It's pretty frequent, a website getting hacked to redirect traffic to another site, or to boost someone else's Google search ranking.  It's especially popular among personal blog sites which often are not properly secured by the user, or kept up as up to date as they should be.  Unfortunately, the attackers are usually never found as individuals rarely have the resources to tract the hacker down.  But sometimes, the hackers mess with someone who actually knows what they're doing and has the determination to find them.

The guy behind Justinsomnia.com was hacked earlier this year by someone inserting spam links into the site to improve the Google search rank of other sites.  Google detected the attempt to game their system and delisted Justin's site from the Google Index.  After some detective work, he was able to track down what happened, who did it, and even found photos and contact information for the hacker.  Of course this has all been posted for the world to see and enjoy.  Click the link below for a rather technical explanation of how the hacker got his in the end.

4,845 views 10 replies
Reply #1 Top
Nice to see someone getting thier 15 minutes of fame, not sure that was what he wanted.  
Reply #4 Top
that was an awesome read.
Reply #6 Top
Good read...
Reply #7 Top

Excellent   

Would be even better if Mr Smellyansky could be locked up for the next 99 years...

Reply #8 Top

LOL

You should read his resume- under "Preffered Positions"  it says "Hacker"  (and, Jafo, that is a quote- I know how to spell "preferred" )

too funny....

Reply #9 Top

(and, Jafo, that is a quote- I know how to spell "preferred"

Karma....all you need to do in these circumstances is add the comment '[sic]' after the 'prefferred'.

But fear not....I'll learn ya rite....

Reply #10 Top

Nice job at tracking down the culprit!

I read this at work today, and was pretty amazed at the length the guy [hacker] went to, to hide his tracks.

Then, when I read how easily he was found through the very medium he was stealing traffic from [Google etc.] ...I laughed at his stupidity.

What a moron....