A reader just told us that UK/US penny auction HungryHammer.com has been down since last Wednesday, November 24th, 2009.
Update: 7:34 PM (EST) HungryHammer responded, they told us they’ve been down due to a DDoS attack. This isn’t the first time a penny auction site has been hacked.
What is a DDoS?
A Distributed Denial-of-Service Attack.
“A distributed denial of service attack (DDoS) occurs when multiple systems flood the bandwidth or resources of a targeted system, usually one or more web servers. These systems are compromised by attackers using a variety of methods.”-Wikipedia
Here’s the official response from HungryHammer:
TO ALL HUNGRYHAMMER.COM USERS:
POSTED SUNDAY 29TH NOVEMBER 2009
On Thursday 26th November at approximately 3:25pm GMT (10:25am EST) HungryHammer.com was the subject of a vicious denial of service attack (DDOS attack).
It caused our entire systems to come down starting with database malfunctions followed by bid blocking, multi-bidding from the attack and eventually a complete system outage.
Looking at the logs, it is clear that the attacker pinged the site starting around 7am GMT (2am EST) on Monday 23rd November looking for a route into our systems and once found it, issued an illegal attack on the server.
We believe we know who the culprit is and are in communication with the London Metropolitan Police and the FBI.
As the attack was significant, there are still remnants now hitting the server and we have taken the decision in house to not load up the server in any way securing all data and sites.
We apologise to HungryHammer.com users for the time the site is down, however we want to rebuild a brand new server from scratch to ensure that even more security barriers are put in place to stop these pathetic hackers from causing problems again in the future.
The server, system and database build will not be quick however we will ensure it as as impenetrable as possible which will take time.
If you are a HungryHammer.com registered user, you will receive an email when the site is back up and running and bidding can continue.
Please note that if you placed a bid between 7am GMT / 2am EST on Monday 23rd November and the site being brought down, these bids will be refunded to your account.
We apologise but the DDOS attack has played havoc with our database (the database errors earlier in the week were due to overloading) and therefore we are unsure which bids are legitimate and which are not and therefore we will nullify all auctions in play or won between 7am GMT / 2am EST on Monday 23rd November under “system outage” in our terms and conditions.
We understand that auction winners during this time will be unhappy however we have had numerous messages from other users saying that they were unable to place bids / bids were not accepted / they were kicked off the site during these auctions and therefore it is only fair to nullify them all and run them again when the site is up and running.
We again apologise for the inconvenience and hope all users join us in wishing the full extent of the law finds and deals with these pathetic hackers that cause unnecessary damage, loss of revenue and loss of winnings to law abiding citizens.
Kindest Regards
HungryHammer Support Team
According to a cached page of HungryHammer.com from November 26th, it looks like they’ve been experiencing database problems:
“We are currently experiencing database difficulties.
We apologise for any inconvenience, we have been notified of the problem and are working to rectify it immediately.
Please note HungryHammer.com will be back up and running shortly.
The system will automatically credit bids that have been placed on items finishing AFTER 21:30 GMT (17:30 EST) on November 25th 2009.
Should your account not have been credited, please contact support when the system is back up and running.
Thank you”
“We are currently experiencing database difficulties.
We apologise for any inconvenience, we have been notified of the problem and are working to rectify it immediately.
Please note HungryHammer.com will be back up and running shortly.
The system will automatically credit bids that have been placed on items finishing AFTER 21:30 GMT (17:30 EST) on November 25th 2009.
Should your account not have been credited, please contact support when the system is back up and running.
Thank you”
Please join the PAW Forum to discuss your experiences with HungryHammer.
Thanks!
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