As you may have been aware, FSElite experienced the longest down-time in our history. Sadly, it happened whilst I was away and our technician was on the other side of the world making communication incredibly hard. Whilst we are back up and running, I just wanted to give you a bit of insight into what happened.
What happened?
Our web server appears to have been attacked and thus installed some new server infrastructure without our knowledge. This then corrupted our SSL certificate, which subsequently caused the whole server to then fall into a downward spiral.
We want to make clear that no private or personal information was seen or taken at any time. This was purely just on our webserver and private data wouldn’t of been accessible. Furthermore we don’t hold an account system (only for those that write for us and they’re aware). The commenting system doesn’t require a password and if you use a social network to post to our site, then those details are secured via that specific platform.
What we are doing?
With FSElite constantly growing, we have to be much more concious to how we handle incidents like this. We are aware of people currently attacking other websites in the community, so have to be very vigilant to ensure our property is protected and our users feel secure.
- We have changed all passwords relating to admin accounts
- We will introduce 2-step verification on our web server and WordPress account
- We have introduced new and more secure methods of logging into our web servers
- We have set up a new brute force protection software to prevent those types of attacks
- We will set up a secondary server to fall-back onto if needed
Back to normal?
Yes, we hope so.
We are going to work hard on catching up with the news and continue to provide the community with unique content as usual.
I can only express how sorry I am for the inconvenience and hope that this explanation continues to demonstrate our transparency with the community. I am still away on holiday/vacation (limited internet access) for another few days so my replies may be slower than usual, but please reach out if you have any concerns. Otherwise someone from the team will be in touch.
Thank you again.
