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Messages - sydgrew

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1
General Support / My forum was Hacked and has now been Abandoned
« on: November 11, 2019, 10:01:33 pm »
1. Ten years ago I founded the Art-Music Forum, and I am still its owner.
My forum was reasonably successful and there were no complaints.

2. Last year a clever hacker deceptively posted falsehoods here, and hoodwinked SMF staff so that they deleted my Admin account.

(https://www.smfsupport.com/support/general-support/administration-password/)

The hacker uses the names Cairnwell, Dundonnell and Colin.

3. SMF staff have at no time consulted me or informed me about this action, and I  have found it impossible to make any kind of contact with them. I do not understand how this can be. It all seems very wrong.

4. Since then the hacker Cairnwell - Dundonnell - Colin has deleted many members' posts, banned me from my own forum, and even banned my IP address.

5. Recently, usng a proxy, I  looked at the forum, and I discovered that the hacker has now abandoned it and has not been seen there for the past three monts.

quote:
Where's Colin?
« on: November 02, 2019, 10:20:55 pm »
   
Inactive here for three months now, apparently.

Anyone know why?

Did I miss an explanation?

Not surprisingly, the forum is almost moribund without him.

end quote

There appears to be no admin and my forum is in terminal decline.

6. Please can I have my forum back. I have many plans for its expansion over the next ten years.
 

2
General Support / Re: Administration Password
« on: October 18, 2019, 11:41:15 pm »
I am the founder and owner of the Art-Music Forum. The first post in this thread contains a number of utter falsehoods:

I did not "indicate my wish to retire". This is quite false.

I did not "invite other members to replace me".
This too is utterly false.

These falsehoods were posted here as a trick in order to hack the forum and gain control of it.

SMF staff seem to have been hoodwinked by these falsehoods and they handed control of the forum to a hacker without advising me or consultne me.

The hacker uses the names Cairnwell or Dundonnell. He was expelled from our forum over a year ago, but he continues to pose there as an adminstrator, usng the hacked admin account that he was illegitimately givem by SMF staff.

Dundonnell/Carnwell was also expelled from the Unsung Composers forum seven years ago, and the owners of the Unsung Compsers forum warned me about his behaviour at that time.

He posts commercial advertising and has deleted many posts from legitimate members. He has banned me from my own forum and even banned my IP. (I can read the forum usng a proxy.) My private mail has also been interfered with and deleted.

For some reason SMF staff seem to attemd to this hacker but they have absolutely refused to respond to my legitimate requests for information and correction.
 

3
General Support / Re: Administration Password
« on: September 24, 2019, 12:58:22 am »
I founded the Art-Music Forum ten years ago, and I am still its owner.

On the first of October 2018 my ADMIN account had a password known only to me.

By the second of October some one had illegitimately changed my ADMIN account, making my forum inaccessible to me.

Nobody has told me anything, but I now believe that this was done by    SMF staff, without consultng me!

I have tried to contact the SMF staff several tmes, and I have been waiting for a response and explanation for almost a year,
but SMF have never contacted me in any way.

The first post in this thread contains a number of false and fraudulent statements which I believe are part of an attempt to
steal the forum.

I am still the forum owner, and I don't understand why no one from the SMF staff has ever consulted me to find out the truth of this situation.

Will you please now restore my ADMIN account to the state it was in on 1st October 2018, with a password known only to me, and let me know when you have done that.


4
General Support / Locked out of my own forum
« on: January 21, 2019, 12:01:18 am »
I am the founder and owner for ten years of the Art-Music Forum (http://artmusic.smfforfree.com/index.php). But I have been locked out of my own forum!

In a thread entitled "Administration Password", full of falsehoods, Cairnwell writes that he has "now changed the password". This was impossible because I was the only person who knew the password for the Admin account. So what really happened? The only way he could have "changed the password" is by some hacking or trickery.

Ever since that day (1st October) I have been unable to log on either as Admin or as Sydney Grew. My IP address has been banned and when I try to re-register I am told I am a "known spammer". Known by whom?

It should not be possible for a forum owner of ten years standing to be locked out in this way. Please can something be done to restore my rights?

5
General Support / Re: Administration Password
« on: January 02, 2019, 04:11:05 am »
I'm getting desperate about recovering my forum. Over the past nine years I have put a lot of work into setting it up and maintaining it. It should not be left in its present hacked and stolen condition. Even though I am the forum owner, my personal account has been deleted and my IP address has been banned.

Before 1 October the password to the Admin account was known only by me. Some one must have hacked it, and that is not right. Let me be quite clear: I am the founder and owner of the forum. I have run it for nine years and no one else is authorised to run it. Please, please, can something be done to reset the Admin account for me and restore the forum to its authorised state?

Thanks for any help you can give!

6
General Support / Re: Administration Password
« on: December 07, 2018, 05:37:51 pm »
Quote from: SMF For Free on December 07, 2018, 10:25:19 am
What was the forum url?

The forum URL is:

http://artmusic.smfforfree.com/index.php


7
General Support / Re: Administration Password
« on: December 07, 2018, 01:14:59 am »
I am the founder  (in 2009) and owner of the artmusic forum mentioned here.

It is quite untrue that I "wished to retire from my duties". Far from it.

At the end of September my administrator account had a password set by me. No one else knew it.

On 2nd October or thereabouts my administrator account was hacked and the password was changed.

This would not have been done by SMF staff, as they would be obliged to consult me and obtain my advice. So the password must have been changed by some one using some hacking tool.

Since then the fellow writing here as "Cairnwell" has been posing as administrator using the stolen account.

He has not only refused to tell me the hacked password and how he hacked it, but he has also banned me from my own forum, and even banned my IP address. Also he has been deletng many posts by other people.

How can I recover control of my wrecked forum?

Many thanks in advance for any assistance - and
I hope I have posted this in a suitable place.
Sydney Grew


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