Walkhighlands

Firefox on my PC is bizarrely refusing to show forum topics and posts, although it shows everything else down to the topic list. Edge on the same PC doesn't have this issue. Any ideas?

Having the same issue on Chrome but I figured it was to do with the issue Paul the admin posted about a few days ago that was making the site slow.

I'm getting this too - Chrome and Firefox, Android and Mac, Virgin and 4G. The response from the topic URL is empty (Content-Length: 0). Maybe related to the blocking mentioned in the slow responses thread as that's when it started? It's not consistent though, seems to come and go and can often be resolved by opening another topic before going back to the one I wanted.

Same with Microsoft Edge too.

Apologies for this - it isn't browser related, more connected to the internet connection used / login status. I've made a change which hopefully has fixed it for those who had the issue.

I've hardened quite a few security settings on the site to try to discourage the distributed attack we were seeing on Monday (which was making Walkhighlands run slow), I'm afraid this was an unintended consequence for some.

running fast on Firefox / Windows 10 for me. Can't believe a hillwalking site is getting a ddos attack? someone's got idle hands..

Can't believe a hillwalking site is getting a ddos attack?
Suspicious minds among us can think of a very recent motive...

No, it's really not that. It is a distributed attack we've had a few times but I very much doubt it's targetted specifically at Walkhighlands; it is an attempt to get users' email addresses from forums like ours but only worked one address at a time and even then required alot of chance - so racked up massive pageview numbers.

We removed the vulnerability years ago (& reported to ICO - some on here may remember) but are probably still on a big list of websites to hit and fish with this particular script in an automated way. Unfortunately although it doesn't expose email addresses, it does generate massive amounts of traffic which then slows us down (as on Monday for a few hours). Whoever runs it has a big international network of machines (probably ghost compromised PCs), so it's very difficult to prevent the traffic spikes from it.