Category Archives: Administrivia

Outage Status

I still can’t reach the administrative page so I assume the WordPress attacks are ongoing. That’s annoying but at least I’ve figured out how to push new posts. That still leaves those comments stuck in moderation, of course, but all … Continue reading

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Still More Information on the Outage

Here’s another article on the ongoing attack on WordPress sites that helps explain what’s going on. From the description of the attack, I think Irreal is pretty safe since we don’t use stupid passwords but who knows. When all this … Continue reading

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Outage

I am unable to reach the administrative panel of Irreal to release today’s blog. Technical support reports that they are undergoing a DOS attack that (somehow) only affects administrative logins. I’m going to try pushing today’s post again. If you … Continue reading

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Scheduled Outage

Irreal’s hosting provider has notified me that the site will be down for scheduled maintenance on August 4th, from 12:01am to 4:00am EDT (UTC-0400).

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Malware Free

I spent most of the day yesterday going over the entire site looking for malware. I made a local copy of irreal.org and grepped for the signatures that I discussed in my Anatomy of an Exploit post. I didn’t find … Continue reading

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Malware Warnings

Yesterday, Google started warning that the Irreal blog was unsafe. After some investigation, I determined that the site had, in fact, been compromised and some JavaScript that targeted Windows users (with the MSIE or Firefox browsers) was being served. I … Continue reading

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Back!

Annnnnd, I’m back. For the one or two of you who may have wondered were I’ve been, here’s the story. Last month, between the fifteenth and twentieth, I was in New York. I didn’t have to a chance to queue … Continue reading

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Spam Update

I’m seeing yet another spike in spam so I’ve reluctantly turned on moderation again. If NuCaptcha can plug the hole that appears to be allowing this spam I will, of course, turn it off again. Interestingly, one mystery is solved. … Continue reading

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Spam Raises Its Head Again

After a period of virtually no forum spam I’m seeing a spike in the amount of spam. This may be because of the recent NuCaptcha break or it may be due to the spammers using a Mechanical Turk-like strategy of … Continue reading

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Site Outage

My hosting provider has informed me that Irreal.org will be down for maintenance from 12:01 am to 4:00 am on February 25.

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