User magmt

[N8BMB]

It appears that my site may have been hacked - however the only thing I can see that was changed were all the user names and passwords, INCLUDING admins,, superusers etc. so I basically have a website that I cannot access through either the front end or backend and am unable to update anything or admin the site. I AM ABLE to take new registrants, however, "newbies" have very little admin rights.

My question is this - WITHOUT having to dump the entire joomla installation, is there a way (in the server directory, maybe?) to access ONLY the USERS and make changes and try to correct this issue?

HELP, please!

Dennis

[mandville]

[ ] Download and RUN the Forum Post Assistant / FPA Instructions available here and are also included in the download package. Post the generated results in your security/been hacked topic. Use these links to download the FPA:
Download .tar.gz version or Download the .zip version NOTE: Do not download the FPA from any other website or links found on the Internet.

[ ] Ensure you have the latest version of Joomla for your version of Joomla. Delete all files in your Joomla installation, saving a copy of the configuration.php file.

[ ] Review Vulnerable Extensions List to make sure any 3rd party extensions versions used appear on the vulnerable list.

[ ] Review and action Security Checklist 7 Make sure you've gone through all of the steps.

[ ] Scan all machines with FTP, Joomla super admin, and Joomla admin access for malware, virus, trojans, spyware, etc. Checklist 7 contains a list or recommended scanners.

[ ] Change all passwords and if possible user names for the website host control panel. Change the Joomla database user name and password.

[ ] Use proper permissions on files and directories. They should never be 777, ideal is 644 for files and 755 for directories. The configuration file can be set to 444 which is read only.

[ ] Check your htaccess for for any odd code (i.e. code which is not in the standard htaccess supplied as part of the Joomla installation).

[ ] Check the crontab or Task Scheduler for unexpected jobs/tasks.

[ ] Ensure you do not have anonymous ftp enabled.

[ ] Verify individually that any non-Joomla file such as but not limited to that will be placed back on the website such as images, pdf files, files for download, and other documents and files are valid and are supposed to be part of your website.

[ ] Replace the deleted files by
[*]Create a new database and install without sample data to it(make sure it the same version as previous site).
[*]Install the 3rd party extensions(including any custom template) to the new Joomla. (That insures you have the files in place for the 3rd party extensions)
[*] Edit the configuration.php file of the new Joomla to connect to your original database.
[*] Make a backup and update to the current full version of Joomla

Only by replacing all files in the installation (including extensions and templates) can you be sure to remove the backdoors inserted and hidden in various files and directories More detailed information can be found in the Security Checklist 7 document.

[N8BMB]

I appreciate the reply, however, it really does not seem to answer my question. I really need to know if there is a way to get into the user database somehow. In the last year and a half, because of hackers on a PRIOR server, template versions not compatable with PHP versions and template changes, etc, I really cannot ask my registered users to re-register AGAIN. As well, I could just do it for them, but THAT is a lot of work as well.

SO, is there a way to get into the user database from the server side and make changes or am I totally screwed AGAIN and have to dump and re-install the site again?

[mandville]

You need to log into your sql direct using these instructions http://docs.joomla.org/How_do_you_recov ... assword%3F

[sovainfo]

You can use phpMyAdmin and manipulate #__users from there.
As an alternative you can take any user and make it super by $root_user="<username>" in configuration.php.

[mandville]

You can use phpMyAdmin and manipulate #__users from there.
As an alternative you can take any user and make it super by $root_user="<username>" in configuration.php.

i am sure all that is detailed in the doc i linked to.

[sovainfo]

Maybe it is because I know the answer I got lost in the document. Hope that my summary was usefull to OP.

[N8BMB]

Thanks all for your help - I got everything back to "normal".

Dennis