Hacking Attacks - Small Business Sites Being

On Christmas Eve one of my websites was hacked. It was a WordPress blog site. The hackers caused considerable damage to the site.

But the most worrisome thing is that the hackers managed to hijack part of the site for a few days and insert hundreds of fake links to pharma, ringtone and adult sites -- links that were not visible to me or to readers. It took quite a bit of work and time to clean out the hackers' crud, revert to backups, and get everything working again.

I just wanted to point out my experience so that others would be forewarned.

I wrote a long piece about it, along with some tips, in case you want to know how to protect your site. My tips focus on WordPress sites, because there are almost 3 million out there and they make an attractive target. But many of the same principles apply to other types of sites.

http://www.smallbiztrends.com/2008/02/hacked-it-could-never-happen-to-my-site-famous-last-words.html/

Message me if you have any particular questions on this topic, or have experienced a similar problem.

Anita

PS, in the process of researching the issue, I stumbled upon evidence that a friend's blog (someone here in NEOhio) had also been compromised for 2 months and she didn't even realize it. So, it does happen right here in our neck of the woods.