Gootloader infection cleaned up

Dear blog owner and visitors,

This blog had been infected to serve up Gootloader malware to Google search victims, via a common tactic known as SEO (Search Engine Optimization) poisioning. Your blog was serving up 291 malicious pages. Your blogged served up malware to 19 visitors.

I tried my best to clean up the infection, but I would do the following:

  • Upgrade WordPress to the latest version (one way the attackers might have gained access to your server)
  • Upgrade all WordPress themes to the latest versions (another way the attackers might have gained access to your server)
  • Upgrade all WordPress plugins (another way the attackers might have gained access to your server), and remove any unnecessary plugins.
  • Verify all users are valid (in case the attackers left a backup account, to get back in)
  • Change all passwords (for WordPress accounts, FTP, SSH, database, etc.) and keys. This is probably how the attackers got in, as they are known to brute force weak passwords
  • Run antivirus scans on your server
  • Block these IPs (5.8.18.7 and 89.238.176.151), either in your firewall, .htaccess file, or in your /etc/hosts file, as these are the attackers command and control servers, which send malicious commands for your blog to execute
  • Check cronjobs (both server and WordPress), aka scheduled tasks. This is a common method that an attacker will use to get back in. If you are not sure, what this is, Google it
  • Consider wiping the server completly, as you do not know how deep the infection is. If you decide not to, I recommend installing some security plugins for WordPress, to try and scan for any remaining malicious files. Integrity Checker, WordPress Core Integrity Checker, Sucuri Security,
    and Wordfence Security, all do some level of detection, but not 100% guaranteed
  • Go through the process for Google to recrawl your site, to remove the malcious links (to see what malicious pages there were, Go to Google and search site:your_site.com agreement)
  • Check subdomains, to see if they were infected as well
  • Check file permissions

Gootloader (previously Gootkit) malware has been around since 2014, and is used to initally infect a system, and then sell that access off to other attackers, who then usually deploy additional malware, to include ransomware and banking trojans. By cleaning up your blog, it will make a dent in how they infect victims. PLEASE try to keep it up-to-date and secure, so this does not happen again.

Sincerly,

The Internet Janitor

Below are some links to research/further explaination on Gootloader:

https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2021/03/01/gootloader-expands-its-payload-delivery-options/

https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2021/08/12/gootloaders-mothership-controls-malicious-content/

https://www.richinfante.com/2020/04/12/reverse-engineering-dolly-wordpress-malware

https://blog.sucuri.net/2018/12/clever-seo-spam-injection.html

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Powerful Statement from Dr. Gonzalez

For anyone interested in listening….

An Open Letter to the American Medical Association
by Julio Gonzalez, M.D., J.D.

Dear Sir and Madam,

I read with great disgust your “Organization Strategic Plan to Embed Racial Justice and Advance Health Equity.”  Seldom have I read a more destructive, divisive, and inflammatory document by a professional organization, and I have never been more ashamed of being associated with the American Medical Association at any time in my career.  

The suggestion that our country owes anyone “equity” because of “past injustices” is revolting.  My family arrived in this country in 1961.  We have not been a party to any of the injustices that occurred so many decades ago, yet you hold my family, my colleagues, and me in the same light that you hold the cruelest slaveholder.  How dare you say that I, a person who is forced to answer on a census form as being white/Caucasian, but who on a different question answers Hispanic/Latino/Cuban, should be in anyway held responsible for those who traded slaves and the African chieftains who willingly sold their tribesmen and women to the Europeans four hundred years ago?  

How dare you say that I, and every one of my colleagues who have spent our lives treating the poor, minorities, majorities, and anyone else who may stumble into our emergency rooms, legally or not, without bias or favor, and without any chance of being reimbursed for our training and our efforts, should be thought of as members of an oppressive consortium designed to inflict evil or inequity to those who we selflessly treat?

How dare you join the countless number of camouflaged communists who furtively and purposely try to confuse those around them by conflating equity with equality? Ours is a nation built on the premise of equal standing under the law and only that.  Everything else is to be achieved through excellence, dedication, training, and hard work.  

Equity, on the other hand, is achieved by fiat, by taking from some and giving it to others at the point of a gun.  Few better ruses exist for the state control of the means of production than through the illusory promise of achieving equity instead of equal standing under the law. This is a dangerous track you are entering from which you and the social system you seek may never be able to return. 

You claim that we live in a land that was taken from Native Americans hundreds of years ago.  That may be so, but you neglect that the same is true of all other civilizations on earth. The Babylonians invaded Israel. The Norwegians invaded England. The Visigoths invaded Rome.  Rome invaded Egypt and North Africa.  The Turks invaded Constantinople.  The Mongols invaded Europe.  The Germans invaded Russia.  The Russians starved their people.  The Germans committed holocaust upon the Jews.  The Calusas ransacked and sacrificed their neighboring tribes.  The Caribes attacked and imprisoned the Taínos.  The Mayans continuously conquered each other and tore their victims’ hearts out while they were still beating.  Mao starved 69 million people and the People’s Republic of China killed millions with their latest virus.

