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that DOS attack

For those of you who are running with the rumor that last night's DOS attack on Hosting Matters was the result of an Al Qaeda jihad against Aaron Weisburd’s Internet Haganah, please be advised that it is not yet certain who the attackers were or where they came from.

From Annette at Hosting Matters:

..the origination points of the DOS and the responsible parties have not been detailed by us, nor will we be releasing those details. Any speculation as to the originator(s) of the DOS itself are the opinion of the party offering the comment and should be not be treated as any sort of official word from Hosting Matters.

I told the kind folk at HM that I would blog this and be sure to let everyone know that the word on this being an al Qaeda fronted attack is not official.

And really, if Al Qaeda is resorting to bring down websites with DOS attacks, I think the war on terror is won.

I'd also like to prominently display what Pete said in my former post on this matter:

The site that received the DDOS is not exactly secret, in fact they're looking for donations to co-locate to avoid this in the future....My understanding is that the PURPOSE of the site was not as much pro-israel as anti-muslim extremist -- they had been getting hosts and DNSs to drop sites promoting Jihad and Terrorism, hence the DDOS.

As for J's comment, this is an example of why someone SHOULD host with HostingMatters -- unless you're going to find a host that refuses to host controversial sites, no host is safe and HostingMatters handled the DDOS spectacularly well.

Yep.

TrackBack

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference that DOS attack:

» Hosting Matters Attacked from Backcountry Conservative
James Joyner has more information on the Denial of Service attack on Hosting Matters Thursday night-Friday morning. This was the reason my blog was down (among others including Instapundit.) The attack was apparently political in nature. An Israeli sit... [Read More]

» Hosting Matters Attacked from Backcountry Conservative
James Joyner has more information on the Denial of Service attack on Hosting Matters Thursday night-Friday morning. This was the reason my blog was down (among others including Instapundit.) The attack was apparently political in nature. An Israeli sit... [Read More]

» Ahh the wonders of modern technology from www [dot] margilowry [dot] com
Two quick thoughts: Server Outtages There's nothing like getting a... [Read More]

» Another Attack? from A Single Guy In The South
Well, I noticed that four Hosting Matters hosted blogs are not loading again. Kevin, Insta-man, Rita, and Michele seem to not be accessible. I'd link to the previous incident when Hosting Matters was hit with a DoS attack, but hey,... [Read More]

Comments

As the harbinger of bad luck for hosting companies I would have to agree with Pete.

One of my biggest complaints with service providers generally (such as ISP's) is that many of the support tools are online which does you no good when you can't get online.

HM was wise enough to realize that no one could get to their network, and had the pre attack forsight to have a renduntant domain in another location not impacted by a site attack. Having the Remote Support Forum during the outage was a bonus you just wouldn't get at most other hosts.

I understand your hosts reluctance to go into detail, as a business they are held to higher standards than individuals. On the other hand, I think you are doing Internet Haganah a disservice by not lending more credibilty to their claims. Aaaron has established a reputation as an honest man and if he says he was targeted by a group I think it's worth a closer look.

A hosting business and a clients interests are not always the same.

As far as, "if Al Qaeda is resorting to bring down websites with DOS attacks, I think the war on terror is won," goes, there is one problem. They brought down three thousand sites, for a matter of hours, not just one site.

It's not just the one site, it reveals a weakness in the infrastructure that threatens anyone who cares about this medium. Expect to see a lot more of these attacks -- this one went pretty good for them.

Cedar, I understand your points, but I also understand the needs of HM to make known that they are not the ones stating it was an al-Qaida based attack.

I've been wondering all day if it wasn't related to the spam attack we all experienced last weekend. Plus, I've attracted a nasty little troll, who left a "insulting" remark on a post I did making fun of Syria.

Unfortunately for him/her, I thought the remark was hilarious.

Mike's attracted one also, even though he rarely posts these days. And a pointy-headed little incoherent ranter it is, too.

I can't help but think these things are all related. Maybe I'm just being paranoid.

Or maybe they are all out to get us.

I couldn't get on most of my favorite blogs. I thought the anti-spam programs everyone was trying shut down things. In the back of my mind I thought that maybe I did something stupid and got my ass banned(unlike the smart thing I did and got kicked off of DU)

Now that is a source of pride.

Oooh, Al Qaeda. I was so afraid after not being able to get on my blog (or any one else's) that I turned off the computer and went to sleep. Heart-pounding terror indeed!