Anyone else heard about this?
Here
Barsteward Hackers

 

Funny thing is that the number of site defacements has dropped off over the last 2 weeks. One can't help but thinking they are being held back for this "competition".

 

Yup

Chap at work told me yesterday. Not a hacker himself, he's just interested in all that $h1t

 

Guess who's just spent the day with a scanner checking out vulnerabilities?

Only needed to apply a few patches (mainly on a machine built by my boss )

 

yep the words 'life' and 'get a' spring to mind.

 

It's hype over nothing, I'd ignore it. The chance of getting hacked is no greater than any other day of the year.

http://www.trusecure.com/knowledge/h...hallenge.shtml

 

Just received this via email, and came here to warn others.

May not be anything, but still best to back everything up at the very least.

 

Well, guess who's Internet Server will be turned off on Sunday

Don't need to be up over the w/end...







Hack me you n00bs!

 

As stated on various other sites, it per domain not per IP, so the targets would be hosters with hundreds of sites per IP. In all probability it'll be machines that have already been broken into and will get defaced during the competition.

As said above though, it's mostly hype, there's lots of these contests and why mainstream media has decided to pick up on this one I don't know.

If it prompts lazy admins to actually do some work and secure their machines it can only be a good thing though

 

Outrageous

 

Just saw your quote Andrew "there's lots of these contests" most of these contests are so called security companys beta testing their products on the general hacking public. I am a bit pissed off with ISS for publicising the website of this contest though, hence my comments on Silicon.com.

 

I meant there's plenty of so called 'black hat' hacking (though it should be cracking ) contests to deface as many sites as possible or particular sites, it's just usually they don't get announced publicly.

I have to agree it's dumb of ISS to bring this to the publics attention as it's just the attention these people crave, though those with more sense will steer clear as no doubt admins will be forced to be on alert over the weekend thanks to managers reading the mainstream media's 'alarming' warning.

It's been noted by sites that keep track of defacements that over the past couple of weeks there's been less, so on average in the end there will probably be no more sites defaced than any other time period.

There are of course the companies that issue the "break our product" challenges as well.

 

2 schools of thought:

1: mindless vandalism
2: intelectual challenge

Considering there are so many tools available to help you get into other people systsms, I would ver on school 1.

oh sod ths - its 2am, they are a bunch of to$$ers that don't have jobs and are trying to prove they are brighter than the rest of use and deserve our jobs! not the right way of going about it imho!

 

Either way - I agree with Jack Clark - a reputable company such as ISS should not be seen to be endorsing cr*p like this.

Cheap advertising and promotion is all I can see. Certainly won't help to improve the image of ISS to large corporates who might consider using their security tools.

Chris

 

So then, as predicted by the less reactive sections of the media it seemed to be all quiet on the web-front yesterday....

 

From Reuters:
Computer hackers vying in a global contest on Sunday defaced a slew of Web sites, but the damage was confined to the Internet's backwater of small, unsecured sites, security officials said.

THE "DEFACER'S CHALLENGE" got off to a quick start on Sunday with 300 attacks reported minutes after the 0600 GMT official start, said Roberto Preatoni, founder of Estonia-based Zone-H.org, a site that tracks hack attacks.

"There were no big names," he said. But he added his own site, www.zone-h.org, was knocked offline for much of the day because of a high volume of legitimate visitors and apparent attempts by hackers to bog down his computer servers.

According to the contest Web site www.defacers-challenge.com, which was taken offline last week, hackers were urged to prove their skills by defacing as many Web sites as possible during a six-hour span on Sunday.

Points were awarded for the number and type of computer servers they infiltrated, the rules stated.

Concern grew among cyber security organizations last week that the competition would cripple countless Web sites, but by Sunday afternoon as the event was drawing to a close there was no sign of damage among the Web's most popular sites.

The Web's largest Web sites, including Amazon.com and Yahoo.com, were functioning as normal on Sunday.

"It seems to be a damp squib," said Graham Cluley, spokesman for UK-based security firm Sophos.

Via.Networks, a U.S.-Dutch Internet service provider and Web site hosting firm that manages Web sites for over 50,000 clients in America and Western Europe, also reported no incidences.

"None of our customers have called to report any problems. It's all quiet on the Western Front," said Joanne Hughes, a spokeswoman for Via Networks.

Hacking activities have been on the rise for years as the expertise behind compromising a Web site's vulnerable computer server is freely passed around the Internet in chat areas and is posted on Web sites dedicated to the activity.

Hack attacks range from outright defacement to flooding a server with data requests, knocking a site offline. In the former case, hackers replace the contents of a Web page with their own message, often a political rant written in the signature style of broken English.

With hackers sending out challenges regularly, security officials expressed bewilderment that this contest received so much press attention, fearing it would only encourage more elaborate events in the future.

But Via.Network's Hughes saw something of a silver lining in the fact she and her team were on the ready this weekend for a possible showdown with hackers. "If it makes people more aware about security then that's a good thing," she said.