to keep them in mind if they keep more'n 1

)

EDIT: Off the top of me head (and being too lazy to look it up) can't remember if the host was V5 or F5........mebbe one of they-who-must-be-obeyed can let me know?

)

jerseydevil · 07-03-2003, 08:05 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Coney
Backups?? How many copies does V5hosting keep? (might have to keep them in mind if they keep more'n 1 )

Just one copy probably. If nothing happens where they have to use that days backup - it just gets overwritten with the next days. A rotating backup scheme is the best though.

Elf Girl · 07-03-2003, 08:23 PM

The guests are gone. Does that mean hacking is imminent?

Sheeana · 07-04-2003, 12:36 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by jerseydevil
Microsoft has been hacked into tons of times....

Well, of course it's been hacked into a bunch of times... It's useless! *contented mac user*

07-03-2003, 06:11 PM	#61
Elf Girl Lurker Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Lothlórien Posts: 3,419	I won't be here for the 6th. Tell me if anything happens, ok? __________________ There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium...

07-03-2003, 06:20 PM	#62
Elf Girl Lurker Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Lothlórien Posts: 3,419	Hey... it says some of them are reporting posts. Admins, have you gotten post reports? And it says they're registering, except there aren't any new members. __________________ There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium...

07-03-2003, 06:29 PM	#64
Coney The Buddy Rabbit Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Trapped in the headlights.. Posts: 3,372	http://www.inktomi.com/slurp.html They gather statistics for a search engine. __________________ Blessed are the cracked, they let the light in Beatallica

07-03-2003, 06:59 PM	#66
Elf Girl Lurker Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Lothlórien Posts: 3,419	worried What would they be trying to accomplish? Will anything happen to the board in the long run if they are succesful? Should I save all the content from my favorite threads? __________________ There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium...

07-03-2003, 07:04 PM	#68
Elf Girl Lurker Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Lothlórien Posts: 3,419	Don't you spoil the first Moot adventure since April first! This is fun! copies all the data on Entmoot into hard drive __________________ There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium...

07-03-2003, 07:10 PM	#71
Elf Girl Lurker Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Lothlórien Posts: 3,419	But how would they hack into inktomi? It must be pretty well protected, yes? __________________ There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium...

07-03-2003, 07:16 PM	#74
Elf Girl Lurker Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Lothlórien Posts: 3,419	Ah. enjoys paranoia AAAAH! leads Mooters to crude shelter and copies every thread __________________ There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium...

07-03-2003, 08:23 PM	#79
Elf Girl Lurker Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Lothlórien Posts: 3,419	The guests are gone. Does that mean hacking is imminent? __________________ There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium...

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