Under attack. Please Help.

sounds like someone is going to a lot of trouble.
no one just attacks a small computer company for no reason

Originally posted by Ventessa
Hello ATS.

Let me start by saying...I am NOT a computer tech, so if I use words like thingamabob, please don't be offended.

My place of work is under some kind of cyber attack. All the emails in our office are getting spammed with about 600 spam messages per hour. Also, the phones are going INSANE. They will ring, but when you answer them, no one is there, and it just disconnects and starts ringing again.

If anyone has any experience with anything like this...how the

do you stop it???!!! It's about to drive me bonkers...


Ventessa

You can't say who you work for?????

But you do say you you are not a computer TECH (above)

but later you say at work your company

we "fix" computers and such

Hmmmmmm...sounds like cow excrement to me.

Maybe if you are working in the field of computers but dont know about computers, it might have pissed off your customers. It would piss me off!!

reply to post by ANNED


Possibly. Gotta see how many unique numbers are calling .

Used to build machines used for predictive dialing, and telemarketing. those were sooo much fun to turn loose on an unsuspecting buddy. However, they only output from the same mnumbers, depending upon how many lines they support.

reply to post by sixswornsermon


This is an inside job. They knew EVERTHING they needed to know to pull this off. They had the smarts to do it, but they lacked the common sense NOT to. I'm pretty sure the boss knows who it is by now.

It's funny though...I didn't get a single spam message. Guess I didn't get on his bad side. That's cool.

A conspiracy in the making. *pulls up seat*

reply to post by Six6Six


There are more positions in the office than just Techs. I am one of the non-tech workers there. I do other, smaller, less meaningful tasks. If it was bull I wouldn't have asked for advice.
Things are getting taken care of now. We just didn't want to interrupt the boss, he was teaching a class.

reply to post by jazzguy


I didn't say it was for no reason.
I'm sure the person doing it has a grudge.

any updates? This was fun for the hour it was happening.

reply to post by Absco


They are still trying to fix it. We still don't know "for sure" who did it, but we have a short list of suspects, so it's not going to be hard to find out. Last I heard, my boss had over 3,000 spam emails. The phones are completely shut down. It's madness.

wow, sorry this all happened. On Wednesday nonetheless. (no significance but it is hump day :lol

I have 34 spam emails. I pray to whatever deity that I never get 3,000 telling me I can increase my penis size or a prince needs funds.

reply to post by Absco


Lmaorof! I think these were all just jumbled words. They were nonsense emails.
I just hope I can do my job tomorrow. If this is still going on, I won't be able to. Guess I could always study up on something to get certified in ... something.

You should get certified in computer animation. No significance to what you do but all I can say is it's fun. I have fun at least.

reply to post by Absco


They don't offer that where I work, but if they did I would be all over it. I'll probably end up talking to one or more of my co-workers all day. At least until they fix this mess. OFFICE PARTY!

reply to post by Absco


Love
It!!! haha!

Originally posted by Ventessa
reply to post by Absco

 

Lmaorof! I think these were all just jumbled words. They were nonsense emails.
I just hope I can do my job tomorrow. If this is still going on, I won't be able to. Guess I could always study up on something to get certified in ... something.

Sounds like (sadly) your geeks are young folks.

We old folks know this one. Someone has an email with a simple trojan (it sounds like the old "I Love You" trojan.)

First -- contact EVERYONE IN THE COMPANY AND TELL THEM TO STOP USING THE MAIL.

Shut down the email server (it'll probably be down most of the day.) You can use Internet based emails (like Gmail) but not the work server.

While the server is offline, the topmost guru (who can deal with mail issues) should tiptoe in and figure out where the toxic message is and delete the whole thing. Meanwhile, a second team needs to go to all the computers and run virus and malware checks. (you will need TWO virus checkers because they actually aren't getting the same thing.) Do this AFTER someone has gone out to MacAfee and so forth and read all the latest trojan warnings on what's hot.

The phones... sounds like a "wargames dialer" from the 1980's. Have the phone company deal with it.

FINALLY -- Do a bit of preemptive disaster control -- call your major clients and ask if they've had this problem. It *MAY* have come from one of them OR your system MAY have infected some of the clients. In either case, it's a good chance to step in and do a bit of good work and teach people about cyber security.

...which means
* don't open mails with videos or attachments unless you know the person
* turn off the preview feature if you're using Microsoft Outlook
* install spam filters
* clean out your mailbox
* be sure your whole network does subscribe to the RBL (Black Hole) list.


Ahhh... those were the days. Been there, did that, with a municipality that had a thousand computers.

Originally posted by Ventessa
reply to post by Absco

 

They are still trying to fix it. We still don't know "for sure" who did it, but we have a short list of suspects, so it's not going to be hard to find out. Last I heard, my boss had over 3,000 spam emails. The phones are completely shut down. It's madness.

Forensics is easy. Find the initial email, backtrack the headers. Pull some strings at the email host.

reply to post by atoptreetops


this is way more than a dos attack.
and dos attacks can be done without hacking into anything. All you need is an IP address.

Sounds like you are having a very intense cyber attack. do you guys have a VOIP system? that would help explain the phone system.

reply to post by Six6Six


its probly geek squad!!

Originally posted by VonDoomen
reply to post by atoptreetops

 

this is way more than a dos attack.
and dos attacks can be done without hacking into anything. All you need is an IP address.

Sounds like you are having a very intense cyber attack. do you guys have a VOIP system? that would help explain the phone system.

This sounds exactly like a DOS attack, with a dialer added in for fun. The OP never indicated that anything was compromised, as in servers. Just because they are receiving mass E-Mails does not mean the mail server was compromised. A VOIP phone system is not required for a compromise most script kiddies can achieve the results with a simple dialer PCI card on their MOBO. All they needed was a phone number....