If you are reading this on the day it was posted (Monday, July 9th, 2012), then you are likely not a victim of Malware Monday.  Far from being as feared as something like the dreaded Y2K situation, Malware Monday revolves around a piece of malicious software known as DNSChanger and the efforts involved in the mitigation and ultimate ridding of this specific piece of malware.

DNSChanger functions on a couple of different fronts, though the fundamental result of infection would be an inability to connect to your ISP.  It reportedly will also prevent your Operating System from downloading updates that would detect and prevent the malware from functioning.

Back in 2007, the creators of DNSChanger began using the trojan to redirect internet traffic to sites containing paid advertisements, resulting in illegal profit for its creators.  Since then, the hackers evolved the malware to execute various other tasks on the infected machines.  The FBI became involved and those responsible were caught and arrested late last year.  Initially, the FBI wanted to shut down the servers that were being used by the hackers to control the infected computers, however it was determined that such action would have resulted in the infected machines immediately becoming unable to connect to the Internet.

The resulting decision was to implement a transitional system whereby the servers in question could be taken down without resulting in the infected machines from losing their Internet connectivity.  The plug was pulled on that transitional system this morning around 12:01am, at which point anyone with an infected computer would need to rid their machine of the malware in order to re-connect to the Internet.

So, if you are reading this on Monday, July 9th, you were unaffected.  If you were affected, then you’re likely seeing this at a later date and I’d like to welcome you back to the Internet (we missed you!) and invite you to regularly scan your computer(s) for any malicious software using any number of free or paid applications available today.

The 2012 Transit of Venus occurred on June 5th.  At the HostGator office in Houston, one of our Admins set up a telescope outside of the building in order to observe the phenomenon, pinhole-camera style, as a small dot projected onto a piece of paper taped within a large box via which we could safely peer at the sun.  Another Admin showed up with some welder’s glass, which allowed us to look directly at the sun and see Venus, as a tiny dot traveling between Earth and the Sun.  Both methods of observation were quite impressive.

The transit is a predictable celestial phenomenon that occurs in pairs, eight years apart.  This happened most recently in June of 1997 and 2004 and will not happen again until December of 2117 and 2125.  Essentially, if you missed it live and in person this time, you will not have another opportunity within your lifetime.

The images below show the telescope pointing towards the Sun and into the lightbox and then the view from within the lightbox, where Venus is clearly visible as a black dot near the upper right-hand corner of the larger circle.

It is no secret that the web hosting industry is the target of a lot of fraudsters, scammers, spammers and various run-of-the-mill riffraff.  The anonymity that the Internet can provide seems to be far too fertile of ground for those simply looking to take advantage.  It would be fantastic if everyone was always honest and never attempted to proverbially hoodwink those that are either more honest or less naive than themselves.  However, the world we live in is one in which many things simply cannot, and should not, be taken at face value.

Fortunately, the Internet is also an excellent tool for exposing various scams and raising awareness such that less people are prone to being taken advantage of; the pyramid schemes that Grandma fell for (it’s true, she did; ask her about it) via snail-mail back in the day are simply not possible these days.  So, schemes and scams have evolved.  As HostGator has grown over the years, we have become a larger and larger target for scammers.

We like to think these days that it’s pretty hard to get one over on us, we’re pretty sharp cookies with pretty keen eyes.  This wasn’t always necessarily true.  The scam that I am about to describe to you, when it was first perpetuated on us, did initially cost us about $20,000.  We were ultimately reimbursed these funds, but lesson learned!

In it’s most simple form, the scam works like this: Scammy McScammer targets a business or an individual and engages in the act of purchasing an item from them.  Let’s say the item in question costs $500.  Scammy will then send a check via FedEx or Priority USPS for $700 and contact the seller to inform them that they either “accidentally” or for some other made-up reason sent a check that was greater than the amount due and request that the balance be returned to them, in some way convincing the target that they should go ahead and send the amount prior to the initial check actually clearing… because it won’t.  The target sends the scammer a good check, which the scammer promptly cashes.  The fake check of course bounces and the scammer then has the target’s money.  Where does the scammer get these fake checks?  Anyone can easily purchase check-making software from virtually any office supply store and begin printing checks, be they for legitimate or illegitimate purposes.  If you have ever seen the movie Catch Me If You Can, it’s basically a modern day version of that scenario.

