|
Most hackers want something for nothing. The administrator A TV Broadcast
Company's FTP site discovered that what one hacker wanted was an online
place to store his files.
The first hint came Friday when the company found that all of their stories and video that was being worked on for an upcoming show were gone. The company had a backup tape and only lost about 12 hours worth of work. The question was why had the files disappeared? What we found was that the FTP site was being used to house pornographic material and that many users had full access to it. The hacker was trading access to "his FTP site" with other people in order to gain more files. It is assumed that one user became upset with the hacker and deleted everything on the FTP site including the company's content. The company restored it's files and we created a new user and password scheme to help reduce the chances of a hacker getting in again. Analysis of the hacker: The hacker probably spent upwards of 2 minutes getting into this site. Several users email addresses were posted on the company's web site. All of those users had access to the FTP server. One of those users simply used "password" as their account password. The hacker gained access to the FTP server, created an inconspicuous directory and began hosting and trading files with other users. The log files showed that the hacker had been active on the server for almost six months. "Password" is the most commonly used password in America. A four letter word beginning with "F" is the second. Children and family member names come in at a distant third. The chances are that someone in your organization is using an easy to guess password right now. We can help you create naming conventions that are far more secure than what your users may come up with. |