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Barbelith, ease my worried mind ...

 
 
Linus Dunce
15:10 / 07.01.04
So, Flowers has had her suit "hijacked" by an obsessive weirdo.

OK, now, what does that mean? Is it that the weirdo has somehow obtained Flowers' password? How did the weirdo do this? Was Flowers' password easy to guess? Or was it hacked mechanically, say by a dictionary attack? (BTW, would this explain the recent unusually slow speed of Barbelith?) Or by more subtle means? It didn't "just happen." And it's unlikely that Weirdrew managed to sneak in to Flowers' place of work and copy her cookies, so logging off is not the issue.

And, leading on from this, it seems to me that there is at least one board user that can identify trolls as being from Wales simply by reading a few of their words. My apologies if they really do have this ability, but is it possible for this person to read my IP address?
 
 
rizla mission
17:03 / 07.01.04
Sorry to only answer with another question, but what's a 'Dictionary Attack'? Sounds terrifying.
 
 
Linus Dunce
17:15 / 07.01.04
Rizla, a dictionary attack, as I understand it, is one in which the weirdo runs a script or program that tries to log on using every word in the dictionary as a password, one after the other, until it finds the right one.
 
 
Tom Coates
17:20 / 07.01.04
With regards to passwords, security and the like - could I remind people that if they're going to use hotmail accounts they should KEEP THEM CURRENT AND WORKING, since if they lose their account and someone else signs up for it, then they'll have access to your passwords and the like. Can I also DEMAND that people make sure their passwords are relatively tough and unguessable (without considerable difficulty at least). I'm going to look into further security issues around cookies and the like at my next available opportunity. In the meantime, can I just ask everyone to let me know if they see our little friend misbehaving anywhere. Hopefully we've already resolved the situation, but if not...
 
 
Bed Head
17:21 / 07.01.04
seems to me that there is at least one board user that can identify trolls as being from Wales simply by reading a few of their words

Where does this happen?
 
 
The Falcon
20:17 / 07.01.04
See Haus beautiful use of Swansea City's badge in the 'What Do Men Find Attractive?' thread.

I didn't even notice the first time, 'twas so subtle.

I do feel sorry for any nice Welsh posters sometimes.
 
 
Bed Head
21:05 / 07.01.04
Oh wow. Who needs IP address tracking when you’ve got Haus?

Also, I seem to remember reading on Flowers’ blog a while ago about hir not being able to log on to Barbelith for some password-related reason. Does this help anyone in tracking down the security hole?
 
 
Jack Fear
21:30 / 07.01.04
Who needs IP address tracking when you’ve got Haus?

Pfft. That's nothing: some of our posters can smell pedophiles from across the sea...
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
22:31 / 07.01.04
Then again, your paedophiles tends not to pay much attention to personal hygeine.

And, leading on from this, it seems to me that there is at least one board user that can identify trolls as being from Wales simply by reading a few of their words. My apologies if they really do have this ability, but is it possible for this person to read my IP address?

No. At least, not to my knowledge. IP adress checking is Tom Coates's ability only, as far as I know. If others believe that a suit is the ingrowing trollnail, they are best off mentioning it to Tom, who can check the IP adress. This is not entirely efficient: the common IP addresses used by persistent trolls have already been isolated, after all.

However, it's really quite easy to identify posts by the boy; his conceptual and actual vocabularies are startlingly limited and he makes the same clunky use of grammar and sentence construction every time. You don't want to go in too hard too early, in case of errors, but it usually becomes clear pretty quickly.
 
 
Harm
22:51 / 07.01.04
He's got a book coming out hasn't he?
 
 
Tryphena Absent
23:29 / 07.01.04
His subject matter is often quite limited as well. Everyone has a posting style and a lot of people are easy to spot because it doesn't tend to shift that much even if they are using multiple suits. Actually I'd hazard a guess that there are a couple of people around who used to post under different names at the moment though I'm not sure who they were- I keep recognising styles but not quite being able to place them. It's quite frustrating.
 
 
Linus Dunce
00:04 / 08.01.04
Well, I missed him the first 27 times around, so I can't spot him as easily as you older hands.

Though it does appear that he has guessed Flowers' new password.
 
 
Tryphena Absent
00:13 / 08.01.04
Yes, interesting that.
 
 
Bed Head
00:15 / 08.01.04
Man, nobody can just 'guess' two passwords that easy, that quickly. There's also the 'who will I be next' thing. Maybe its bullshit, but maybe theres something else.
 