Where does HostGator fit into this scam?  We definitely didn’t receive fake checks and then mindlessly send out real ones.  What happened was scammers made fake HostGator checks (with real account and routing numbers) and sent those to their targets.  There are now multiple safeguards in effect to prevent this from ever being successful, so please don’t use this blog post as a how-to for beginning your scamming career.  We do receive about a dozen fake checks each month that are used in an attempt to scam an innocent individual or business.

The most recent attempt to utilize this scam involved a $2,850 check and the request to purchase a $100 Toyota Tundra factory stereo on Craigslist.  Essentially, the scammer said “here’s a $2,850 check, please deposit it into your ATM and take out the cash, keep an extra $100 for your trouble and send the rest to me via Western Union.”  Seriously.  If you’d like to see the actual email, click here.

The intended target of this scam smelled a rat and contacted us, as is what most often happens in these cases.  We now have not only the email that I shared with you, but also the original check and even the USPS envelope that was used by the scammer.  We also have a very healthy relationship with various levels of law enforcement.

Do not let yourself fall victim to an Internet scammer!  If something seems too good to be true, then it is.  If something seems like a scam, it is.  Don’t fall prey and don’t hand your hard-earned money over to any two-bit trickster.  Notify the proper authorities and let’s put criminals where they belong.

We have many characters not only within the HostGator buildings, but particularly in the areas surrounding the Houston buildings.  Essentially, there is a cast of familiar faces comprised primarily of homeless people.  There is the gentleman we fondly refer as “U-Turn,” because he can perpetually be found in the U-Turn lane under the freeway nearest to the office with his squeegee in hand.  Interestingly, I’ve never seen him actually wash a windshield.  One of the most well-known characters, Dumpster Dan, was first mentioned in this blog back in 2007: http://blog.hostgator.com/2007/11/28/hostgator-ceo-becomes-homeless/

As stated in that post, Dan gained his nickname by taking up residence and ultimately starting a fire in the building’s dumpster, years before HostGator owned the building.  Dan was seemingly harmless and never caused any real trouble, mostly he would go through the dumpster or fish half-smoked cigarettes out of the ashtrays and then go on about his business.  To my knowledge, Dan never had any negative impact on anyone here at the office.  Everyone knew who Dumpster Dan was, likely Dan had no idea that he was somewhat endeared to the HostGator staff.  He never asked for money, there was actually very little interaction other than eye contact and head nods.  Dan was just Dan.

It was made known to us this week that Dan had recently passed on.  We don’t know that much about Dan, to be perfectly honest.  We don’t know his story, or if he is survived by anyone.  We don’t even know what kind of person he actually was; we do know that he survived in an unfortunate circumstance and was, in our experience, respectful of those around to him.

Farewell, Dan.  May you find peace in whatever lies beyond this plane of existence.

We are fortunate enough to have some very loyal followers who like to show their appreciation in unusual and creative ways.  This goes all the way back to the early days of HostGator, when none other than crunk rapper Lil Jon offered to introduce Brent to some ladies at his show in Florida, in appreciation for Brent having personally assisted him with some technical issues.  Another random caller once offered to send Brent some weed, via the US Postal Service for the same reason.  For the record, both of these offers were respectfully declined.  These days, it’s not terribly unusual to receive the occasional gift basket at the office, but please no more offers of groupies or drugs.

Here’s a couple examples of the art we’ve received:

This Snappy was done by a child of
one of our Customers.

Back when we sponsored the Joe Nemecheck
NASCAR, we received a few racing-themed
comic strips starring Snappy. Please click
on the image to see the whole series.

More recently, a Customer named Richard called us up for some assistance on his account and ended up singing us a song he wrote by the name of “GatorBill Me.”  The recording of the call is posted below along with the lyrics. By way of explanation, the acronym “PSR” stands for Preferred Support Representatives; Richard’s term for our Jr. Admins.  Without further ado, please enjoy:

GatorBill Me

I love my webhost
I love my VPS
Just like I love my mom
And I love my PSRs at my host
They teach me “how to host”

But best of all
I love the hosting HostGator gives me
Don’t talk; shut up
Just GatorBill me
‘Cause I’m feeling kind of creative today
And the business plan makes it easier

My PSRs are great
All they do is help and they encourage me
And I love the Help desk
They’re always available
Even on Christmas day.

But best of all
I love the hosting HostGator gives me
Don’t talk; shut up
Just GatorBill me
‘Cause I’m feeling kind of creative today
And the reseller plans makes it easier

Better off on a VPS
Than to use the shared plan
The control, the ease, the price
Host my site on Gator server one

I love the hosting HostGator gives me
Don’t talk; shut up
Just GatorBill me
‘Cause I’m feeling kind of creative today
And the dedis plan makes it easier

QuickInstall!

