GREG 1
Member
Registered: 28th Jul 00
Location: Essex
User status: Offline
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Blackmailers target $1m website
Alex Tew gained unwanted attention from net attacks
The site of a UK student who had the idea of selling pixels as advertising space has been hit by a web attack.
Alex Tew, 21, hit the headlines at the start of the year when he revealed his Million Dollar Homepage had made him a million dollars in four months.
But the publicity brought the unwanted attention of extortionists who knocked the site over with a massive denial-of-service attack.
Following a week of downtime, the website is now back online.
Police alerted
Mr Tew's encounter with the net criminals began on 7 January when he received an e-mail threatening to bombard the site with data unless he paid a ransom of $5,000 (£2,800).
I haven't replied to any of them as I don't want to give them the satisfaction and I certainly don't intend to pay them any money
Alex Tew
He did not respond and the 10 January deadline passed without incident. But the following day the site went down, and has only been up intermittently since then.
A series of other e-mails, upping the ransom to $50,000 (£28,000), followed.
"I haven't replied to any of them as I don't want to give them the satisfaction and I certainly don't intend to pay them any money," Mr Tew told the BBC News website.
Both the FBI and the Hi-Tech Crime Unit of the Wiltshire Constabulary have been notified about the problem.
"Their instinct is that this attack originates in Russia although it is not possible to track the e-mail back to its source," said Mr Tew.
"There is not much more that they can do," he added.
Instead, Mr Tew's web hosting firm Sitelutions worked to solve the problem, initially coming up with a hardware solution.
It did not work because of the size of the attack.
Currently traffic to Mr Tew's website is being filtered via a US-based firm DDoSprotection.com - experts in dealing with such attacks - and that solution appears to be working.
The site is back online, albeit a little slow for visitors.
Preventing denial-of-service attacks can be a costly business but, ever the entrepreneur, Mr Tew is hopeful he can do a deal with his new partner - offering them free ad space in return for them keeping his site up and running.
Zombie PCs
It has become common practice for extortionists to target net firms and threaten to cripple their websites with deluges of data unless they pay a ransom.
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Brett
Premium Member
Registered: 16th Dec 02
Location: Manchester
User status: Offline
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I tried to look at it yesterday and it was slow and wouldn't work, must be why 
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City
Member
Registered: 30th Dec 03
Location: Wakefield Drives: Red GSi
User status: Offline
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whats the link
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Simon
Member
Registered: 24th Apr 03
Location: Oxfordshire
User status: Offline
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http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/
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Ian
Site Administrator
Registered: 28th Aug 99
Location: Liverpool
User status: Offline
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I don't think he's too worried, if anything its more publicity.
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MarkM
Member
Registered: 11th Apr 01
Location: Liverpool
User status: Offline
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He probably brought it down himself...
For the publicity...
Crafty
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drax
Member
Registered: 5th Feb 05
Location: Sittingbourne, Kent
User status: Offline
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I hate him for thinking of it before me
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Ian
Site Administrator
Registered: 28th Aug 99
Location: Liverpool
User status: Offline
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I wanted to hate him but he was actually quite like-able on the news reports. Good on him I say. I'm happy that it proves the concept that there's money in phenomena like that and that you can throw the traditional business model out of the window and still be viable.
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MarkM
Member
Registered: 11th Apr 01
Location: Liverpool
User status: Offline
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I hate myself for not coming up with that idea...
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K2 GTi
Member
Registered: 21st Oct 04
User status: Offline
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Hes a genious
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Bart
Member
Registered: 19th Aug 02
Location: Midsomer Norton, Bristol Avon
User status: Offline
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hes just made a million dollars or so, he shouldnt have that many worries now
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Sims
Member
Registered: 15th Aug 03
Location: Bath/Bristol area Drove: 1994 Corsa SRi Now: VTR
User status: Offline
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Genius!
Just read the FAQ and its quality. Top bloke.
I'm going to have to put my thinking cap on cos i'm in my final year and going to be struggling big time for money 
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Rus
Member
Registered: 24th Jan 05
Location: SE London, Kent
User status: Offline
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thats harsh. But if it was me i wouldn't give too shits. i've earnt my $1 million
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