SOURCE Site Hacked But Media Outlet Up & Running

FRAMINGHAM – The SOURCE news site was hacked on Presidents Day.

A flaw with a WordPress plugin allowed backdoor access to a hacker who gained complete control of the SOURCE website and wiped the entire database clean.

The SOURCE media outlet is a customized WordPress site, which has been hosted by a California-based company since the SOURCE site launched in April 2016. 

The hosting company knew of the Wordpress plugin “vulnerability” on February 16. SOURCE was hacked just after 1 p.m. on February 17. Neither the developer of the plugin nor the company that hosts the news site notified SOURCE of the issue so SOURCE could deactivate the plugin before 1 p.m. 

As a result of the WordPress plugin compromise, SOURCE lost complete access to the site and the site was wiped of all data.

But today, February 19, SOURCE is live again.

The database is slowly being rebuilt and articles from the last week have been re-populated on the site, along with our very valued advertisers.

The new SOURCE site is completely SAFE. The WordPress plugin vulnerability only applies to websites that had it installed. It did not give hackers access to any viewers’ data. The plugin is no longer installed.

Reading a SOURCE report is safe.

Sharing a SOURCE link will is safe.

The SOURCE archive is still in process. Please be patient while looking for past articles. SOURCE is working on restoring them into the new database. That takes time.

Yesterday, we went back to what we do best – reporting the news.

SOURCE will continue to provide the best source of Framingham news – our mission since our launch on April 13, 2016.

Thanks for your support!