Two UA departments discovered that hackers broke into their servers Wednesday and inundated them with links to hundreds of Web sites containing pornographic material.
Computer servers at the philosophy department and the Large Binocular Telescope Observatory were the only ones affected by the intrusion, said Jim Slagle, project manager of the LBT.
Slagle said the incident did not cause any damage to the server, and did not interfere with work at the LBT.
“”The hackers knew there was a weak spot on the two UA servers and made use of it.””– Jim Slagle, LBT project manager
“”It’s amazing how well these things can be handled,”” said Slagle. “”The CCIT (Center for Computing and Information Technology) did exactly what they were supposed to.””
An LBT staff member was switching to a newer version of computer software to protect the server from hackers when he discovered the links to pornographic Web sites.
Slagle said hackers could easily find out which servers have a susceptible version of the software by doing a Google search.
“”The hackers knew there was a weak spot on the two UA servers and made use of it,”” Slagle said.
The LBT is up-and-running with the new version of the software, which should protect it from any further tampering, Slagle said.
An investigation is taking place, Slagle said, adding that, often, pornographers use vulnerable areas in software to add links to their sites that can increase their Web site’s visibility.
Michele Norin, executive director of the Center for Computing and Information Technology, could not be reached for comment.
