Got Hacked. Want to understand how.
- by gaoshan88
Someone has, for the second time, appended a chunk of javascript to a site I help run. This javascript hijacks Google adsense, inserting their own account number, and sticking ads all over.
The code is always appended, always in one specific directory (one used by a third party ad program), affects a number of files in a number of directories inside this one ad dir (20 or so) and is inserted at roughly the same overnight time. The adsense account belongs to a Chinese website (located in a town not an hour from where I will be in China next month. Maybe I should go bust heads... kidding, sort of), btw... here is the info on the site: http://serversiders.com/fhr.com.cn
So, how could they append text to these files? Is it related to the permissions set on the files (ranging from 755 to 644)? To the webserver user (it's on MediaTemple so it should be secure, yes?)? I mean, if you have a file that has permissions set to 777 I still can't just add code to it at will... how might they be doing this?
Here is a sample of the actual code for your viewing pleasure (and as you can see... not much to it. The real trick is how they got it in there):
<script type="text/javascript"><!--
google_ad_client = "pub-5465156513898836";
/* 728x90_as */
google_ad_slot = "4840387765";
google_ad_width = 728;
google_ad_height = 90;
//-->
</script>
<script type="text/javascript"
src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js">
</script>
Since a number of folks have mentioned it, here is what I have checked (and by checked I mean I looked around the time the files were modified for any weirdness and I grepped the files for POST statements and directory traversals:
access_log (nothing around the time except normal (i.e. excessive) msn bot traffic)
error_log (nothing but the usual file does not exist errors for innocuous looking files)
ssl_log (nothing but the usual)
messages_log (no FTP access in here except for me)
