You know what's worse than leaving the stove on, or having a pipe burst in your house? Leaving the stove on or having a pipe burst and then going out of town for six days!
Or! You go out of town for six days, and then your website gets hacked. I hate it when that happens!
So, on the bright side, I'm now home, and neither my stove nor my pipes were a problem while I was away. But, naturally, the day I left for ECCC was the day we were attacked. Again.
I wanted to make a quick blog post to explain in layman's terms what happned, as I myself am a layman.
The Blind Ferret ad network was broken into last week, and the malware warning many of you got was (if briefly) valid. Once the problem was detected and cleared out, my website was safe to browse through. Hooray! Except Google takes DAYS to meander over to my site and confirm that it's now safe to enter, even after a review has been requested, so the warning stays up until they do so. Boooo.
This sucks a lot, because (aside from the obvious reason this sucks) my primary source of income is ad revenue, which means that I've lost quite a bit between the server crash a month ago, and this little fuck-de-do last week. (This is where I send a HUGE thank-you to everyone at ECCC for helping me make up for it! You guys are just the best.)
Thanks also - a LOT! - to people who sent along information and screen caps last week; it was actually quite helpful! I forwarded all of your emails the moment I got to my hotel Wednesday night so that our guys at BF could track down the problem, and it did help.
2013 has already been a rocky year for my website, which sucks in particular because I'm REALLY enjoying the stories that I'm working on right now, and I want y'all to be able to read them in order, strip by strip, at a nice easy pace. Siiiiiigh. For now, you may want to
go back to Wednesday's strip and hit the "next" button until you're up-to-date.
Thanks to everyone for being so kind and patient with the website. It's out of my hands and I feel completely helpless, but I still feel guilty and awful that y'all have had to put up with all the problems we've been having. Also, while I appreciate all the offers for advice, I'm trying very hard to stay with Blind Ferret.... and simultaneously avoid all the problems that they've been struck with!
I'll keep you guys posted, especially if I need your help. I'm grateful I have such a wonderful community to rely on when shit & fans have a party. (Ewww gross party.)
(If any of this makes sense it'll be a coincidence, as I'm loopy from a day of flying and oh god it's 4:45 in the morningzzzzzzz)