Gents,
Some of you may have recently experienced frustrating delays and/or errors loading pages and forms. This was due to both unprecedented cyber brute force attacks and new DD0S attacks on our website by hackers in multiple countries.
Brute force attacks repeatedly try to crack administrator passwords to gain unauthorized access and DDoS attacks bombard the site with coordinated zombies/botnets to flood the server and slow it down or even crash it. Welcome to 2021!
I’ve been monitoring these attacks and tightening our login requirements using several tools. So far I can confirm that no breach has occurred although our website has been very slow at times.
With https our site already offers the most secure server side connectivity as is possible so for all users/members there is no need to do anything other than ensure you follow safe internet practices, such as:
- ensuring your connection to our site is always secure – via https only (you will see a little lock icon beside the address);
- use a unique password for your Scratch32 account to ensure that should any breach ever occur your password is useless for any other web related services;
- change your password regularly; and
- avoid using auto login on your computer.
Remember that under ‘My Profile’ you can also add/remove/edit your own contact information at any time. Please ensure that you only provide as much information as you are comfortable with. To have a Scratch32 account you only need to provide a valid login ID and email address – the rest is superfluous.
Scratch32 does not process payments, payment information of any kind nor any financial transaction at all. Links to products from any of our advertisers are handled and processed separately and independently through their own secure servers. No data whatsoever is shared. For example, our title sponsor DArt processes every financial transaction through square.com .
For those of you who I may not see over the upcoming break – stay well this holiday season and I would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Remember that if we all do our part we will continue to keep Scratch32 safer for all of us to use for years to come.
The Happy Canadian Scale Modeler!
