Question

How to prevent site Hacks during the current "hacking war"

Asked by: WEBuilder

I have a few cilents that are Israel-based, and according to the news there are many terrorist groups that are working hard right now to hack Israeli sites. I just had one site get hacked: the hacker placed a new index.html file on the server, and his content came up instead of my client's.

How did he do this? It wasn't an SQL injection attack - I am used to those. This site was hacked previously, and I changed the password to a new one that contained upper case, lower case, numbers and symbols. Is it possible they discovered the password again?

How can I best protect this client against future hacks? Do any "hacker proof" services work?

Thanks.

Lev

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Asked On: 2009-01-05 at 23:16:38ID24027501
Tags: FTP HSPHERE HACK WEBSITE
Topics: Networking Security Vulnerabilities
,; Microsoft IIS Web Server
,; File Transfer Protocol (FTP)
Participating Experts: 3
Points: 500
Comments: 10

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Answers

by: NeoDiffusionPosted on 2009-01-06 at 00:20:23ID: 23302609

Hello,

The hack source is probably:
"This site was hacked previously, and I changed the password to a new one that contained upper case, lower case, numbers and symbols. "

--> at which level have you modified password(s)? (ftp? backend? htaccess?, ...)

the previous hackers probably left more than an index.html file, namely one or more backdoors. My recommendation:

sanity: make an file snapshot (zip whole site) and copy locally. Bitwise compare with a copy you know as safe (far before first attack). This is a huge work and requiring a reliable archive, an alternative is to run an antivirus software on your snapshot (and possibility on a database dump). Norton Antivirus for instance used to know several web backdoors.
curative: the only way to make sure you do not leave any backdoor is to re-install the whole site from scratch. This is however a huge work to get the copy site at the same level as the original one. This is how I proceed: create from an empty repository a mirror of the site. If based on a CMS, download again the files, don't trust local files. Use as few archive files as possible, and check them for unexpected content before use. Once the mirror is at the level of the original, swap them. Depending on your hosting plan, it can be as simple as 2 mv commands...

Last time I've worked on an infected site, there were over 10 backdoors/spam engines on the website, and still not sure to have catched all of them.

Of course, it is also possible that you simply have an unfixed vulnerability. If using a CMS, look at http://secunia.com/advisories/ for security advisories.

In all case, look at the raw server logs around the time the file got modified (few hours before/after). Seek for strange formed URL (GET or POST). If your site hadn't a index.html before the attack, look at the first mention of "index.html" to see the attack point...

Good Luck,

Werner.

by: servoadminPosted on 2009-01-06 at 01:20:57ID: 23302835

If you try to protect your server in 100 ways..Hackers try to find a 101 way to intrude into the server...Its a race that will stay on till the end.... As of now the hack attemp carried out on your site cab be achieved by .

1.WebDev ( Http compromise)
2. Trojen through compromised CSS files in your server.
3. Weak Passwords ( If you notice in depth sites that were hacked should have got very weak passwords in that server..We have seen that sites in same server with strong passwords escaped from this kind of attack)
4. Scripts and Executables enabled with backdoor trojan atack...
5. NO FIREWALL IN YOUR SERVER.
6. Sites or Users having permissionover "CMD"
7. EXE file execution Allowed.
8. Make sure to scan your server throughlly ...Most Trojan's or virus files are hidden or attached in zip files and CSS scripts...check them .....
9. Have very Strong Password..

Last but not at all the least.... Have Firewall installed in your server and spo the Attackers IP from the HTTP request used to upload the files ( using PUT method) from IIS logs and block them imdtly...

You can very well trace the IP location and ISP from their IP and Block a whole IP range for safty...

I would not like to recomend any firewall..But I have personally used Visnetic Firewall (3) when 5 of our servers came into attack.... The best part is that I had a chance to chat with the hacker as and when he was uploading the files in our server and I could not stop him finally till I banned his IP in FW .... So be carefull USE FIREWALL FIREWALL and scan server with latest security and AV updates...

by: WEBuilderPosted on 2009-01-06 at 01:37:25ID: 23302885

I went to look at the log files, but they were all erased!

The files that still remained had a date of 6-Jan-09 01:08 as the first time, and the index file from the hacker was at 01:06! So after depositing the index.asp, they deleted the logs.

Not good.

I am looking at the other solutions, such as confirming that there are no extra files.

by: NeoDiffusionPosted on 2009-01-06 at 02:09:07ID: 23303012

> I went to look at the log files, but they were all erased!
This is alrady an information in itself: they got admin "access" on your server, not only as user apache (or whatever depending on the configuration you're running).

