RedTube: Our Registrar was Hacked
On Writing (and/or Media), Telecom Comments (1)
I got a note from FiveStarMedia today in response to my question from two days ago about RedTube being taken down. FiveStar owns RedTube and has built it into one of the most trafficked porn sites in the world in less than a year … and has put it up for sale, too. I asked: “So how bad is it, folks? Inquiring bloggers want to know …”
The answer:
It’s not that bad 
Our domain registrar got hacked. And the hackers changed the nameservers, so a lot of routers have a wrong IP. They set the refresh time for them to 48 hours so hopefully everyone can reach us in a couple of hours again.
I had not heard in years of a domain registrar getting hacked, other than maybe by social engineering. But maybe I haven’t been paying attention the way I used to … I don’t have my domains with eNom.com (which is the registrar used by RedTube.) What it means, for those unfamiliar with the terminology, is that the porn wasn’t touched. But anyone trying to go to RedTube was getting sent to servers chosen by the hackers.
If you’re new to the discussion, here are the previous posts:
http://www.jeffschult.com/blog/?p=48
http://www.jeffschult.com/blog/?p=50
jss @ February 6, 2008
[...] not forget about RedTube.com, either, once brought briefly to its knees by Turkish cyberhackers. All this is alongside all the personal porn posted on the major social-sexual networking sites. [...]