Every single civilization, even those in Africa and the Far East, have conquered and been conquered.  It is a fact of life and a staple of history.  Your skewed and biased view of the events that took place between the Europeans and Native Americans while ignoring every other injustice carried out throughout history upon the very groups against which you point an accusatory finger is ignorant, hypocritical, and insulting to the 100% of us living Americans who played no part in the invasion nor were victims of the conquests.  

You have abused your position as the self-proclaimed purveyor of the medical profession to promote a self-proclaimed social(ist) agenda against the will of so many of those whom you falsely claim to represent.  

I will oppose you with all my being, all my strength, my intellect, and my voice.  I will oppose you from here to the ends of the earth.  I will oppose you because of your disgusting abuse of the great privilege that has been bestowed upon you, and because of the great insult you asperse upon me by suggesting that I carry anything other than love, charity, and good will towards every human being that I meet and have treated in my 30 years of practice as a physician.

There is a magnificent document whose signers pledged their Lives, their Fortunes, and their Sacred Honor to a cause much greater than themselves.  Today, I pledge the same in opposition of you.  

Here’s to seeing the end of your filthy, disgusting, and vile organization.  

Julio Gonzalez, M.D., J.D.
Former Florida State Representative
Former Congressional Candidate


Dr. Julio Gonzalez is an orthopaedic surgeon and lawyer living in Venice, Florida.  He served in the Florida House of Representatives.  He is the author of numerous books including  The Federalist Pages, The Case for Free Market Healthcare, and Coronalessons.

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Why waste energy on hatred, anger, victimization, rationalization when we need to direct our energy toward real, deep and long-lasting solutions?

After listening to the news and seeing and hearing all of the protests and anger out there about racism, I wondered why we only hear from the loud voices of victims or those who say they speak for victims. So much energy seems to be placed on trying to divide us, by saying that white people are racist and must accept that. We need to teach our children a new history about how bad this country is, and we must pay money from whites to blacks for all of the past sins and acts of inequality and racism that have gone on since our country’s founding. This is only dividing us and not moving us forward. Then I saw this article in the Cincinnati Enquirer by Donna Jackson. She says it so well.

Opinion: Better Things to Fight for Than Juneteenth

By Donna Jackson; Opinion Contributor, Cincinnati Enquirer

June 17, 2021


Like many Black Americans, I must admit that I had never heard of Juneteenth until recently.

So the push now to make this celebration of emancipation a national holiday certainly didn’t come from me or anyone I know. It sure seems as though it’s part of a bigger agenda being imposed on the Black community by those who never bothered to ask us. And while elevating Juneteenth to such prestige may seem relatively harmless, it comes with the baggage of radicals who are also promoting critical race theory, reparations and self-segregation.

It’s time for Blacks to counter such extremism with a productive agenda based on faith, patriotism and a love for all mankind.

The more I learn about critical race theory, for example, the more I realize it is definitely not my worldview. As an American, I reject the notion that our nation is irredeemably flawed. Indeed, I am thankful I was born and raised here. I refuse to succumb to anger rebranded as social justice. As a human being, I have no desire to divide people into incompatible tribes. Nor do I see the sense in trying to make up for past racism against Blacks by visiting it upon whites.

I resent that the people peddling all of this nonsense claim to speak for the Black community when I know they do not.

As a Christian, I look beyond individual differences and see the potential for good in everyone. If I can’t love my brothers and sisters whom I can see, how can I claim to love a God I can’t? Based on the ideology of critical race theory, I would have to hate God too.

So as far as Juneteenth goes, I am happy to have the 4th of July – Independence Day – instead. The Declaration of Independence and our Constitution are unrivaled among other nations. And I say that, knowing full well that Blacks didn’t get their freedom until several generations after 1776.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. also understood this, and he remained hopeful. His belief in America radiated throughout his “I Have a Dream” message – his goal that one day people would not be judged by their skin color but by their character, and that all would receive the promises of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Dr. King strongly believed in America, and he was confident that it would someday live up to its full potential. He never saw any reason to give up on the American experiment or harbor bitterness and hatred. And he applied the fight for freedom and equality to all of God’s children despite superficial differences.

We could do worse than to make Juneteenth a holiday, but – to the extent we look back through history – it would be better to learn other lessons that will help Blacks in the present and future.

We often overlook the history of Black innovators and entrepreneurs. More children should learn stories like that of Madam C.J. Walker, a Black business owner and America’s first female millionaire of any race, who overcame the obstacles against her over a century ago. That spark of entrepreneurship still exists in the Black community, but greater knowledge of this kind of history would only increase it.

