Message from Mick ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- DDOS on the forum The site has been under attack on and off for the last 2 days, which is why you will see it timing out sometimes. I'm getting the police involved now, I believe the guy was stupid enough to leave a trace of his own virgin media IP address. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We think its now sorted so all should be well. Before we blame one of the other sites, it was'nt
A DDOS attack is where a bunch of compromised computers (computers which a person or persons has access to without the PC owner knowing) directs all of it's traffic to a website at the same time therefore overloading it. The website can't handle all the requests at the same time so either works very, very slowly or more often, not at all. To give you an idea of scale Spanish police recently busted the worlds largest 'botnet' (where DDOS attacks come from) and it consisted of over 13 million compromised PC's.
DDOS is when you use, in most cases, "zombie" computers (computers the attackers have taken over with viruses) to connect to the website at the same time. If enough connections are requested at the same time, then you overload the website and it goes offline. its like, for example, a million (or some really high number) users trying to connect similtaneously and the website cant cope with it
A current, up-to-date anti virus software with a built in firewall will do the trick. If you noticed any unusual pc behaviour there is a Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool that can also be used
What I don't understand is why anyone would want to do this? What do they get out of it? This sort of stuff really annoys me. The world has millions of people in poverty and starving, terrible wars and natural disasters, climate change etc. to contend with, and all these people can do, with their no doubt enormous brain power, is attack a football forum!!! If any of you 'clever' buggers are reading this, get off your arses and use your energy and intelligence to address some of the real problems the world faces. You will get more satisfaction from it and the world will be a far better place for all of us.
I got accused of doing it in general chat last night (i didnt do it though), and a proper DDos is what the others have said, but you can get 1 program that will do it all for you, you dont need a botnet anymore, if you have a server with a fast upload, bang you can take a site down. (even if your home connection has a fast upload you can). And DDos is a pain in the arse to stop at server level, you usually just have to let it wind down by itself.
Its great how people jump in accusing anyone who know about computors. What motive would you have Steve, no, I cant think of one either.
As may be, but the police are involved now, so I must ask - Steve, will you still be able to supply stats from the nick, and what %age of SAFC supporters have been banged up this year so far in comparison to the RPI? Cheers mate.
