Hacked phpBB Forum Clean Up
Your phpBB forum can be hacked due to an outdated phpBB installation, outdated MODs, or compromised FTP credentials. When a phpBB forum is hacked, the hack is used to insert malicious code that performs one or more harmful activities. Hacks can have a serious impact on the traffic that your forum receives. A hack that distributes malware can cause the forum to be blocked from visitors and a hack that inserts spam can cause the forum's search rankings to drop or cause the forum to be removed from Google's search engine. If your phpBB forum has been hacked we can clean it up for you and work with you to secure it against a future hack.
Some of the most prevalent activities preformed by the malicious code are inserting hidden spam links in the forum's pages, creating spam pages, redirecting visitors to another website, and attempting to install malware on the computers of visitors to the forum. When a phpBB forum is hacked, the inserted code may perform one or several different activities. When the hack inserts hidden spam links or creates spam pages, your search rankings can drop significantly and Google may remove it from their search engine's index if they detect hidden text, cloaking, or other violations of their quality guidelines. If Google has removed the forum they will place a "Notice of Suspected Hacking" message in their Webmaster Tools indicating that this has been done. When the hack inserts code that attempts to infect the computers of visitors to the forum with a virus, trojan horse, drive-by download, or other type of malware (malicious software), not only could your visitor's computers become infected but your forum may also be blocked from visitors. The forum may be flagged and blocked in the Internet Explorer ("This website has been reported as unsafe"), Firefox ("Reported Attack Site!"), Safari ("Warning: Visiting this site may harm your computer"), Chrome ("Warning: Visiting this site may harm your computer!"), and Opera ("Fraud Warning") web browsers. It may also be flagged and blocked in the Google ("This site may harm your computer."), Yahoo ("Warning: Dangerous Downloads"), and or Bing search engines as well as Google's AdWords advertising service and Twitter ("unsafe link"). The hacker can also place a backdoor script that allows them remote access to the forum to make future changes to it.
The hacks can be hidden in a variety of places and might only be active when the forum is visited in a particular way. The hacks may be located in phpBB files, MODs, templates, or the database. The most common form of malware infection places an iframe or JavaScript code into the website's pages. When the code inserts hidden spam links, these links may only be in the page if the request comes from a crawler for a search engine. When the code redirects a visitor or attempts to infect a visitor's computer with malware, the attempt may only occur if a visitor comes to the forum through Google or another search engine. When coming to the forum directly, it will appear to be normal. If you are not sure if your forum has been hacked, please feel free to contact us to confirm whether it is hacked.
To clean up the forum, we will review the forum's files and database for code inserted during the hack and remove that code. If the forum is running on an old version of phpBB, the current version is 3.0.7-PL1, we will upgrade the forum to the latest version of phpBB following proper upgrade procedures. Also, if any MODs are out of date we will update them. Checking and cleaning the forum's files takes a few hours. We will also work with you to secure the forum against a future hack. If your forum has been removed from the Google search engine we will assist you in filing a reconsideration request. If your forum was distributing malware and has been flagged and blocked, we will assist you in requesting a malware review from Google, Yahoo, and or Bing to have the warning removed. It should take no more than a day to be removed from Google's malware blacklist after a review has been requested.
Price:
250.00 USD, payment is due after the website has been cleaned up and we accept payment by credit card, debit card, or eCheck through PayPal in a number of currencies.
