Look out Look out theres a hacker about

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donrecardo

Senior Member
I recieved an email from the forum this morning saying ....

Dear donrecardo,

Your account on PICAXE Forum has been locked because someone has tried to log into the account with the wrong password more than 5 times. You will be able to attempt to log in again in another 15 minutes.

The person trying to log into your account had the following IP address: 192.251.226.205

I went to that address and found ....

This router is part of the Tor Anonymity Network, which is dedicated to providing privacy to people who need it most: average computer users.

They forgot to add not only average computer users but also people trying to hide whilst using your details !!! If you are up to nothing naughty why do you need to be anonymous ?

Perhaps the admin could consider banning IP address: 192.251.226.205


Don
 
D

Dippy

Moderator
It would be nice if pre-emptive bans were available - maybe they are?
But it doesn't stop every Tom Dick or Herman trying to log in.
If this was Startrek a reverse nano virus could be sent to their computer(s).

There is certainly quite a lot coming from that source.
http://www.projecthoneypot.org/ip_192.251.226.205

Anyway, we can do whois and whereis and post links like this all day... and probably will ;)
Hopefully, he/she/it will give in.
I'll probably get a similar email!
 
hippy

hippy

Ex-Staff (retired)
We'll keep an eye on things and look at what options we have for preventing or limiting such attacks.

In the meantime we suggest making sure you have a password which is not easy to guess by looking at your name or details in your profile nor easy to determine through dictionary or brute force attack.

Use a reasonably long password with a mix of numbers and letters. Don't re-use passwords or near identical passwords for other services. Change passwords on a regular basis.
 
A

Andrew Cowan

Senior Member
My advice for complex passwords is to use the first letter of each word of a phrase, then replace some letters with numbers. Eg:

t1mpftpf

Meaning: This Is My Password For The Picaxe Forum

(By the way, that's not it :D).

Andrew
 
M

Minifig666

Senior Member
My main pondering is why would anyone try to attack our poor little forum, especially your account? I can understand someone trying to get at a moderator's or possibly a senior members account. (You're only one post off mind)
Do you have some e-enemies that would try to attack you?
I am imagining a kid with a picaxe using it to generate passwords.

While were on a similar topic, I've had a number of mystery people try to 'add me as a friend' on my email account. From a quick google it would appear they are Australian. The only Aussies who I know are aware of my e-presence are on the forum. Is anyone guilty?
 
S

SAborn

Senior Member
Not me, i dont have any friends :eek:

I have to wonder what satafaction these spammers get from hours of useless work.

On a different forum i spend an hour or more a day filtering these idiots out.
There is several countrys that appear to have lots of these idiots, and when i see a new member from one of these countrys without a posting i just delete them from the forum.

So should anyone register with our (different forum) and you get deleted as a member than try again and post a message so we know who you are.

I would block the countrys but there is some great people out there as well.

I HATE SPAMMERS !!!!!!!
 
hippy

hippy

Ex-Staff (retired)
Minifig666 said:
My main pondering is why would anyone try to attack our poor little forum, especially your account?
Click to expand...
Most cases it's drive-by-spammers who want to place links to the scams and wares they are punting and don't particularly care how or where that's done so every forum and user is a potential target. I wouldn't suspect a specifically targeted attack unless there were more evidence to support that.
 
J

John O

Senior Member
hippy said:
Most cases it's drive-by-spammers who want to place links to the scams and wares they are punting and don't particularly care how or where that's done so every forum and user is a potential target. I wouldn't suspect a specifically targeted attack unless there were more evidence to support that.
Click to expand...
I think that's absolutely right. Even my humble forum gets its share of nutters with nothing better to do.

I can't think why they'd bother trying to hack someone else's account though when it's just as easy to set up one of their own with a throw-away email address.

John.
 
D

Dippy

Moderator
Exactly my thoughts too John.

Probably just quick opportunistic attempt.
Maybe he's got an uncle called don and it just caught his/her eye.:rolleyes:

All the Spammers from China have gone quiet. We had a quite a few a year or two ago. It's as though someone has put up a great wall.:)

Why don't we start a special Spammers Forum and then they can annoy (and bore) the crap out of each other. Tedious bunch of t0ssers.
 
