Preventative - How to avoid being Hacked by TeamPS i.e. p0wersurge
 

No doubt some of you have already been defaced at some point in the past, what I aim to do is make a quick post letting you know a few simple tips to avoid or recover from this and also help you re-secure your site if you've recently recovered from such activity.

Lately what I've noticed is on older versions namely pre 4.1.4 a group of hackers have been exploiting the Admin Username and Password through member groups and the search feature, granting them access to the forum in question to do so as they wish. The main goal of the information outlined below is to help you prevent this from happening by adding in some additional security to your admin and moderator control panels with .htaccess. Initially newer versions were not affected by this however after a recent post on vBulletin.org I'm not sure what other methods they are using - https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=275715 so let's go ahead and remedy this shall we?

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If your currently secure:
1) .htaccess protect your admincp and modcp here are some useful links;
.htaccess authentication generator:
http://www.htaccesstools.com/htaccess-authentication/
.htaccess password generator:
http://www.htaccesstools.com/htpasswd-generator/

Now if they are able to somehow obtain your primary admin account username and password they can only do so much damage... why? Well your admin control panel now requires a completely different username and password before you can even login, without server/ftp access they can never bypass this.

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If you've been defaced:
1) Try restoring to a backup before you were hacked, if not possible recover the best way you can.
2) Change database passwords *Don't forget to update the config.php files for vBulletin and any other software running on your site.
3) Change FTP account passwords.
4) Change admin account passwords.
5) .htaccess protect your admincp and modcp here are some useful links;
.htaccess authentication generator:
http://www.htaccesstools.com/htaccess-authentication/
.htaccess password generator:
http://www.htaccesstools.com/htpasswd-generator/
6) Check to see if they added any admin accounts, on one site they changed the primary admin account name to what they desired and went so far as to re-create the admin accounts w/ the same details but no admin permissions to throw the site owners off for a little bit.
7) Use this guide and ensure your site is 100% clean - http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/blogs...iller/3934768-

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*Use a entirely different username and complex password when creating the .htaccess and .htpasswd files. Also on that note, be sure the .htpasswd is stored above public_html i.e. in /home/accountnamehere/.htpasswds

**Wayne Luke of the vBulletin.com team also posted some very sound advice here, please take the time to read his post - https://www.vbulletin.com/forum/show...=1#post2245651

lolz that doesnt secure you at all it only secures the admincp but not that good theres tools for it I know becuase ive seen people do it and i had it all you need is a good hosting with alot of security cloudflare htaccess and no vuln and all that thats how you get secured

I've never understood posts like the one above ^ - Not trying to be rude but either post "How-To" or don't post comments like that at all in my threads please, anywhere else go ahead however imo it does help if the one gaining access to your site knows nothing more than the context of the tutorial or video he/she is viewing correct? Case in point.

Your exactly right though, there's other ways that are much better however in my initial post above I clearly stated:

Pay attention and read between the lines so your not presented with a response like this in the future, everyone should be well prepared :cool:.

Great article. You are definitely a superman.

No he is not....he is the LAST SUPERMAN!! ;)

Thank you for this article. :up:

Check my Article out that secures your site from Shells. plus Im working a tool that scans and when finds shells it removes them me and relevant are doing it so once its done it will be out to public but in the mean time use my article look at my threads

--------------- Added [DATE]1324909616[/DATE] at [TIME]1324909616[/TIME] ---------------

Im a pro hacker and a pro secure I know alot of basic but vb4.1.9 had too many LFI and RFI docks in them so thats why they are easir plus thats why I made my thread on how to block shells ill make a tut later


Sorry for my grammer just woke up

Basically vBulletin websites doesn't have RFI / LFI Injections... In based the files aren't supporting these kind of LFI or RFI injections... Just letting you know ;)

Yeah I know, I thought they where. Tm currently working on my tool to prevent hacking and shells. It might be possible but my other coder said it will take time.

the best method is to encypt the config.php & class_core.php.

and keep a backup on ur pc.

and disable html in posts.

and change the path for config.php & change admincp folder to other and keeping the old name as an ambush.

Sorry but someone who could access your server to have read rights for config.php (meaning the code) would have no problems with a simple copy & paste and then decode everything.

One thing to add maybe - if the site got defaced then the usual way would be to do a complete reinstall. Just copying in backups would also copy the security issue again someone used for the defacement.