Whether June 19 becomes a national holiday or not, I am glad I’ll be spending it in America. The future can be bright, so long as we Black Americans stay true to ourselves and reject the hateful nonsense being thrust upon us.

Donna Jackson is a member of the Project 21 Black leadership network. 

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Finding Civility and Honesty; Losing Hypocracy

Let’s just keep a couple of facts in mind as we try to “unify” the country.
74 Million Voters did not vote for Joe Biden. That is @ 47% of all voters. 81 Million Voters voted for Joe Biden. That is @51% of all voters. Yes, Joe Biden is my President.
In order for America to return to civility, honesty and respect for different points of view, we need to recognize the meaning of these numbers.
Despite very bad behavior by our previous President, 74 million voted for him. Why? I, of course, do not have all of the answers; but, common sense would tell me that these people overall liked the policies and actions of the previous administration. These people also, it seems, did not like the prospects of what the powerful progressives and their media supporters had in store for a very successful country prior to a terrible pandemic.
That being said, what do you think these 74 million voters think of the 40 executive orders flooding out of the new administration with the stated desire to turn back the policies of the administration for which these voters supported. My guess is that they are not happy with these orders, in fact, maybe even angry about these orders.
Instead of bringing people from all sides together to talk about these issues and try to find an effective common ground or reasonable compromises, the new administration pokes a unilateral pen-stroke into the eye of these 74 million voters.
Why does the new administration think that these actions will create an environment to facilitate “unity”, civility and honesty? Do these new leaders simply ignore this massive group of Americans? Do they want to belittle these 74 million as “despicable”, ignorant, or foolish people? I see the Obama arrogance returning to Washington…we can agree, just so it is what we want to do.
What I see happening is that these 74 million and their leaders will not see the opportunity to “unite” with, cooperate with, compromise with this new administration. This country will not rise up to address the real issues facing our country today, like educational inequality (and I don’t mean free tuition and loan forgiveness), inequalities in our justice system, and economic opportunity for all, to name a few. Maybe 2 years from now, these 74 million will gather in their own towns, counties and states and vote some of their candidates back into the House of Representatives and Senate.
If we can be politically honest and drop our blinding hatred for the personality of the previous administration, maybe we can see that some of the policies that came out of the previous administration actually worked for all Americans. It appears that the economic statistics support this fact. Can we just be willing to look honestly at the results that 74 million voters apparently believe? If we can do this, there is a chance for us to move the country further ahead in the next several years. If we deny this and try to erase all of the policies that were supported by 74 million voters, we will once again make no progress for our country and all of our citizens.

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I am a liberal

In today’s WSJ Editorial section, Michael Blechman wrote an incredibly honest and insightful article, “Liberalism isn’t what it used to be.” The “progressive” movement has moved so far away from the true liberal principles of our nation and our Constitution that so many of our liberal values are seriously threatened. Unfortunately, the mainstream media is complicit in this distortion. I encourage all to read this article and take it to heart.
#progressive histeria

5-29-19 Robert Mueller falls off the Pedestal

So many have placed Bob Mueller on a pedestal as the most honorable, trustworthy, and balanced person, so well suited for his assignment as Special Counsel on the Russian Investigation. This morning, Bob Mueller got up before reporters to make an 8 minute statement that pushed him off the pedestal of respectability in my mind.

He stepped up to the podium and spread more doubt about the innocence or guilt of President Trump in regard to collusion with the Russians and obstruction of the Mueller investigation. He claimed that due to Justice Department regulations he was not able or allowed to indict the sitting President. This is true, but totally meaningless. His job was to investigate the issues regarding collusion and obstruction. His report says that there was not sufficient evidence to suggest that Trump was guilty of either. If he had evidence, he could find Trump guilty in either case (as Ken Starr did in the Clinton investigation) and send the matter forward to the Justice Department to bring an indictment, or to send the matter to Congress to impeach the President. Yes, he could not himself indict the President.

Although he spouted the cliche that a person is innocent until proven guilty, his statement left doubt about the innocence of Trump, despite no evidence to support that position. He has clouded the waters for all sides, when he had no basis for making the statements he made.

Based on this performance, Mueller has fallen into the political camp of actors like Comey. He has fallen very far in my eyes. He is a disgrace.

