Posted on 03/28/2006 9:07:54 AM PST by N3WBI3
Oklahoma city threatens to call FBI over 'renegade' Linux maker Our mistake is YOUR problem By Ashlee Vance in Mountain View Published Friday 24th March 2006 20:20 GMT New year, new job? Click here for thousands of tech vacancies.
The heartland turned vicious this week when an Oklahoma town threatened to call in the FBI because its web site was hacked by Linux maker Cent OS. Problem is CentOS didn't hack Tuttle's web site at all. The city's hosting provider had simply botched a web server.
This tale kicked off yesterday when Tuttle's city manager Jerry Taylor fired off an angry message to the CentOS staff. Taylor had popped onto the city's web site and found the standard Apache server configuration boilerplate that appears with a new web server installation. Taylor seemed to confuse this with a potential hack attack on the bustling town's IT infrastructure. SPONSORED LINKS
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"Who gave you permission to invade my website and block me and anyone else from accessing it???," Taylor wrote to CentOS. "Please remove your software immediately before I report it to government officials!! I am the City Manager of Tuttle, Oklahoma."
Few people would initiate a tech support query like this, but these are dangerous times, and Taylor suspected the worst. (Er, but only the world's most boring hacker would break into a site and then throw up a boilerplate about how to fix the hack.)
CentOS developer Johnny Hughes jumped on the case and tried to explain the situation to Taylor.
"I feel sorry for your city," he replied in an e-mail. "CentOS is an operating system. It is probably installed on the computer that runs your website. . . . Please contact someone who does IT for you and show them the page so that they can configure your apache webserver correctly."
That response didn't go over so well.
"Get this web site off my home page!!!!! It is blocking access to my website!!!!~!," Taylor responded, clearly excited about the situation and sensing that Bin Laden was near.
Again, CentOS jumped in to try and explain some of the technical details behind the problem. It pointed Taylor to this page, saying it was the standard page for a web server and noted that it provides instructions on how to fix the problem. The CentOS staffer suggested that Taylor contact his service provider or have an administrator look into the issue.
That response didn't go over so well.
"Unless this software is removed I will file a complaint with the FBI," Taylor replied.
Later he added,
"I have four computers located at City Hall. All of these computers display the same CentOS page when attempting to bring up Tuttle-ok.gov. Now if your software is not causing this problem, how does it happen??? No one outside this building has complained about this problem. This is a block of public access to a city's website. Remove your software within the next 12 hours or an official complaint to the FBI is being filed!"
And later,
"I am computer literate! I have 22 years in computer systems engineering and operation. Now, can you tell me how to remove 'your software' that you acknowledge you provided free of charge? I consider this 'hacking.'"
After a few more exciting exchanges, CentOS managed to track down the problem for Taylor. It turns out that hosting provider Vidia Communications is running CentOS on some of its servers and had not configured the Tuttle web site properly. CentOS informed Taylor of the situation, and, a day later, Taylor had calmed down.
"The problem has been resolved by VIDIA who used to host the City website," he wrote. "They still provide cable service but do not host the website. The explanation was that they had a crash and during the rebuild they reinstalled the software that affected our website."
"I am sorry that we had to go through the process and accusations to get the problem resolved. It could have been resolved a lot quicker if the initial correspondence with you provided the helpful information that was transmitted in the last messages. My initial contact with VIDIA disallowed any knowledge of creating the problem."
Er, so despite the fact that CentOS went out of its way to figure out the problem for Tuttle, Taylor still places the blame on CentOS for not fixing the problem - that it didn't create - sooner. In addition, Taylor didn't really start off the whole process on the best foot despite Tuttle being a town "Where People Grow - Friendly!" Grow friendly, threaten to bring in the FBI at the drop of a hat - what's the difference?
As of this writing, one Tuttle web site still had not been fixed, although you can find the charming Tuttle man Taylor over here.
Taylor has yet to respond to our request for comment.
It seems that Tuttle has quite the hacking epidemic on its hands. The Tuttle Times newspaper's web site, for example, has had its Forum section cracked. Click at your own risk to see it or have a peek at our screen grab.
To see the full transcript of the web server war, travel over here. It's classic reading. ®
ROFL!
Great post!
I've seen moderators step in unasked for far less than what you have done.
The Register is just another one of the foreign websites you boys love to quote around here.
All of us know to take anything in The Register with a grain of salt and consult other sources. Unfortunately for you, we know the original source of the information and have verified.
Can't debunk what you pathetic troll? Here's what you said in your post
That's what happens when open source kooks like those at CentOS try to explain their commie philosophy to red blooded Americans, it simply doesn't make sense. So then they try to smear him in foreign newspapers and hack his computers. Typical.
Here's the thread that CentOS posted on their website:
http://www.centos.org/modules/news/article.php?storyid=127
It is not much more than a list of the emails as exchanged back and forth from the idiot at OKC to CentOS. How is that smearing him? The ignorant user was belligerent from the start, accusing them of installing software on his servers:
Thu, 23 Mar 2006 00:52:58 +0000 (Wed, 18:52 CST)
Jerry A. Taylor submitted the following Information:
Email xxxxxxx
Company City of Tuttle
Location Oklahoma
Comments
Who gave you permission to invade my website and block me and anyone else from accessing it???
Please remove your software immediately before I report it to government officials!!
