We have been hit hard from servers out of Ukraine and other foreign locations. It was/is clearly well organized.

It is costing us quite a bit for tech support to fix this problem, so we will be asking for fund raising shortly. Our annual funding from March of 2013 has run out. We have not done a fund drive this year. We only do it once and keep the money collected to what we expect our costs are for 1 year. The DOS attack unfortunately was not budgeted. We run an extremely modest budget and no volunteer is paid.


Before we even started a fund raising $658 was received. Thanks! A sticky going up later today. I estimate $3800 needed for the year. After I pay a current bill we will have around $900 in the account. This does not include a bill for the DoS attack work. The bulk of account pays for tech support for things like the DoS attack and managing our dedicated server and other services that pop up.

Our ISP has blocked some ranges. We will need to go through the logs so legit posters will be able to get through. I finally have a free weekend.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/23/2014 07:00AM by Eric K.

Could be anyone, with technology the way it is you can launch and attack from anywhere to anywhere while sitting anywhere. If they didn't cover their tracks properly, a good investigation might be able to link it back to someone. Wait and see if something turns up, I suppose.

FAIRLDS is not "affiliated" with LDS Inc. but is full of people sympathetic to a potential demise of RfM.

I can only guess that this attack is not from LDS Inc. but someone attempting to further their cause.

I would love to see how LDS Inc. could be funding FAIRLDS. That would be interesting. As for this attack, there is not much information or could be?

I have a Masters in Information Security. DDOS attacks are fairly common and pretty easy to carry out, especially if you have access to a bonnet. The organization I work for gets attacked a lot (government), and we have very expensive devices (IPS) to fight them off.

Let us know, I'll throw in some funds to help.

> especially if you have access to a bonnet

And most people in Utah come from pioneer stock and no doubt have an old bonnet or two in a trunk in the attic. ;)

Do you believe it's possible to "spoof" that the attack was coming from the Ukraine? Possibly using a VPN or something to that effect?

Possible? I would bet you a week's pay that the attacks did not originate in the Ukraine, but a spoof or zombie of some sort is being used. The most likely suspect is going to be American and Mormon. Mormon be ause nobody else would give a shit about attacking this website and American because there are bigger fish to fry in the non English speaking ex Mormon world, and Mormonism is really only relevent in the US anymore (at least among the English speaking world).

That's what I figured. The people in the Ukraine have a million other real problems going on(like Russia)than to be dealing with Mormon crap. I'm just curious about the technical details of how it could be done.

Google botnet and see what you find out. It's a crazy world in which the hacksters setup bots (small automated programs) on various systems that they've been able to compromise. When they want to lauch a DDOS attack, they tell those bots to send http requests to the designated target server, which is then flooded with so many requests that it can no longer function. Kind of like trying to get a drink of water from a fire hose. In that scenario you would turn away from the hose, but the web servers being targeted are sitting ducks.

While the person pushing the button is likely American, I actually don't doubt the attack itself is coming from a machine in the Ukraine, no real point in spoofing that.

As this is a simple bulletin board, I also think it's more likely a DOS than a DDOS, it would not take a botnet to overwhelm a basic message board.

johnnyboy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> That's what I figured. The people in the Ukraine
> have a million other real problems going on(like
> Russia)than to be dealing with Mormon crap. I'm
> just curious about the technical details of how it
> could be done.
=================================
From what I've seen the hacker people and bad apples in
the Ukraine only go after sites when there's something in
it for them, such as money or identity theft.
Ain't none of that here, which makes me suspicious of
someone a whole lot closer to home using a VPN or
otherwise makin it *look* like it's from the Ukraine!

~Reggie the CyberDog

I'll throw in some funds too.

Please let us know the details of how/where to donate. I'm happy to be part of something that gets TSCC's gander up.

I'm pretty sure it's 'dander' but some agree that i am not well educated.

Mom says I'm gettin a bit too fat so I'll chip in a bit from my dog biscuit fund!

But I would RATHER be bitin me some Ukranian ankles! Ah, Eastern European achilles tendons... sounds SO tasty!

Mom says I'm gettin a bit too fat anyways so I'll chip in a bit from my dog biscuit fund!

But I would RATHER be bitin me some Ukranian ankles! Ah, Eastern European achilles tendons... sounds SO tasty!

Wish I had opposable thumbs!

Thanks Eric - just tell us when and how to donate and it will be done :-)

Tom in Paris

I'll donate.

