Anyone that visits us semi-regularly knows that we
hacked on Tuesday, November 6th. Here's the inside
scoop.
I was online that morning, at 1:38 am, and I was working
to upload new articles, I began seeing things disappear from my FTP
(the folder on the server that holds all of our files). It was being
wiped out very quickly.
How could this have happened, I wondered? GoDaddy.com, my hosting company, recommends
that you choose a password for your website that is 7-14 characters, a
combination of letters and numbers, with a variation of capital and
lowercase letters. I did have that. I never once thought
about the security of my site - never thought anyone would be malicious
enough to delete information on how to contact your political
representatives, alternative health methods, where to find breast cancer
info, tributes to Veterans, ways to stop animal abuse, civil rights
petitions, news and advice on important issues from A to
Z.
Never underestimate the true dark character of some
people in this world.
As soon as I saw the items being deleted, I got on the
phone with GoDaddy. I quickly explained what was happening, and
the representative I spoke with could see it being wiped out on his end
as well - he marked it a security issue, which he said waived the $150
"data restore" fee, since he saw it with his own eyes and was unable to
stop it from happening.
We went in and changed the hosting password right away,
but it takes time for that change to set in, and it didn't happen fast
enough - I lost absolutely everything.
The rep was
very kind, and told me that the data would be restored to what was on my
site the previous day - Monday - within 24 to 72 hours. Some of
you may remember that I posted "Thanks to the help and support of
GoDaddy.com, we'll be back up in 24-72 hours," on our front page, in
good faith.
Four days later, nothing was restored yet, so I called
them.
"The representative should have told you," the new rep
says. "It can take up to 7 days. If it was just a security
issue, it would have been 24-72 hours, but since we have to go to our
offsite data backup to reinject the information onto your FTP, we need
you to pay the $150 data restore fee, and it will be up within 7
days."
Fine, I say, seven days from Tuesday is fine. I
get out my credit card and pay the $150 restore fee, even though I feel
deep down the first rep should have been able to stop this from
happening - I couldn't have reported it any sooner than reporting
while it was happening. On the fifth day, I receive an
e-mail that my data has been restored. I check the "RESTORE"
folder they created for me, and there are about 10-20 files in there -
all files which I already had, and none of the year's worth of archives
that I was missing.
No, I respond to the e-mail, that is not what I had on
my site on Monday. You must have restored it after Tuesday...the
representative clearly knew when it was there and not there, and I need
everything that I had on Monday.
They open a new Case ID - I had at least 5 different
Case ID's throughout this process, even though it was only one
incident. Today, 10 days later, I call them again.
"It has been ten days," I tell the representative.
"Not seven. I don't care how many subsquent Case ID's you opened,
GoDaddy screwed this up, they did not restore what was there on
Monday, I guarantee you."
"They restored what was there on Sunday, even better
than that," the rep tells me. Even though I know better than I
know how much I weigh, what exactly is on my site and when. When
it disappeared, and when it was there. I ask for a
supervisor.
Twenty minutes later, a supervisor gets on the
phone. He tells me that they did restore what was on the site on
Sunday. I assure him that they did not, and that he can look for
himself at the 10 new files they restored, which I had already
had. I don't know how they did this incorrectly, I tell him, but
everything that I've worked on for the past year was on my server on
Monday.
Do you know what he tells me?
"It's not that I don't believe you. It's that I
believe our data backup center 100%. If they noted that they
restored it from Sunday, then that is what they did."
"Human error exists," I tell him. "Maybe it was a
new employee. Maybe they went to lunch while they were in the
middle of doing it and then forgot they hadn't finished it. I
don't know what it was, but there's no possible way they restored my
data prior to Tuesday, November 6th. I was on the phone with
GoDaddy when it was being deleted. How could you not know
when to restore it to?"
"Regardless, this is considered a second restore,
because we already did it once. You are lucky we're not charging
you a second $150 restore fee."
This is no joke - this is how I was treated. He
was rude, he yelled at me, and implied that I have no idea what I'm
talking about. He insulted my intelligence, and meanwhile, I am
losing web traffic, income, and it is hurting my status with Google
because 90% of my news articles that they've indexed are showing up as
broken links, for ten days now.
I liked GoDaddy before this happens - I knew that they
had 24/7 service, so I felt secure. I was wrong. You never
know who you can trust until you run into a problem.
The funny part is, my hosting contract with them is up
for renewal at the end of this month, and they knew that, and I
reiterated it, and they still didn't do anything to try and help me or
keep me as a customer.
Why? They don't need me. They're huge.
What do they care if they lose one customer that has one website and has
been bugging them for ten days?
The good news in all of this is that I have acquired the
information on the individual that intentionally hacked into our site
and deleted all of the pages on our domain. In fact, it broke
international theft and fraud laws, which are enforced by the FBI.
So we'll let you know how that goes when it's all over and done
with.
I've since found that there's a website dedicated to the
less than stellar GoDaddy service customers have received at nodaddy.com, and the stories are even worse
than mine...
At the suggestion of one of our awesome
readers, we've added a Donate feature so that you can help us with the costs of refurbishing
our site. Thank you in advance for any assistance you can provide, it will make us bigger,
badder, and better for our new site reveal.
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