Over the weekend, Australian domain registrar and web host Distribut.IT was the target of a “deliberate, premeditated and targeted attack”. The attack was so extensive that data on four of the host’s servers was completely trashed. But that’s not the worst of it.
Distribut.IT had to make the awful confession that it never made an offsite backup of its customer’s data. All website data, backups, snapshots and other server information was permanently destroyed during the attack. About 4,800 websites lost their information forever. [Sydney Morning Herald via Silicon Filter]
Owen
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 5:20 PMEven an on-site but offline backup would have been better. And telling their clients to make their own backups in case of pure emergency.
WHAT THE HELL, DISTRIBUT.IT.
The lawsuits are going to be amusing, to say the least.
Tai
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 5:47 PMNP, just restore it from your OFF SITE BACKUP! :P
OUCH!!!
I sense a large law suit and high demand for web programmers in the near future..
Lachy
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 5:57 PMReading this is like hearing about someone getting kicked in the nuts. Hard. It didn’t happen to you, but you feel it intimately. Rght in the pit of your stomach. *ouch*
Greg
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 6:42 PMwow *sigh*
Scott
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 6:45 PMHere’s an opinion.
I think there is an imminent backlash coming from the public at large.
Over the past decade or so hackers have enjoyed a bit of a romantic public image due in no small part to the movie/TV/literature industries…and some journos.
While the older generation mostly see through that for the impact they have on society, the younger generation cant help but be swayed by the romantic depictions. Just like modern Jack Sparrows. No real harm and a lot of fun. A bit like graffiti artists. Its easy for young people to view them as modern establishment fighting, likable rogues who stand for “something”. Its not until those young people have been around long enough to have invested years of work to acquire possessions or set up businesses, that having someone deface or vandalize your property is something you don’t ever want to deal with or wish on others.
The recent increase in activity and the impact of the targets are such that not only are hackers about to lose that bit of empathy that resided to differing degrees in many of the us but have actually now raised their status to that of a public enemy. The various recent actions are causing the population to change their subconscious classification from rogues who cause a bit of mayhem to others, to criminals who are a threat to us all. I think hackers have enjoyed a large amount of public apathy towards the threat they posed in the past. Well with every new attack that apathy is going to be replaced by very real anger and desire for justice. The general public will be driven into action. We the hardworking non hacking population wont be interested in your ideals when it comes to protecting our privacy and possessions. You the hackers will find yourselves hunted down and lynched by the angry mob.
EXPECT US.
Matt Ryan
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 7:22 PMBull*h*t, These people are simply blaming hackers for a failure in a proper back up solution. Id hate to be the person in charge of that…
anona
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 8:11 PMsimply unbelievable…
Rupert Ralston
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 8:24 PMHard to believe Giz, all that data gone when is could so easily have been saved.
Jack
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 10:56 PMThat feeling you get, where it feels like a knife stabbing into your stomach.
I bet that was shared a lot today.
God damn, I would consider the perpetrator a hacker, but more of a cracker.
FiveStein
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 11:30 PMreally there should have been at least 3 backups, 2 by Distribut.IT, and the third by the client. Not having any backup system is something an amateur would do and I’m surprised Distribut.IT got as far as they did without one.
ChemZ
Thursday, June 23, 2011 at 3:29 AMSue! Sue! SUE! =P
Dean
Thursday, June 23, 2011 at 7:43 AMI am absolutely flabbergasted that in this day and age with so much talk about hackers, a company of such high stature can drop the ball so badly. Although I think the hackers who pulled this off are absolute bastards, whoever is responsible for the lack of a real DR plan at Distribut.IT should be bloody ashamed of themselves.
DK Son
Thursday, June 23, 2011 at 8:33 AMBuy shares in Distribut IT in a few days!!!
Heck, can prolly buy the whole company for $500 on Saturday!!
Ben Evans
Thursday, June 23, 2011 at 3:04 PMcan you not get some things back via Google’s cache or even waybackmachine.org ?
Caesar Wong
Sunday, June 26, 2011 at 6:33 PMIf it was only front-end content, probably yes, even though it’d be a total pain in the ass. It wouldn’t be a complete loss.
However, back-end data, say, e-commerce transaction history, would be gone, and if you were a small online business, you’d basically be screwed.
Man, I seriously feel for the customers affected by this. If it were me I’d probably have spent all this whole weekend crying.