What Should I Do To This Person?

BlackhatBigfoot said:

Today is day 3

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This is like reading a Jack Reacher novel.

This just seems to be a little strange, I bet you have a backdoor installed somewhere in your theme or other NULLED plugin. I guess its possible to brute force your password, but I suspect its something more programmatic than that. That's the risk you take using hacked copies of software, unless you study every line of PHP in a NULLED theme/plugin you really are putting yourself at risk.

I remember one of the popular traffic tricks was to offer premium for free, but they all included a redirect that you could later activate once the "sucker" got decent traffic, you could steal it all.

Moral of the story....there's no free lunch.

Update: I just checked my site and the same article is filled again with injected links. I checked recent visitor stats in C-Panel and found that some people in Croatia and in Singapore were accessing my site through wp-content/themes/js. I clicked on what they accessed and found what I think is the script they were using. I IP-denied the whole range and will password protect that directory as well as some other ones.

It appears the links were indeed out-sourced. Since I can't be 100% sure that I have the right company, and therefore the culprit, I'll pass on trying to contact who I think it is in favor of either emailing the clients, or posting their websites here, or both, and let others take his business seeing that the guy can't get good help.

ScripterAlex said:

This just seems to be a little strange, I bet you have a backdoor installed somewhere in your theme or other NULLED plugin. I guess its possible to brute force your password, but I suspect its something more programmatic than that. That's the risk you take using hacked copies of software, unless you study every line of PHP in a NULLED theme/plugin you really are putting yourself at risk.

I remember one of the popular traffic tricks was to offer premium for free, but they all included a redirect that you could later activate once the "sucker" got decent traffic, you could steal it all.

Moral of the story....there's no free lunch.

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Are you saying that there are no good and safe WP themes that are free?

BlackhatBigfoot said:

Are you saying that there are no good and safe WP themes that are free?

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There are tons of good free WP themes, its when you get a NULLED premium theme that you would otherwise pay money for then you are certainly putting yourself at risk, especially if you don't go through the code with a fine toothed comb.

The virus detect programs that are run on the [GET] files in the members download don't protect you one bit, as they aren't looking for PHP/Javascript backdoors.

Looks like you found the culprit, if its something you got here it would be good to warn others.

ScripterAlex said:

...Looks like you found the culprit, if its something you got here it would be good to warn others.

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I'm using thr Platform theme by Pagelines.

Send him a professional email.

If that doesn't work, threaten him and steal his clients.

Today is day 4 and the end of the ultimatum I gave to the person whose company has been injecting links into the body of my articles. I don't think he is aware of this thread or my complaint because I think he would have contacted me so as not to have his clients disturbed. Now I have to make a decision what to do about it after receiving lots of comments full of great advice.

After some soul-searching, I've decided for the sake of my own reputation and as an example to other noobs (I'm a noob of sorts) to follow the good advice of people who counseled me to forget it, and not seek vengeance by threatening his clients which, even though he deserves it, would in my mind be a form of "snitching." I don't want my BHW persona to be equated with that sort of behavior even though hacking someone's site is criminal. I've learned something from this experience and what I take away from it must serve as the reward for my damages.

Yet, it is not as though those who counseled me to take him out were wrong, and if I had kept this thing private, I probably would have done just as they told me to do. But it's public now and there are political considerations that go along with any public actions I take in this matter.

Having said that, I don't think it would be improper at this point to give out the list of sites that were injected into my article. If I were at the point of having saleable SEO skills, I would, for business' sake try to take the clients myself, but since that isn't the case with me right now I'll give the list to whoever PM's me for it.

I'm certain that these are links to different clients and not just tier 1 or tier 2 buffers. I've already had one request for the list and will send it, but I think it is only fair to make it available to anyone who requests it. It's not a very big list but it is filled with bona-fide clients who are paying for SEO services.

Finally, thanks to every one who contributed. It really helped me to understand the totality of the experience, however unpleasant.

I respect and admire this decision! PM me the list if you would not mind (if not I understand)

blackhataffiliate said:

I respect and admire this decision! PM me the list if you would not mind (if not I understand)

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I'm sending in a few minutes. I haven't included the anchor text with the links(may be useful) but I can give you the url of my affected article and you can harvest them there faster than I can.

PM sent

BlackhatBigfoot said:

I'm sending in a few minutes. I haven't included the anchor text with the links(may be useful) but I can give you the url of my affected article and you can harvest them there faster than I can.

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WOW - You are a lot nicer than I would be. I took a look at the link you sent and found 55 out going links injected in to this article. Your a lot nicer than I am, because I would definitely be taking it to his ass over this.

blackhataffiliate said:

WOW - You are a lot nicer than I would be. I took a look at the link you sent and found 55 out going links injected in to this article. Your a lot nicer than I am, because I would definitely be taking it to his ass over this.

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Believe me, I wanted to, but I figured why destroy, if others (even if I can't) can monetize the situation.

If anyone else wants this list and wants to see (and maybe make a screenshot of) the affected article, you need to PM me today because I'm going to remove those links tonight (for the third time). I let them stay since yesterday when they were injected again. Obviously, the anchor texts (keywords) used with those links may come in handy for those seeking to take away this company's business.

I think now you are in a mess. Feel so sorry for you !!

upgrade your software. Your site got hacked somehow and it probably happened to plenty of other sites. Get over it and move on. Unless of course you know the guy personally.