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Forum hacked to send spam emails?


 
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AsciiSector
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Joined: 09 Dec 2008

Posts: 30
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark


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PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 3:52 am 
Post subject: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

My hosting provider shut down my site for a couple of days, as they could see excessive amounts of mail activity. When I checked my main mailbox, there were more than 4000 emails, all of which where returned mails that couldn't be delivered. All of it was spam, and all of it seemed to have randomly generated sender addresses in the form of xxx@asciisector.net (www.asciisector.net is my website and xxx was the randomly generated name). Have anybody here experienced anything similar and has my site truly been hacked to send spam emails, or is it just that spam emails have been sent out with a fake sender's addresses, so all the undelivered spam is returned to my email address?
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Dog Cow
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Joined: 18 Nov 2008

Posts: 378


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PostPosted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 6:18 pm 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

If these emails were really sent from the server you're on, then the web host would likely have logs of each email sent.

In any case, email is no different from postal mail: one is expected to write the correct return address (ex: your home address, if mailing from there) on the envelope, but in actuality, any address can be written.

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Lincoln's Tomb, Oak Ridge Cemetery, Springfield ILMac 512K BlogMac GUI
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Slackervaara
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Joined: 01 Jan 2009

Posts: 70



PostPosted: Wed Jul 15, 2009 1:18 am 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

I have been hacked once by someone that sent a lot of spam. The hacker uploaded a php-program to my site with a upload program that was a part of a chat program I had on the site. The php-program was used for spamming. I removed the php-program and disabled the upload program and the problem is solved.

My suggestion is that you look in your access logs to find out what the spammer has been doing on the site. From the return mails you know what time he has been active, so it will be fairly easy.
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AsciiSector
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Joined: 09 Dec 2008

Posts: 30
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark


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PostPosted: Wed Jul 15, 2009 7:03 am 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

I haven't been able to find anything in the access logs, nor are there any unwelcome php scripts or anything. I've asked my hosting provider whether or not the large amount of mail activity that caused them to originally shut down my site was outgoing mail or just incoming mail (i.e. the returned spam emails). I haven't heard back from them in two days and I've opened my site again without any complaints from them. I'm thinking this really "just" was spam email sent with a faked return address. Thankfully all the returned spam is sent to an email address that I don't use, so I've just set it to delete everything that comes in (which seems to have died down a lot).
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Holger
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Joined: 19 Jan 2009

Posts: 509
Location: Hanover


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PostPosted: Wed Jul 15, 2009 9:12 am 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

Does not nessecarly have to do with your site.
My mailaddresses are also used to send spam.
Do you use catch-all for those addresses not known? Disable catch-all.
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AsciiSector
Board Member



Joined: 09 Dec 2008

Posts: 30
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark


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PostPosted: Thu Jul 16, 2009 4:34 am 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

I've disabled catch-all now. Thanks for the advice. icon_smile.gif
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Holger
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Joined: 19 Jan 2009

Posts: 509
Location: Hanover


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PostPosted: Thu Jul 16, 2009 4:40 am 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

The problem is, the mails do not nessecarily have to be sent from your server. Those idiots just use your address as sender.
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AsciiSector
Board Member



Joined: 09 Dec 2008

Posts: 30
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark


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PostPosted: Thu Jul 16, 2009 5:48 am 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

Yeah, it was pretty annoying. I'm also a tad annoyed at my host for just shutting down my site without any word from them. I had to contact them to hear what was going on. And shouldn't they be able to see that the increased mail activity was from incoming mails - not from me sending out spam?
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Acaria
Board Member



Joined: 20 Feb 2009

Posts: 238



PostPosted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 10:08 pm 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

As you'll come to find, some hosting companies really don't care about the technicalities at first. They must've simply looked at the increased mail activity, saw that it was over your limit, and did the whole "shoot first and ask questions later" bit.
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AsciiSector
Board Member



Joined: 09 Dec 2008

Posts: 30
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark


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PostPosted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 5:03 am 
Post subject: Re: Forum hacked to send spam emails?

Yeah, they haven't even replied to my last couple of mails, where I ask if it was incoming our outgoing mail. Guess they consider the problem fixed and don't need to reply to my mails...
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