I'm in.

Done and done via the handy donate link. Long live rfm

Eric,
Yes please create a sticky thread at the top of the rfm main recovery page when you decide to start the fundraiser. My wife and I would be happy to donate. It's because of RfM that we both found the support that we needed to give us the courage to finally leave.
Thank you,
Virgil.

will there be a sticky on how to donate? I would submit that asking for help (instead of demanding it for hoped for blessings . .. ahem) would not be ignored . . . .

Same here, I'm all for donating to RfM. Just let me know how to do it :) Good luck with dealing with this DOS attack and I hope the investigation turns up something useful!

I have donated in the past and will continue to help you whenever you need it, Eric. I have been coming here since the late 90's when the site was very new and I was mentally leaving LDS Inc.

RFM has saved my mind when I thought I was going insane. I don't know what I would do if I did not have this amazing resource and the very loving people who run it and post on it.

I would love to donate

I'm willing to help as well.
In fact, I'll take it out of my 10%-increase-from-not-paying-tithing-fund.

I'm happy to contribute too. I wondered why I couldn't access the site today.

Paypal would make things easy for me.

In like flint

Is there anything we can do in the meantime?

I learned math on a slide rule so I really don't understand all this technology.

Second question. Do you think the attack was done thinking they would be hurting the actual church? Maybe the attackers didn't understand their target?

This validates the claim that the Mormon God is a sneaky little deceptive punk with His ilk at His service.

Mormon God, no Bueno, es del Diablo. (Mormon God, no Good, he's of the Devil)

This board saved me from getting insane, this board saved the Guy from getting brainwahed and to learn the Truth about T$CC. We met great ppl who encouraged us to walk the way out of that cult into a self-determined free life - we would love to contribute!

is on the main page http://exmormon.org/ at the absolute bottom of the page. I, too, have donated in the past, and I assume the donate button still works. I'll find out after I've done my bills.

Yup

It still works - just donated from France with PayPal

Thanks Eric and the rest of the team for what you do

Long live RfM

Tom in Paris

donated. Thanks for everything Eric.

Sent what I could, thanks Eric

Donated. Thank you for making this site available.

Will gladly donate

I don't see link to donate. How is it done?

It's right down the bottom of the main page.

It took me straight to paypal, so I suspect it will take you there too.

Tom in Paris

Thanks, made a small donation. I don't have a lot of extra money but this site is important to me. People who understand and daily I get a good laugh.

Thanks to Susan and Eric and all others who run it.

He has been having to work in SC. He always handles donations so I am not sure how everything is set up but he should be home later today and I will find out more. And yes, we are going to report this.

Please accept my modest donation, Eric. I have a lot invested in this site in a psychological sense.

Donated.

My NOM DW wanted to know if RfM stands for "Rotten F-in' Mormons" haha.

Yep, I haven't been able to log in - keep getting messages that my server is blocked! Happy to donate later when I can get back on.

fiis ri......?
good to see that the site is up again.
Our cult enemies and their sympathizers can't shut us down.

I think it's way too premature to speculate that the LDS church caused this DDoS. The site remained up and running well throughout the Philips trial, the FLDS raids, and lots of other, far-more embarrassing events.

A distributed denial of service attack requires access to a botnet of some sort; this can be willing conspirators (like what Anonymous has done with Scientology in the past) or people whose machines have been compromised without their knowledge. The former is unlikely, and the LDS IT department doesn't have the chops for the latter. Correspondingly, the risk of exposure if an investigation pointed the finger at the LDS church is very high and would be quite embarrassing to the leadership.

Let's not make easy, hasty conclusions absent any evidence.

Thanks for dealing with this issue, Eric. It can't be fun. RfM must be a thorn in someone's side.

In the ten months since I found this forum, I've developed a deep appreciation for its effects and sincere respect for those who run it from the goodness and wisdom of their own hearts and from their own pockets. Without downplaying or under appreciating the work of the adminsitrators and the frustration the DOS attacks must be causing, I'm laughing my ass off to think the almighty, 13 million strong and growing, followers of the most important prophet in history and led by a living prophet, seer and revelator, holder of the keys to the kingdom, one-true-church is threatened by an internet chat board, and threatened to the point it feels it needs to cloak its vandalism.

Brothers and sisters, all is not well in Zion.

"you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
John 8:32

Tell her where to donate $, and tell me who to bite.