To prevent such incidents Linode have alerts of traffic/cpu/disk thresholds. For example you can configure notification if your bandwidth utilization more than N Mbit/s in duration more than N minutes. Very useful for DDoS prevention.
Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
21–30 of 83 posts
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#22I had something similar happen with AWS but the bill wasn't as high since they ended up flagging my box as spam-producing and shut off all outbound traffic. I'd just ask them and see if they can remove the charges, it worked in my case.
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#23Have you talked to your VPS provider? They should be able to cut you a break; after all, that 40TB of traffic cost them only a small fraction of what they're charging you, so if they're reasonable you should at least be able to get them to reduce the charges to their actual cost. You might also offer to suggest writing up a post mortem for them, that they can provide to their customers as a lesson/tutorial on how to…
In my opinion, it is negligence to an extent that OP should not have to pay for this, and he should find a new VPS provider.
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#24Just in addition to some other helpful comments: based on posting I assume that your are Dutch or Belgian, located in Europe and are buying this VPS as a private consumer, not a company.
Which means your case is probably covered by consumer protection rules when it comes to informing you about data usage, and I seriously doubt a VPS provider has covered their ass as well as mobile providers tend to do.
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#25I've been in the exact same situation with AWS ( http://cl.ly/SHOu ). It was a nerve recking couple of days but I contacted AWS support and they were extremely good. They helped me secure my machine and then cancelled the 1.4K payment they were going to take from my account. In all the whole process took 2.5 weeks and I only had to pay $15 for the I/O requests. The best thing I can recommend is to talk to your host a…
In aws, you can set up billing alerts, so they will email you if you go over X per month. It's a good idea to set that up, so at least you'll be alerted as soon as possible if you get hacked.
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wonder what experiences we have with police in similar situations in recent years. In the USA many years ago I brought a telephone bill dispute to police. They explained, not without kindness and patience, that the legal question involved intent. Consequently it wasn't a matter where they could easily provide assistance.
What was the situation? In the OP's case, they're alleging a very definite crime of illegally accessing a VPN to do nasty things with it. I think at least taking a report is going to be standard behavior, though I wouldn't be surprised if they just let it "sit on the shelf". If it's just a garden variety dispute with a company, then it's more likely to be a) a civil matter, and b) subject to interpretation.
Well, that's the point. The specifics make a difference.
In my example, it appeared that a roommate unknowingly permitted a friend of theirs that I never met then or since to run up big charges at billable services on the apartment telephone line that was in my name. (I understand what my mistake was and because it was so long ago it's not a sore issue.)
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#271. Report the incident to the police. Right now. 2. Report it to the VPS provider. Explain that you've reported it to the police. Ask for their cooperation in investigating the problem. You do not have to pay. If they try to force you to pay, depending on your country, you'll probably end up in small claims court where you'll find judges are very reasonable people who usually side with the little guy. (IANAL)
Yes. This happened to a company I worked for in the UK in the last 1990s. We had a half rack full of NT4 machines and someone got into our kit and used it to run a pr0n FTP. They took us to court to pay up and the magistrate said we had no bill to pay and that it was a waste of court time as it wasn't intentional. You're right about reporting a crime though even if the police don't take it seriously. A crime ref numb…
Am I right in assuming that "pr0n" is some kind of 1337, 80s hackerish misspelling of "porn"?
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#28I've been in the exact same situation with AWS ( http://cl.ly/SHOu ). It was a nerve recking couple of days but I contacted AWS support and they were extremely good. They helped me secure my machine and then cancelled the 1.4K payment they were going to take from my account. In all the whole process took 2.5 weeks and I only had to pay $15 for the I/O requests. The best thing I can recommend is to talk to your host a…
AWS also has billing alarms. If you're running an account which should cost $15/month then for the love of god set an alarms at e.g. $20/month.
I had a reserved instance for 12 months, forgot to renew it, and on the 13th month (when it was on-demand) the usage creeped over my cap and I started getting alarms allowing me to kill the instance, renew my reserved, and restart it. Saved me at least $10.
On a related topic, I wish VPS providers allowed you to pre-pay. With Microsoft's Azure I have an MSDN Ultimate account, which has $150 of pre-paid credit on Azure. When you go over the $150 they just shut your stuff down rather than charging you (in fact I don't have a CC on there at all). They don't even offer this kind of service to non-MSDN subscriptions which sucks, I'd love to just pre-pay $50/month to them and have everything shut off when I exceed it (so it becomes a "no risk" playground).
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes. This happened to a company I worked for in the UK in the last 1990s. We had a half rack full of NT4 machines and someone got into our kit and used it to run a pr0n FTP. They took us to court to pay up and the magistrate said we had no bill to pay and that it was a waste of court time as it wasn't intentional. You're right about reporting a crime though even if the police don't take it seriously. A crime ref numb…
Am I right in assuming that "pr0n" is some kind of 1337, 80s hackerish misspelling of "porn"?
Yes. There's some semantic information associated with the choice of that misspelling, though.
Re: Ask HN: My VPS got hacked and now I'm facing a massive bill. What can I do?
#30Stop using providers which charge a ridiculous price for bandwidth (like AWS). There are many excellent alternatives where a TB costs only a few dollars/euros.