For those in the USA, Happy Thanksgiving.

I think I have fixed the major blog problem.

For more details keep reading: The Kosmos Travel Log uses software called “WordPress”. This is blog software that keeps track of all the stories and comments. As with most software, it has some defects and is often open to attacks. So, along with the Kosmos Travel Log, lots of other WordPress sites have been disabled or redirected to advertising pages. Clearly this helps makes the attacker money by sending readers to their ads. Christi and I have never put any ads on the Kosmos Travel Log, or ever plan to do so. So if you see ads, we have been attacked.

Anyway, I was able to upgrade to a new WordPress (from 2.1.2 to 2.6.3) from our Fantastico control panel. It required a database fix at our hosting using mySQL PhpMyAdmin. Then the WordPress install required disabling new charsets in the wp_config (comment out define of ‘DB_CHARSET’), disabling plug-ins (rename the plugin directory) to allow login, and then re-enabling the plug-ins. The site should be back, but there might be some quirks.

Anyway, what a crazy time to have this happen, after we are in the middle of the scariest story we have ever posted on the blog about Stromboli! Luckily we were in a place with Internet so we could fix this. Many times we are at sea, and we would be unable to fix for a potentially long time.

—
Eric