Security leaks could be
a big problem for any site using a communication
board. Hackers can actually make use of
your communication
board to go in and change things on your web site. This has happened to me at least four times. Once an iframe was added to every single page of one of my very large sites. Thankfully, I had it completely backed up, so all I had to do was send the pages back up to the server. Twice, the front page of one of my sites was hijacked. The entire content of the front page was replaced by some note from a hacker stating he had been there.
The last instant one of my sites had to be taken down to prevent the server from crashing. After calling my web host they we are
able to tell me my communication
board was the cause of the problem. I used, and still do on some sites, the phpbb communication
board. It is one of the most popular boards on the internet, and its costless. The web host technology
told me that the problem was that a virus of sorts had been placed onto the server, through the communication
board, in the message board folder, and was calling out to other servers causing a major load on my web hosts server. To fix the problem the web host tech found the document
and deleted it. After that, all I had to do was update to the latest version of phpbb and so far so great.
If you make use of
a popular message board like phpbb you positive need
to build sure youve always got the latest version. The more popular a message board is, the more hackers are likely to strike. Perhaps the familiarity is the problem or maybe the hackers understand
they can get a lot of bites going after a widely used board. As of this writing, the most current version of phpbb is 2.0.15. As the phpbb guys are always security conscious they have added to this version a re-authentication to access the administration panel.
Forums are a very important part of a internet site
, but they might
be the downfall if your board script is not updated on a regular basis.
