Perhaps I should apologize?

Ever since I was a kid, I have been told to shut up. I’m used to it. What I have enjoyed about blogging is that while people can tell me to shut up, no one can actually shut me up.

Well, on occasion, maybe they can. A strange thing happened on the way to the forum. Maybe I haven’t been blogging as much as I should, but lately I have sounded off about foreign policy (if that is what it is), and so has Dave. I don’t like seeing free speech being stepped on by those who are entrusted to protect it, and ever since the latest September 11 attack (yes, attack) I have seen a concerted, coordinated effort to squelch free speech. That this effort has been directed by the White House is bad enough, but for the press — the free press on which the First Amendment depends — to be assisting an attack on its own freedom, is beyond mind-boggling. I’ve been so amazed that I haven’t even known what to say.

I should emphasize that not knowing what to say after a decade of blogging is… well, saying something.

In addition to that I have been busy with stuff I don’t want to blog about, so blogging has been sparse. This wouldn’t have been a big deal and certainly not worth a blog post but for the inescapable fact that a couple of days ago, stuff started happening. First, the blog got blacklisted as a virus site. About a day later, it just crapped out completely, giving everyone (myself included) a weird error code.

Fortunately, this site is hosted by Host Matters, and in a very short amount of time, they figured out exactly what the problem was (we were hacked and a Trojan was installed), and they have eliminated the threat.

How this happened is anyone’s guess. I’m just glad it’s back up, because no matter what causes the problem I do want to be able to enjoy my First Amendment rights, at least here.

I don’t know and may never know whether this was just your basic spammer trying to hijack the blog to make money or a malicious attack. If its the former, well, life goes on as usual. If it’s the latter, well, if I have been saying things that have offended anyone enough to try to take out this blog, then I feel obligated to apologize — for not having done enough to offend such totalitarian swine earlier.

I’ve been too busy, OK?

UPDATE: This site is virus and malware free, but AVG (which relies on user reports and not actual status) continues to blacklist it because it was reported to be infected.


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13 responses to “Perhaps I should apologize?”

  1. M. Simon Avatar

    I look forward to the time when the busy season is over and we can get back to business. Things are going well. Faster than I expected actually on some fronts. Others are stalled.

  2. Bobnormal Avatar
    Bobnormal

    Eric, it’s happening again, your Website is blocked by My AVG anti virus, calling your site a Blackhole exploit.
    when I refresh I got through, might want to look into this,
    Bob

  3. Eric Avatar

    Bob, thanks for letting me know about that. It is no longer blocked by most of the search engines, but Opera (via AVG) persists in blacklisting. I contacted AVG to let them know the problem was corrected, so we will see….

  4. Eric Avatar

    It has been repaired, but here’s the problem.

    http://www.websitedefender.com/what-is-malware/

    ***END QUOTE***
    If your website gets infected the damage can be devastating. Your website can be restored, but the trust of your users and customers can easily be destroyed. Furthermore, if you are discovered serving malware your site will be blacklisted in hundreds of blacklists worldwide. Removing yourself from these blacklists is a very lenghty and difficult task, so even after you have cleaned the virus, the damage will continue to linger for a long time.

    […]

    Worms, zombies and distributed denial of service attacks are a good way to inflict mass damage on a global scale and are therefore very appealing to cyber-activists. These people want to get a message across and are ready to do so by utilizing any means necessary and this includes writing malware that causes damage, gets them noticed, and enables them to announce their messages and beliefs to a large audience.

    Governments are also part of the game.
    ***END QUOTE***

  5. Eric Avatar

    BTW, AVG does not rely on current status, but user reports:

    http://wordpress.org/support/topic/blackhole-exploit-kit-how-to-remove-it

    ***QUOTE***

    AVG Online Scanner relies on historical user reports, so, it’s diagnostics won’t change for at least a few days after disinfection.

    ***END QUOTE***

    So if you can hack in and damage the blog with malware, the damage will last longer than the malware.

  6. Frank Avatar
    Frank

    Eric, it’s noon West Coast time, and Norton just blocked your index page. I entered through Foxfire history. The notice said: MASS INJECTION Malware Blockhole etc…

  7. Bobnormal Avatar
    Bobnormal

    Eric, I just started a fresh Firefox 14 session, and your page loaded fine ,Yea:)
    Bob

  8. Frank Avatar
    Frank

    Two hours later now, and index page loads OK.

  9. Kathy Kinsley Avatar
    Kathy Kinsley

    And I’m getting “Parse error: syntax error, unexpected T_ENDWHILE in /home/escheie/public_html/wp/wp-content/themes/classicalvalues/index.php on line 12”

    on your main page. Like Frank, I sneaked in through history–and then I hit your archives (which don’t have the error). But I suspect you might still be under attack.

  10. Eric Avatar

    The folks at HostMatters are working on it and they are great. I’m told that the attacks are ongoing.

  11. Another Anon Avatar
    Another Anon

    The fun fact about web-based attacks is that, because everything is so inter-connected, you don’t have to be at fault for your site to be attacked. You have an ad-rotator? *BAM* They get hit, you get hit. Not you *you* and your site, but that little widget that goes to AD.COM and pulls the bit of javascript to handle ad metrics. Your web server can be fine, but the end user gets hit by the drive-by attack.

  12. Kathy Kinsley Avatar
    Kathy Kinsley

    Yeah – what Another Anon said – though I don’t think that’s YOUR problem. (We’ve had it.)

    I think your problem is another – and may not even be related to content. It’s this… once a script kiddie gets in, he tells ALL his buds. And they all try to get in. And then you are under attack.

    Tell Annette, or Stacy – or whoever – to look for 2 or 3 – maybe 4 – digit nonsense.php (like dh.php or xyz.php) files. And if they find them, delete them (dunno why, but the script kiddies we’ve been hit by have never gone past 4…). And after they’ve gone, tell every last one of your posters to change their passwords – and change yours. It’s easier than you think to get your computer hacked.

    And ask HM to run an htaccess in any upload directories to either deny access to php files from outside or to turn php/pl/cgi etc. files to text (either works)

    We got zapped—and I do mean zapped–on one site because we had not considered the possibility that our client was compromised – and she was – not because she was hacked but because she gave out her pass to everyone offering to “help” her. She no longer has access to her site – we’re updating it now. Any rate, that gave them HER pass, and her upload directory access. And they uploaded php files into her upload directory – those php files then had access to write anywhere on her site and BOOM – BLACKLIST … sigh.

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