FireFly Forum

[Martin Francom]

Is anyone else having problems getting to the FireFly Forum at:

http://www.planetsquires.com/forums/index.php

When I try to go there I am getting re-directed to another site. I am not sure if it's a problem on my computer or if Paul's FireFly Forum has been hijacked. Was getting a 404 error.

Again I wait a bit then I went to your home page, first. Then from there to the forum page and it was OK.

09/23/2009
It appear the link has been changed, the new link seems to be working. It is:

http://www.planetsquires.com/support/index.php

[Gary Stout]

Marty,

Go to the re-directed site (Paul's home page) and click on "support forum". I was having the same problem. I think Paul has made some changes to his links. Once I updated my shortcuts, all was back to normal.

Gary

[Mike Doty]

New url

Same problem here. Tried a second time and got a message from AVG about a rouge virus (hopefully a false reporting.)

This should work:

http://www.planetsquires.com/support/index.php

Sent an email to Paul pointing to this PowerBASIC url.

[Paul Squires]

Thanks Guys - I am getting redirected occassionally as well. Must be something with the SMF forum software update that I did last week (not sure at this point).... no sign of malware on my machine. I have scanned with multiple malware/spyware scanners. Hopefully I'll fix this pretty soon. I'll post back once it's back to normal.

[Eros Olmi]

Same experience.
Can be a DNS attack/redirect.

[Paul Squires]

I read a post on the SMF forum that is exactly what I am experiencing. I'll make the changes to the forum to see if it corrects the problem. Give it a few hours and hopefully life will resume as normal.

[Martin Francom]

Paul,
Does the SMF forum tells us how much of a problem this might be and what sort of damage it might cause? And any specific action that we who experience the problem might need to take?

AVG antivirus program is reporting threat detected as:
antispywaretotalscan0.com/scan/?
that it is an "Exploit Rogue spyware scanner (type 690)"

Anyone know more about this (virus?)

[Paul Squires]

This is the thread:

http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=336903.0

The latest post indicates that it may have originated from a hijack of ftp passwords. I will change my password and that of others that ftp access to my site.

[Paul Squires]

I changed all forum and site passwords and then reinstalled fresh copies of all php software (SMF, Mantis, etc). I have not had a redirect since. I will keep surfing the site tomorrow to see if it happens but so far it has not.

[Paul Squires]

Problem appears to be fixed now. It probably wouldn't hurt for you to download, install, and run MalwareBytes http://www.malwarebytes.org/ just to be safe. I have ran several malware utilities and my system and it appears not to be infected so I trust that yours will not be either.

[Mike Doty]

Clicked on the free download at cnet and it locked up my Vista machine (never got the download.)
Be sure to save everything before attempting that download.

[Eros Olmi]

Paul,

it happened again.
I've sent you a mail with the screen image of what comes out when going into your forum. It does not happen all the times.

I continue to think that the problem is related to a DNS attack of your domain maintainer: SNHDNS.COM
Send them a mail or send it to your provider.

Ciao
Eros

[Martin Francom]

Paul,
Eros is right, the problem is back. It happened to me just now. I can not get to either your forum nor the PlanetSquires homepage. Now I waited 10 minutes and tried again and was able to connect to both yor website and forum. This is surely a strange problem.

[Paul Squires]

Looks like I am not alone. Several others on TotalChoiceHosting servers are reporting the same problem. Looks like the staff are checking the servers tonight. Hopefully they will find the root of the problem. My fingers are crossed.

[Martin Francom]

Looks like I am not alone. Several others on TotalChoiceHosting servers are reporting the same problem. Looks like the staff are checking the servers tonight. Hopefully they will find the root of the problem. My fingers are crossed.

Happened again tonight (Monday). Might be time to be looking for a new server host. I like GoDaddy.

[Mike Doty]

It is working here:
http://www.planetsquires.com/support/index.php

[Martin Francom]

It is working here:
http://www.planetsquires.com/support/index.php

Yes that does seem to be working. The link has been changed from /forums/ to /support/

Thanks for pointing out the new link. I have made note of it.

[Scott Slater]

Check your SQL database too, could be PHP Injected code in one of the fields.

Check things like the forum names and descriptions. Sometimes the bad guys inject hidden code there.

[Tom Cone Jr]

Had trouble visiting the PlanetSquires website this AM. On arrival, the website immediately downloaded a bogus malware scanner which began scanning my system. Not good.

[Patrice Terrier]

Tom Cone Jr

Yep, same thing occured to me.

...