I am the City Manager of Tuttle, Oklahoma.
The folks at CentOS attempted to explain the situation, but it was like talking to a brick wall. (Have any Freepers out there experienced similar frustrations when responding to our resident troll?) Eventually, the pathetic whining of the OKC city manager provided enough information for the fellow at CentOS to determine what the problem was.
Rather than apologize, the bureaucrat at OKC accused the guy at CentOS of not being helpful enough in the initial messages, even though he'd correctly identified the problem in his first email exchange.
In your usual trollish manner you accuse CentOS of "hack(ing) his computers."
As usual, you either have displayed once again that you can't read, or you just pulled that right out of your ass as a smear of your own.
Well...most of us us got the joke. :-)
Thanks for the ping - the raw transcript of emails is just hilarious. Gave me a nice giggle this morning.
Man, and I thought I had a bad day or two.
What would you suggest they should have done to resolve the situation?
You can't easily resolve a situation when the guy in question doesn't actually ask for help, but instead throws around unfounded accusations. They helped this guy despite himself.
Who are they other than some copyleftists who make their entire living by plagiarizing the work of others?
Show evidence of plagiarism, i.e., copyright violation, or retract. You have just accused these people of a tortious act, which would be easily your second instance of libel recently.
Looks like the first words out of CentOS mouth was "I feel sorry for your city". You call that trying to help the guy with his problem?
What, are you denying CentOS isn't a bunch of copyleftists whose product isn't anything more than a cheap copy of the work of others? Of course it is, why are you always trying to cover for these guys?
And the first words that were given to them were:
"Who gave you permission to invade my website and block me and anyone else from accessing it??? Please remove your software immediately before I report it to government officials!! I am the City Manager of Tuttle, Oklahoma."
The guy emails them a threat when he had no clue what their software was and played up his position as a city manager in order to add to the appearance of authority...
While they did poke at tuttle they also gave him the information he needed:
"CentOS is an operating system. It is probably installed on the computer that runs your website.
We hope you are happy with it, since we produced it for free and you are able to use it without paying us ... and are even threatening to have us arrested for providing to you free of charge.
Please contact someone who does IT for you and show them the page so that they can configure your apache webserver correctly."
Then after "Get this web site off my home page!!!!!, It is blocking access to my website!!!!~!"
It is not a website ... it is the operating system.
I would be glad to help you configure your webserver.
Do you own the machine that your web site is on, or is it at a hosting provider.
This gave poor old Jerry an out and he refused to take it. He was so bold as to say "I have no fear of the media, in fact I welcome this publicity."
The sorry man brought this on himself..
Ive just read that people are starting to use the term 'tuttle' to refer to an unreasonable support request...
Well for me I give the authority of any discussion to the city manager of a city in America that is questioning access to his server during the time our nation is at war.
"I feel sorry for your city" is an insult, and not only was it the first words out of their mouth it came from a bunch of guys who could easily be confused with actual hackers. Look at their product, it's basically a rip off of another anyway.
I doubt this guy from Oklahoma regrets one bit of what he did. So what if the propeller heads got spun up about it, they'll never be city manager anyway.
Bwahahahahahah....
Its such a matter of national importance that even days after being told how to fix it the site stays down.... I sure hope our boys in Iraq are not being hurt by missing this website..
I doubt this guy from Oklahoma regrets one bit of what he did.
If he does not then he is a bigger fool than he appears.. He is now asking people to stop talking about it despite the fact he "welcomes the media attention".
they'll never be city manager anyway.
I seriously doubt most peoples goal in life is to make 63K to manage a 'city' of a little over four thousand people (where I come from thats called a town at best..
When the first words of an unsolicited e-mail begin with "Who gave you permission to invade my website and block me and anyone else from accessing it???" then the first line of the response is justified.
Well for me I give the authority of any discussion to the city manager of a city in America that is questioning access to his server during the time our nation is at war.
A "city" of less than 4,300 people. Having grown up in such a city, that doesn't speak well for his capability, but it (and his e-mails) speaks volumes about his assumptions of his capability.
A rather sick attempt at a joke in support of the copylefts at CentOS. Computer security is important at all times but especially those like these, this man is in charge of it at a city in our nation, and CentOS is a bunch of hackers who obviously don't respect his position or authority to question them on the issue.
I seriously doubt most peoples goal in life is to make 63K to manage a 'city'
So what if it's a small city, it is a city in America, and deserves to be responded to appropriately. These CentOS are a bunch of freeloaders who spend all their time making copies of software which is given away for free. You call that smart, LOL.
The only thing that irritates me more than clueless users, are clueless Techs that they call in who insist that a problem is software instead of their network that they put together.
Happens daily in my office.
You guys just don't have any manners. Rude, Crude, then think it funny. A proper response would have started with "Sir", an acceptable one would have been "I'm not sure what you are referring to", not "I feel sorry for your city". That statement has no hope of allowing respectable communication to ever take place.
That guy was concerned about his security, and I can guarantee you Sun or Microsoft or Apple won't be treating their customers this way, else it end up in the Register as well, but with the shore planted firmly on the other foot.
I can see the headline now, if a US COMPANY was involved:
"Apple/MS/Sun tells customer 'I feel sorry for your city' in response to security concern."
Smaller print:
"Still no formal apology"
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