Aywas Hacked

On March 24, 2011, a news post alerted all users with an "important message from Slash" that the site would be closing in 24 hours due to "unforeseen circumstances".

Many users believed it was an early April Fool's Day joke. Many users also believed it was true, and tensions were very high. Others also believed it was a hack. More and more users began realizing it was a hack when it was discovered that all of the Administrators had lost their powers. Users later contacted Slash, and it was confirmed to be a hack (though later it was found to be a case of cookie grabbing, where the person had gotten an admin's login data).

To get things under control, Erienne took charge and took away Slash's Admin status and powers. She later deleted the "important (fake) message" and posted a second news post, explaining that the first news post was fake, and Slash's account had been "temporarily compromised", and she and Slash were working on sorting things out. Later Slash posted an update on the news and forums, letting users know what really happened.

"Just so you're all aware, there was no hacking. They cookie grabbed one of the admins, logged into her account with the session they stole from her, then cookie grabbed me by sending me a message from her account (which I read immediately). When I left to go to dinner, they got into my account next. We fixed the vulnerability." - Slash

All issues appear to have been solved, and Slash announced that he took action and pressed charges for the site and for all who were stressed or affected over the incident.

Aywas Hacked a Second Time
On April 19, 2011, Aywas was hacked a second time (technically the first time, as the previous "hack" had been ruled a cookiegrab), this time causing much more trouble for the staff and for users. Around 8 PM Aywas Standard Time (Central Standard), all items disappeared from users' inventories and deposit boxes. Many users were in a panic at first, but were reassured that it was mostly likely a glitch and Slash would issue a rollback to recover the items. The site started lagging and after a long while of this happening, the whole site was temporarily shut down with the only message left being "undergoing maintenance". Users were unsure of what was totally going on, as the site was inaccessible for several hours.

A while after the site was closed for maintenance, Slash posted an update on the Aywas Facebook Page. He let users know that the staff was working on restores, and also that they "knew what happened, but not how just yet". It took about another hour for the site to be brought back online, and an explanation was posted to the News. Aywas had been hacked, and the person who did it had "changed all the items to be owned by one person."

Due to the intensity of the issues caused by the hacker, Slash had to rollback to April 17, a few days before the incident, and many users lost a lot of items. All lost items needed to be restored one by one by the staff, so users were only able to ask for items worth 10+ GP back. All users are still feeling the effects of the hacking and of the item loss, but it is Slash's and the staff's hope that the incident will help them be better prepared for any future attacks.