#progressive hysteria

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10-04-17 Tillerson’s comments today on the NBC Claims

10-04-17  Tillerson’s comments today on the NBC commentary
Some people close to me think that my outrage at the media bias is crazy and unfounded.  I guess it depends on what you want to believe. However, I challenge anyone to listen to the full statement and questions answered by Rex Tillerson this morning and then listen to the NPR commentators talk about that Tillerson session and tell me that my outrage is not well-placed (about 4:30PM Eastern Time on WBUR).
The NPR commentators pointed out that Tillerson did not specifically deny that he called the President a “moran.”  When Tillerson was asked (listen for yourself), he said that the NBC report on that was too dishonest and low to even get a response from him.  He was just flabbergasted that the press would even say such a thing.  Listen to what he said…it is much better than what I can describe here.  However the 2 NPR commentators went on and on about how he did not specifically deny the statement, therefore it is true.  Where is the source if it is true!  How can they just assume that it is true!  What kind of intellectual dishonesty is this?  How low can NPR stoop to create a non-proven story?  Are they so desperate to say anything about about the Trump Administration as to not care if it is true or not?  Now here is the ultimate kicker…the male commentator on NPR said with indignation that he does not understand how the Secretary of State can say such a thing about the President and not lose his job.
This hysterical progressive media just blows me away.  Surely there are intelligent people on the anti-Trump, progressive bandwagon who see this as outrageous!
#progressivehysteria

10-03-17 My personal Dilemma 

10-03-17 My personal Dilemma
I want to be happier and send out happier posts, but these times are very difficult for me.
Let me put this out there…I would be very happy to see Trump step down and allow a real leader like Mike Pence take over the office of President.  Trump’s management style is so weak for a man who has run several large, successful organizations.  His main problem, as everyone knows, is in his tweets, although most are somewhat reasonable and to the point.  However, his tweet this past few days telling Rex Tillerson to stop trying to use diplomacy with the North Koreans baffles me.  His is using an informal, wide-open forum to give direction to the Secretary of State.  That is nuts, even if you give him the benefit of the doubt that this is just a negotiating or positioning stance to catch the attention of the North Koreans.  His constant tweets responding to every little criticism is wearing me out.  His ego gets in the way, over and over again.   Why take on the Mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico?  Although I think her criticism is unrealistic and unfounded, she is on the ground facing a serious disaster.  Trump’s responses make her a hero of the media and the progressives.  Why assist the hysteria Mr. Trump?
I strongly support the policies and philosophies that propelled Trump into office.  I would just like to see almost anyone else leading the charge today in getting things done behind these policies and philosophies. I admire his desire to work with the Democrats to find solutions to our key issues today.  I don’t think Nancy or Chuck have any interest in compromising to a successful conclusion.  They are worried more about how a successful bipartisan solution would benefit the Republicans; rather than how it might benefit the American people.  Yes, I know, the Republicans haven’t been any better. But, hope we can move forward.
My unhappiness comes also from the relentless media bias and actual campaign to undermine all of the good that can come from good policies and philosophies.  They aren’t being honest.  They claim a balanced point of view.  A very small example of the media language comes from the speech that Trump made to the United Nations.  Fox News, claimed by the progressives as the most biased said: “Here is some of the reaction to Trump’s UN Speech…”  NPR, NBC and CNN all opened their commentary with the words: “fallout from Trump’s controversial speech to the UN…”  Usually these guys are not so subtle.
So that’s my personal dilemma.
#progressivehysteria

10-01-17  Views on the Criticism of the Rescue and Recovery Response for Puerto Rico

10-01-17  Views on the Criticism of the Rescue and Recovery Response for Puerto Rico
I have seen many of your posts about Puerto Rico and I just want to give you my 2 cents (all it is worth) about what I see there.
I don’t think any of us understand the logistics of providing aid to an island in the Caribbean.  I have a good friend who was responsible for the logistics of setting up U.S. military operations in several countries and regions in the world.  It took months to get the supplies and personnel in place to even begin to set up operations on the ground, and they had several months upfront based on careful planning to even achieve what they did.  It was all planned in advance.
Although not politically correct to say, the Puerto Rican infrastructure has been neglected for many years (the responsibility for the power grid is solely with the Governor and his appointed Board); the financial care and planning has left the island bankrupt.  The storm devastated what was left.
It is so easy for us to say that the response should have been faster, better and more complete.  Of course, many progressives are saying that he didn’t tweet enough about Puerto Rico.  I also just heard NPR say that it has been 2 weeks since the disaster and Trump is just now visiting Puerto Rico.  I for one choose to believe the many, many reports that show that so much is being done and just as quickly as humanly possible.  Certainly one can choose to believe what CNN or NPR say about the complete failure of the recovery effort.  However, CNN and NPR will never say anything that would imply that the Administration has done anything right since January 2017.
The size of the overall military-related community in Puerto Rico is estimated to be 100,000 individuals. This includes retired personnel.[3] Fort Buchanan has about 4,000 military and civilian personnel.[1] In addition, approximately 17,000 people are members of the Puerto Rico Army and Puerto Rico Air National Guard, or the U.S. Reserve forces
#progressivehysteria