 
Tryphena Absent
00:20 / 08.01.04
What will happen will happen. Let's just be sensible.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
18:38 / 08.01.04
Yeah. He's a disturbed young man with some issues, which we will no doubt all have a chance to read about in his highly original book, "The Unsievables", about a secret group of young magic-using anarchists who refuse to help their mum with the cooking NO MATTER HOW MUCH SHE COMPLAINS, led by a young man with a sexy Swansea accent, psychic ninja skills and the premature male pattern baldness the ladies love. It's not a big deal. Business as usual, Delete the posts, lock the threads, tweak the IP blocks. No big.
 
 
odd jest on horn
17:45 / 01.02.04
If Flower's new password has been "guessed", I bet that he's got access to hir hotmail. Or he's using dictionary attacks and Flower's not adding random stuff to hir password.

On an embarrassing note, I had my hotmail account hacked through the secret question, which I had set when I was a wee li'l kid. My password was quite unhackable, but the secret question... sheesh. So watch out for that too.
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
15:00 / 02.02.04
Well, I've had no access since Thursday as Tom suspended my account believing it had been hacked by Andrew again. Whether or not that was the case I've changed all my email accounts passwords and my one on here.

I do notice meanwhile that someone called fffdddfff is displaying Callo tendencies in the Conversation. Has anyone mentioned this to Tom yet?

As it is, I feel the need for a big discussion about devolving more powers on the board which I shall start when I have the time...
 
 
Smoothly
21:23 / 02.02.04
That's my suspicion too. And since he's operating at least three suits, so it might be worth a mod having a word in his ear regardless.
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
16:01 / 03.02.04
Communication with Callo is pointless. As I and several others know, he's perfectly happy to spin you a line but at the end he wants to post her and it's been decided he's not allowed. Read the Knowledge FAQ if you want but this isn't a discussion any more.
 
 
Smoothly
07:45 / 04.02.04
Sorry Flowers, I didn't really mean 'regardless of whether it's Calo'; I meant more, 'suspicions that it's Calo aside, someone might mention to tdtrg/ffffdfffff/Tedy that multiple suits aren't accepted'. My mistake. I'm up to speed on the Knowledge situation I think. I didn't mean to seem ignorant of, or insensitive to, the nightmare's you've had with him.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
01:10 / 09.02.04
As it is, I feel the need for a big discussion about devolving more powers on the board

Good luck with that...
 
 
Tryphena Absent
02:05 / 09.02.04
Isn't it about time luck was left behind?
 
 
---
04:06 / 09.02.04
Mix numbers in with your password and then put numbers either : At the beginning, end, or on either side of your password.

A dictionary attack will fail if the word has numbers mixed in with it.
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
16:56 / 21.02.04
The current situation is that Tom has the board set so that when Calo tries to hack into my account it suspends my account. I then have to email Tom to get my account back. Therefore, if Calo is trying to hack into my account then he doesn't need to get in to cause me problems.
 
 
Tom Coates
20:39 / 21.02.04
Actually no - that's not true. What I have it set at is if a banned user SUCCEEDS in logging in as another non-banned user then the user name they have just logged in as is automatically banned. So actually he DOES need to actually get in to cause you problems. That is PRECISELY why I'm being bloody careful letting you in again!

I KNOW that you're not doing any of this, and I KNOW that you're as much a victim in this than anyone, but for some reason no one else has been affected by this problem so in the absence of any other information I HAVE to assume that it's to do with the way you're handling your personal web security even if you're not. Let me say it again - EVERY. TIME. I. LET. YOU. BACK. INTO. THE. BOARD. A. BANNED. USER. MANAGES. TO. LOGIN. TO. YOUR. ACCOUNT. That's why you're having trouble.

With regard to devolving power down to people on the board - GOD I'D BLOODY LOVE TO! On the other hand, you guys already have pretty much the most devolved board on the internet, and in the absence of Cal, there's only so much I can do to rebuild the place in the image of the enlightened community that we'd all like to make. So give me a break already, or go and install Slash somewhere and move the community there!
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
10:06 / 22.02.04
Why Tom, I've never seen you so forceful before!
 
 
Issaiah Saysir
17:10 / 24.02.04
Why make a mockery when the man is obviously trying to accomodate you? Near as I can tell, Tom's suspicions about you are quite walid. It is with a mixed kindness/niavette that he allows the "hijacked suit" continue on. It is not the first time suits have been impersonated on the board.

These flowers smell funny.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
18:30 / 24.02.04
Says the suit with eleven posts to its name.

Even though the temptation is to make an exception in your case, Thorn, how about we don't go jumping to conclusions?
 
 
Tryphena Absent
18:43 / 24.02.04
This might sound like a really dim question but anyone feel free to answer it- how do you know Calo is hacking Flowers' account or anyone's for that matter?

Apart from the obvious moment when he posts that he's him.
 
 
Tom Coates
15:26 / 25.02.04
Well to be honest, that tends to be the giveaway.
 
  
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