B

BrendanP

Senior Member
I got the same message this morning guys.

"....The person trying to log into your account had the following IP address: 174.132.178.37..."
 
N

NXTreme

Senior Member
Same here...

Well, I've been "tried" as well. Got a message just a short while ago, IP is "174.132.178.37", same as Brendan here. "Watch out, hacker about" indeed!
 
D

Dippy

Moderator
Blimey fritz , you must have too much spare time.
If so, I'm having a little problem with dsPIC vectors, maybe you can do it for me so I can have a prolonged Google :)
 
Technical

Technical

Technical Support
Staff member
Unfortunately this is a problem that all forums around the world suffer from.

There are huge banks of computers setup as forum breakers/spammers. Their main intention is to post pornographic links and images on any old forum they find.

We run quite a tight ship here that now stops most of this activity. It does make the process for new users to register slightly harder, but is necessary to preserve the forum integrity.

As the robots cannot easily join this forum as a new user, they try another way - looking for existing usernames in old forum posts and just trying them one by one with the hope of finding someone who has
a) used their username as their password
b) or used a common password such as 'password' or 'elephant'

After 5 goes they are banned and try someone else. So as long as your password is unique and sensible you should be fine. We can (and have) banned IP addresses, but unfortunately this doesn't help much as IP addresses of the robots constantly change.
 
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M

moxhamj

New Member
Thanks Technical. I suspect they are going to just work through the list. I've been tried as well 174.132.178.37

Thanks++ to our original poster donrecardo for bringing this to everyone's attention!
 
W

westaust55

Moderator
Dippy said:
Blimey fritz , you must have too much spare time.
If so, I'm having a little problem with dsPIC vectors, maybe you can do it for me so I can have a prolonged Google :)
Click to expand...
Likely not.
Could be Fritz has been watching the TV a lot as the Great Wall vehicles have had numerous ads in the media here down under in recent times .
 
G

gengis

New Member
I haven't had the already logged in message but hit the incorrectly entered PW message a couple of times.

Brute force attack? The hacker's software will just methodically keep pounding away until it has all the passwords.
 
slimplynth

slimplynth

Senior Member
Hello Filthy Hacker - my password = 0p1a2s3s4w5o6r7d8

(just thought I'd chum the water)



Y'all know me. Know how I earn a livin'. I'll catch this bird for you, but it ain't gonna be easy. Bad fish. Not like going down the pond chasin' bluegills and tommycods. This shark, swallow you whole. Little shakin', little tenderizin', an' down you go. And we gotta do it quick, that'll bring back your tourists, put all your businesses on a payin' basis. But it's not gonna be pleasant. I value my neck a lot more than three thousand bucks, chief. I'll find him for three, but I'll catch him, and kill him, for ten. But you've gotta make up your minds. If you want to stay alive, then ante up. If you want to play it cheap, be on welfare the whole winter. I don't want no volunteers, I don't want no mates, there's just too many captains on this island. Ten thousand dollars for me by myself. For that you get the head, the tail, the whole damn thing.
Click to expand...
 
slimplynth

slimplynth

Senior Member
Cheers Hugh, the cat flap has needed fixing since the start of the week.. maybe that's why it's on my mind. (Nothing is gettin done at the mo though - the most serious case of man flu in recorded history has taken over my face) May have to beg for medical intervention tomorrow... sinusitis making driving up an down big hills a form of torture... ears can't pop :( Wonder what Dr Acula does to treat man flu?
 
D

Dippy

Moderator
Bless you Slimmy.
On your death-bed and you can still struggle to your PC for a Forum-Fix :rolleyes:
I'll be sending you to the Betty Ford Forum Addicts clinic.
 
slimplynth

slimplynth

Senior Member
This trusty little asus has been a god send in these difficult times.. in between the 18hr periods of sleep.. the forum and films have been a true saviour of my sanity. (curbed my forumming though - posts must be down 90% on this time last year, learned a lot more for it to ;) Merry Christmas all.. unless you're a hacker in which case I hope Santa burns all your presents in the yard.
 
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