What a week and what a month... I HATE H-A-C-K-E-R-S

Here I am each day just happily typing away.

  

 

enjoying the fact that I get to "meet" so many different artists and learn about the beautiful creations they fashion with their own heart, minds and hands.   Then BAM!!  I am blocked in Google as being a dangerous site...   It was Horrible.  I was shocked... after nearly a decade of owning this website it has never been a danger to anyone... 

My heart began racing...     I was in a bit of a panic... It's not every day you find out that the past Month your poor little website is a victim of horrible hackers.  I did not know it at first.   My site acted weird back in July and I didn't know what happened.  I thought it was because the fact that I updated to the new     I n t e r n e t E x p l o r e r   8  -  But after reading all the info on Google about being hacked I became enlightened...

and knew that time was of the essence.    

I needed to get things corrected and fast!!   I started to do lots of research about how to fix my site so that it was safe and Google could remove the "unsafe warning" they had with it in the search results.    I found lots of very helpful information on the Google webmaster blog.   I was up till Saturday night 3AM working on this.  

 

Please be sure to do virus scans of your computer and also search the web or look in Office Depot or Staples (or some kind of office store)  for some reputable spyware/ Malware detections software.   Use it to be sure your personal computer is clean.  

 

And...

 

If you own any website,  and are ever a victim of hackers - you might find these links helpful too. 

 

The Google webmaster blog is full of great info. here's two posts that helped me a lot.    The blog posts are Chock full of links to helpful resources which I used as I was dealing with this terrible issue.  

 

http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2008/04/my-sites-been-hacked-now-what.html

 

http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2008/08/hey-google-i-no-longer-have-badware.html

 

 

And the site below is recomended by Google to use if you are a victim of being hacked.

 

http://www.stopbadware.org/home/security

 

All these links above are HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.  they helped me wade through what would have been a very very scary and confusing time if I hadn't had the info and resources available within the articles. 

 

 

 

And I can't stress this enough -  

 YOU MUST HAVE VIRUS PROTECTION AND FIRE WALL PROTECTION

on your own personal and work computers!!!     If you do not you are surfing the internet unprotected... it is like jumping into man-eating shark infested waters with bloody chum all around you... there is no question about it - you WILL be attacked,  Infact, after just surfing the net for one day without protection you probably would invaded by possibly many viruses, worms or who knows what kind of malware .   So Please if you thought it was just a stupid unneeded joke (virus protection and fire walls)   Don't think it anymore.   Get protected from here on out! 

 

Take it from me,  I have been uber-protected  - using Norton Anti Virus and McAfee Anti virus for nearly 10 years now and this is the first time anything got through and it's NOT fun!! 

 

 

 

I want to leave this post right here on the top of the blog for the next few days.  Don't want it to be buried just yet.    Hacking is a horrible thing and there isn't much we, as surfers, can do about it - other than a good defense... protection against being invaded.    Hugs to you all. 

 

 KEEP YOUR VIRUS PROTECTION UP TO DATE -   Pass it on.