mutley 4,495 Posted May 13, 2009 Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 The news is AVSIM has been hacked big time, for what point? From AVSIM AVSIM Hacked Tom Allensworth, CEO and Publisher of AVSIM, today issued the following announcement; Link to post Share on other sites
Martyn 9 Posted May 13, 2009 Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 I just hope they can get things up and running again. It worries me a little that they seem to be suggesting they have no server backups... We have offered the services of our I.T boffins and I'm sure the whole community will be behind them! Link to post Share on other sites
mutley 4,495 Posted May 13, 2009 Author Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 It looks that way Martyn, if their backups were on a second on-line server then they could be buggered. All our software backups at work are kept off-line and off site, in-fact they are kept in a bank vault, that's how important it is to us. I am sure the FS community will help in any way it can, we cannot afford to lose this valuable and essential resource. Link to post Share on other sites
wisemanp 0 Posted May 13, 2009 Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 Avsim down?! No... :biggrin: A blow to community certainly. I think many will be praying it gets going again! Curse the people that did it... Link to post Share on other sites
rosariomanzo 545 Posted May 13, 2009 Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 Really sad. Link to post Share on other sites
mutley 4,495 Posted May 13, 2009 Author Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 http://linux.myalbemarle.org/forums/index.php Link to temporary AVSIM forum for updates to bringing AVSIM back on line :biggrin: Link to post Share on other sites
mutley 4,495 Posted May 13, 2009 Author Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 As feared the backup system was open to hacking and was hacked too, sadly, very poor disaster recovery planning. Some have asked whether or not we had back ups. Yes, we dutifully backed up our servers every day. Unfortunately, we backed up the servers BETWEEN servers. That is, GREEN, our library server, would be backed up to PURPLE, our WEB/Forum server. That way, if one or the other failed, we would have a back up on the remaining active server. The hacker took out both servers, destroying our ability to use one or the other back up to remedy the situation._________________ Tom Allensworth AVSIM Online Link to post Share on other sites
allardjd 1,853 Posted May 13, 2009 Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 I don't see this as sad. I see it as criminal. Here is a non-profit organization that is providing a useful service for many thousands of people, mainly through ads and donated money. They aren't harming or threatening anyone nor even taking a position on controversial issues that might make some people angry. This is what they get in return. This is vandalism, pure and simple - destruction of something worth while just for entertainment and to prove they can do it and get away with it. Yes, AVSIM should have had a better (make that smarter) backup scheme and if they had, maybe the damage would have been less. I wonder how many times things like this happen and the damage is minimal or short term because there are safe, undamaged backups. I suspect that it happens frequently and I just don't understand the mentality of the cretins who engage in this kind of crime. There's a case going on in the US right now where a teen-ager has been arrested. He's a fairly famous on-line presence in some unsavory circles and has specialized in prank phone calls, harassing businesses he doesn't like for some reason. He was apparently in the habit of tying in hundreds of on-line listeners so he had an audience while he did his thing. His mother knew of all that and found it very enertaining - she thought he was funny. He expanded his repertoire to bomb threats and eventually got to the point where he was charging others $5 (paid via PayPal) for him to make an anonymous bomb threat to their school, workplace, or wherever they wished. His antics resulted in school closings and other incidents. The authorities managed to track him down and arrested him and his mother's hair is on fire about that. She thinks it's an abuse of government power and doesn't think he did anything illegal. With parents like that out there... it's no wonder. I think that his sentence should include a prohibition of using a PC for about ten years - long enough that the technology completely passes him by and he's a technical druid by the time he can legally engage in those activities again. If someone does harm with an automobile, he can lose the privilege of using one for a long time, or forever as a result. It should be the same with computers. I'm very frustrated about all this hacking, setting of viruses and that kind of thing. I wish more could be done against it, but about the best one can do is protect yourself as best you can. John Link to post Share on other sites
mutley 4,495 Posted May 13, 2009 Author Report Share Posted May 13, 2009 As mentioned on the AVSIM update forum, you may want to consider changing your password for this and other forums if your password and username was the same on AVSIM :biggrin: Cheers Link to post Share on other sites
allardjd 1,853 Posted May 14, 2009 Report Share Posted May 14, 2009 This is probably another nail in the FS9 coffin too. There was an awful lot of FS9 stuff available there in every cagegory, AI, AC, scenery, utilities - you name it, they had it. It wasn't the only place I downloaded from but it was the first place I'd check when looking for something. I really hope they can find a way to bring it back, even if it's a new, smaller version. It will grow back into something very good if it can get on its feet. The rest of the flight sim community (even those who compete with them for ad revenue) should do what it can to help them with publicity, etc. The whole community just took a big hit and the community should pull together to help restore it. It benefits all of us. If and when it's appropriate, I'll certainly consider a donation to help them if it's needed, though I'm not sure you can buy your way out of something like this. This is a harder blow to FS than MS closing the ACES studio, at least in the short term. John Link to post Share on other sites
hurricanemk1c 195 Posted May 15, 2009 Report Share Posted May 15, 2009 What do hackers get out f it? Apart from ruining many peoples lives (AVSIM staff, uploaders and downloaders) Link to post Share on other sites
TapA321 0 Posted May 19, 2009 Report Share Posted May 19, 2009 This is a real blow to a lot of the FS Community - and really sad too. It's amazing when you think about it just how many people will be affected - World of AI for example. This is such a shame. I don't think there would be a single week if not a day that I downloaded something from that site. George As mentioned on the AVSIM update forum, you may want to consider changing your password for this and other forums if your password and username was the same on AVSIM Cheers Luckily, I've used a completely seperate password for that site. Link to post Share on other sites
B77W 0 Posted May 29, 2009 Report Share Posted May 29, 2009 It's back! Link to post Share on other sites
mutley 4,495 Posted May 29, 2009 Author Report Share Posted May 29, 2009 Yep that's great news, you can see the story unfold here viewtopic.php?f=4&t=3060 Cheers Link to post Share on other sites
Recommended Posts
Please sign in to comment
You will be able to leave a comment after signing in
Sign In Now