QuickInstall!

If you’d like to hear some more “GatorBill Me,” Richard also sent us an .mp3 that he recorded himself:

This saga does not end here. Having been inspired by “GatorBill Me,” a certain HostGator employee, who has requested to remain anonymous, decided to pen their own Gator song as well. Though a recording of this does not exist at this time, perhaps enough public outcry could convince this employee to grace us with a recorded version of their song:

Ode to HostGator

One, two, three and to tha four
Everything you need comes knockin’ at your door
Not really at your door, through your internet connection
Sitebuilders, templates…. what’s that, you need lessons?
Video tutorials; don’t forget the KB
Check it for yourself, don’t take it from me!

What’s that you say, you need a web host?
I’ll tell ya one time, who’s the host with the most
Go on sign up, you can thank me later
Wicky-wicky, wut-wut, check out HostGator

The top-notch staff, always happy to assist
Via chats, phones, twitter and tickets!
twenty-four seven, three sixty-five
Never chat bots, this help is alive!
Money back guarantee, never any hidden fees
If you can find a better host, sign up with them, please!

What’s that you say, you need a web host?
I’ll tell ya one time, who’s the host with the most
Go on sign up, you can thank me later
Wicky-wicky, wut-wut, check out HostGator

If these artistic offerings happen to have inspired you, we’d love to hear your Gator-themed musical stylings or see your Gator-themed artwork.  Feel absolutely free to leave a poem in the comments, or you can certainly always email us at feedback@hostgator.com, ATTN: Blog.

Recently, HostGator began our transition into a new building in Houston.  Presently, we occupy two floors while the remaining floors continue to be built out.  Our Houston buildings are only a short distance apart, in fact you can see each from the other.  The geography makes it convenient to dispatch teams from one building to the other, as needed.  Though we’ve been executing practice drills of this nature for many years, some of us veterans had grown complacent, thinking there would never be any true need to exercise our finely-honed emergency-response skills.

As explained in the recent Internet Speak post, one of the primary means of inter-office communication is via instant message and conference rooms.  The story told here will be best conveyed via excerpts from these conference rooms, for historical accuracy.

Saturday April 21st, 2012 was a day not unlike any other. Until the late afternoon brought with it a distress call received from HTX2:

(04:59:18 PM) Sundeep: we have a situation at the new building.

The years of training immediately roused the team from their aforementioned complacency and they began gathering the necessary data in order to spring into action, like a… spring… that goes… into action!  The situation was explained further:

(05:00:18 PM) Sundeep: My windows programmer is working out of there, programming, minding his own business and a possum just walked into his office and is chilling in the corner…

It was now clear that an intruder had successfully breached our security perimeter, gained entry into HTX2 and was now on the hunt for our Windows Development Team.  We had heard stories, but never believed them to be true, of this type of industrial espionage in the early days of web hosting, but we thought our parents were just trying to scare us with those tales.  This was actually happening!  The initial fear experienced by the team was quickly replaced with resolve; they’ve been trained, they could handle this!

(06:44:07 PM) Steve: soooooo
(06:44:25 PM) Steve: what do we do if we need to remove an opossum from the new building?
(06:44:37 PM) Steve: anyone have the number for animal control?
(06:44:46 PM) Steve: should I call Farrar?

Fortunately, we have several former members of the United States military on staff. Brendan, one of our Migrations Supervisors, quickly assembled a strike force of fearless warriors who were mentally and physically prepared to meet this threat head-on and save not only HTX2, but likely even the entire world, from certain destruction.  As the strike force mounted up at the designated staging area at HTX1, tensions were understandably running quite high in anticipation of the five-minute trip to HTX2.  This is what all those years of training were leading up to; this was the time to shine!

The ride to HTX2 was sprinkled with nervous laughter as the team prepared themselves for what would prove to be an undeniably epic battle.  The Band of Brothers pulled into the HTX2 parking lot amidst screams of fear emanating from the building.  Grown men were sobbing uncontrollably, it was utter bedlam!