For the fix, a fresh (server) install, not forgetting to check for security updates is the more efficient one, but this is a huge work.

To prevent futur attacks, look at servoadmin advices.

An alternative is to go for a hosted service, provided you can afford this (technical, commercial and policies requirements), where you delegate all server level maintenance, and focus on the "application" layer.

by: TolomirPosted on 2009-01-06 at 02:27:46ID: 23303095

It might be a good start to use a log server that gets all the logs from your websites.

Combine http://www.balabit.com/network-security/syslog-ng/ with a ssh tunnel.

Tolomir

by: servoadminPosted on 2009-01-06 at 02:40:13ID: 23303143

cool...nevermind...Just check the latest forums or post the attacker notes here so that we can find some information on net or general forums were some one might have posted their IP address for others to save their servers...

by: servoadminPosted on 2009-01-06 at 02:46:55ID: 23303170

-----> Is this relevant ...Hackers notes similar to the one in your server...

http://www.zionismontheweb.org/hackers/attacked/

----> If the above is true..check the below notes for IP address and block them...

http://www.zionismontheweb.org/hackers/attacked/ip_address.htm

by: WEBuilderPosted on 2009-01-06 at 03:15:26ID: 23303314

Tolomir: I am on a shared hsphere server. Does the log solution work in such a situation or not?

Hacked index file is attached

<html>
<head>
<title>:: Hacked by CWD@rBe for islam for gazza for palastine ::</title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=">
</head>
<td height="65"> 
      <div align="center"><font color="#FFFFFF"><b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="6" color="#FF0000">&quot; 
Hacked by CWD@rBe"" <br>
""Turkish Cyber Hizbullah Militan"" <br> HAMASA SELAM DÝRENÝÞE DEVAM !!!
<br>ALLAHU AKBARRR !!! <br>ALLAHU AKBARRR !!!<br>ALLAHU AKBARRR !!!</font></b></font></div>
    </td>
 
    </tr>
    <tr>
<body bgcolor="#000000" text="#000000">
<table width="75%" border="1" align="center" bordercolor="#999999">
  <tr> 
 
      
    <td><img src="http://img399.imageshack.us/img399/3396/imzarq1mo4.jpg" width="630" height="198"></td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      <td>
 
        
      <div align="center"><img src="http://www.islamigundem.com/images/stories/haber/manset/gazze_icin_ayaga.gif" width="540" height="292"></div>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
 
 <div align="center"><img src="http://site.mynet.com/sehidlerolmez/mynet_resimlerim/israilbayrak.gif" width="150" height="112"></div>
      </td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
      
    <td height="65"> 
      <div align="center"><font color="#FFFFFF"><b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="4" color="#FF0000">&quot; 
Allah ve Rasulune karsi savasan ve yeryuzunde fesat cikarmaya calisanlarin cezasi, 
        ancak oldurulmeleri veya asilmalari yahut ayak ve ellerinin caprazlama 
        kesilmesi, ya da yeryuzunde baska bir yere surgun edilmeleridir. Bu, dunyada 
        onlar icin bir zillettir. Ahirette ise onlar icin buyuk bir azab vardir.&quot; 
        [Maide: 33]</font></b></font></div>
    </td>
 
    </tr>
    <tr>
      
    <td height="74"> 
      <div align="center"><font color="#FFFFFF" face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"><b><font size="4" color="#FF0000">&quot;The 
        punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and 
        strive</font><font size="4"> <font color="#FF0000">with might and main 
        for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting 
        off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that 
        is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the 
        Hereafter&quot;<br>
        [Al-Maida: 33] Allahu Akbar!!!</font></font></b></font></div>
    </td>
    </tr>
 
    <tr>
      
    <td>&nbsp;</td>
    </tr><p align="center">
    </p>
  </table>
<BGSOUND SRC="http://www.tur-as.com/kudusgunu.mp3" LOOP=50>
</body>

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by: servoadminPosted on 2009-01-06 at 03:37:11ID: 23303403

Among other CP's Hsphere always prone to hackers and once compromised leads to big probs as this is the cluster CP (Win + Lin) .. I guess the PWDs are not at all strong and allows users to have any PWD..very simple...that other CPs that force users to have strong PWDs....

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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Question

How to prevent site Hacks during the current "hacking war"

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FTP HSPHERE HACK WEBSITE

Networking Security Vulnerabilities

Microsoft IIS Web Server

File Transfer Protocol (FTP)

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