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Disabling exploitable proftpds
A stack overflow bug has been identified in ProFTPd. This bug allows users to gain remote access (usually root) to an attacker. This bug requires immediate attention and potentially a restore to the last backup image of your server. Information on the bug can be found here: http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-4221 We have been handling the issue per…
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Older versions of debian and updates
We have come across several users who run older versions of debian. This is usually fine, sometimes for some reasons users are unable to update for some time but require a package to be installed. This is where the fun begins…
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Security at home – encrypted home directories
This isn’t directly server related at all, more for the home or office user who wants to make sure things are nice and secure. At the office we like to also make sure our desktops are fairly safe to connect from as well, mostly in case the machines ever get stolen, we know our data…
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Updating old installs – Plesk – and other nasty issues
When choosing a VPS often people go with the distro that suits them best, usually one they find easy to manage. Whilst this is fine, you also need to remember that at some stage in the future you will need to reinstall or upgrade. Debian/Ubuntu based distros seem to scale and upgrade versions fine with…
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Exploited VPS? phpmyadmin?
Currently we are being inundated with scans and exploits looking for new machines to take over, most of these are using insecure phpmyadmin installs. If you are unsure if your box has been hacked then the things to look for are similar to this…
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Old versions of PHPMyAdmin and Automated Scanning
It has come to our attention that we have had a decent number of alerts about machines scanning on our networks in the last day. All of them have been running hacks from /tmp named things like /tmp/dd_ssh etc. These files are owned and run by the apache user, and on further investigation all put…
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WordPress Mass Upgrade Script 3.0.1
This script will search /var/www (changeable in a variable) for any wordpress installs and make sure its upgraded to the latest version. It will run a backup to /root/wp_upgrade/ of all files and database before doing anything with the site in case of major catastrophe. It pays to check each site after the upgrade to…
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Pingability Facelift
While I was kicking back camping in Yosemite Justin here has been ‘messing about’ with CSS on our Pingability web check and alert service. Bringing it from my 2003 design to something a little more contemporary. Thanks, Justin. — Pingability lets you monitor your websites pages, check that things are running OK, and alert you…
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66% off .org domain name registration anyone?
We use gandi.net internally for some of the domains we have. Gandi have given me a few ‘promo codes’ for 66% off .org domains.
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Virtualmin on the command line
We often encourage our users to use software which is better, and does things in a standard way. When it comes to control panels we prefer Virtualmin. It works with the distro you are using and the packages that come with it rather than setting up things in its own odd way and tieing you…