The team entered the building to the tune of “Lose Yourself” by Eminem, or maybe it was the Theme from Rocky… either way, their senses heightened in preparation for the battle.  Upon exiting the elevator, they transformed into the warriors they had been trained to be.  The actual battle was brief, though glorious!  Unfortunately, the mere English language does not contain the necessary words to accurately describe the briefness and gloriousness of this particular battle, so we simply cannot appropriately describe it herein.  Trust us, though, brief and glorious it was!  The briefest and most glorious of any battle ever fought since the dawn of time, pretty much.

When the dust settled, HostGator’s strike force was declared victorious; the beast was sated and peace restored to HTX2 and the surrounding countryside.

(07:36:44 PM) Steve: Brendan has returned victorious from animal control detail
(07:37:39 PM) Brendan: I should win the HG medal of valor though
(07:51:23 PM) Jon: Brendan, on behalf of HostGator, I award you one whole internet

It was a triumphant return to HTX1 for our heroes.  Three separate ticker-tape parades, sailors kissing ladies, like in that famous old picture of a sailor kissing a lady.  Special colored wristbands were immediately procured to celebrate the remembrance of this spectacular event.

As the sun set on this most momentous of days, our warriors faded back into their more traditional roles.  However, not only did they gain One Whole Internet today, but also the knowledge that no task was too large, no creature too vicious and no battle too insurmountable for the team at HostGator.

It should go without saying, but we still want to make it known for the record, that the little guy was captured and released back into the wild unharmed and that no animals shall ever be harmed in the making of this blog.

Toilet paper is serious business. It’s genuinely a severely overlooked and under-appreciated medium of information distribution; believe that! Fortunately, http://www.getshitter.com can assist in elevating toilet paper to a more appropriate level of respect, by taking your twitter feed and turning it into toilet paper. What you subsequently do with said toilet paper would then be completely up to you.

As we all learned from the classic Pauly Shore cinematic masterpiece Bio-Dome, the most effective means of instituting change, or raising awareness, is to think globally and act locally. The month of April contains both Earth Day (April 22nd) and Arbor Day (April 27th).  As you may already know, back in 2008 HostGator took the initiative of becoming a Green webhost, which you can read even more about here.  With environmentalism in the air this month, we thought it would be appropriate to discuss toilet paper and the trees that make toilet paper possible. Because like toilet paper, trees are also serious business.

I’m going to stop beating around the bush, not because a bush could potentially make for decent TP, but because toilet paper conservation is something that deserves significantly more attention than it presently receives.  At least once per day, you hold in your hand a number of 4.25 inch squares that could change the world, if you held less of them at a time.  Twenty-seven thousand trees give their lives daily to supply the world with toilet paper.  That is not a typo; that’s a 27, followed by a comma and 3 zeros.  Don’t take my word for it; go ask National Geographic.

Thinking globally may lead you to discover General Sherman, a giant sequoia tree located in the Giant Forest of Sequoia National Park in Tulare County, California.  The General is one of the tallest, widest, longest-lived and most famous trees in existence, therefore unlikely to ever become toilet paper.  Another unlikely TP candidate would be a certain White Cedar located in the Great Lakes area of Canada: it’s 155 years old and less than 4 inches tall.

In acting locally, we began here in our own offices by purchasing GetShitter toilet paper for our restrooms to further educate all HostGator employees on trees and toilet paper conservation. To see the twitter feed we used for this purpose, click here, and please be sure that you are not easily-offended by juvenile bathroom humor… after all, Gators can be found in the sewers from time to time…

Now that we’ve appropriately addressed thinking globally and acting locally, we’re on a roll (so to speak)!  How though can we thus act globally?  Our thoughts turned to our HostGator India office, India being widely known for having a culture that does not utilize toilet paper.  In the spirit of educating, enlightening and raising awareness about environmental issues, we present this series of photos to explain how that culture accomplishes this goal:

How is showing you those pictures acting globally, you ask?  Well, it’s not.  But encouraging you to adopt the same behavior is!  Because if we want to change the world, and save some trees, then we need to take action; one ply at a time!  Interestingly, the above-pictured method is considered even more sanitary than using toilet paper.

The Arbor Day Foundation began in 1972 and now plants and distributes more than 10 million trees annually. Earth Day began in 1970 and is largely credited with launching the modern environmental movement. Please visit both of their websites to further educate yourself about potentially making a difference that could impact the entire world. What’s been around longer than both Earth Day and the Arbor Day Foundation, combined? Toilet paper, which dates back to the 6th century AD, in early medieval China. Feel free to print that fact on your roll of GetShitter.com toilet paper! Happy Earth Day and Happy Arbor Day from HostGator!