Emergency Reboot - Tonight 11PM EST

[WHSP-Mark M]

Hello All,

This evening at 11PM EST we will be doing an emergency reboot to complete a necessary kernel upgrade on all of shared cPanel servers.

While we normally try to give as much notice ahead of time as possible, this situation warrants us to be pro-active rather then re-active. This exploit has been spreading through 64-bit servers like wildfire and causing much aggravation for users and administrators world wide. You can read up on this attack at the following URL:

http://linux.slashdot.org/story/10/09/20/0217204/Linux-Kernel-Exploit-Busily-Rooting-64-Bit-Machines

The following servers will be rebooted this evening:

• breakout.whspn.net
• defender.whspn.net
• donkeykong.whspn.net
• galaga.whspn.net
• pong.whspn.net
• sonic.whspn.net
• tetris.whspn.net
• tron.whspn.net

Expected downtime is less then 30 minutes.

As always if you have any questions or concerns, don't hesitate to let us know.

Warm Regards,
Mark



_______________
Mark M
Senior Support Administrator
http://www.webhsp.com

[john]

Hi,

At this time we are going to defer these reboots.  While we are considering this a critical issue there is a lack of consistency in the online community on the best way to approach resolving this.  Also, as I understand it, CentOS has not even released specific kernel upgrade for this.  So we are going to review this with the data center and their technical staff and come up with a plan on how to approach this tomorrow. 

We are also going to look at a "rebootless" kernel upgrade option that is referred to in the article mentioned in Mark's post.

More updates tomorrow.

Best Regards,

John Burns

[WHSP-Mark M]

Hello All,

This reboot has been re-scheduled for tonight. The kernel has been released from CentOS and it is fully tested and ready to go.

We will rebooting these at 11PM EST and the expected downtime is less then 10 minutes.

Best Regards,
Mark

[john]

Hello,

All the servers have been rebooted.  There is an issue with the sonic server that we are working with the Data Center on, and should have it back online shortly.

Best Regards,

John Burns

[john]

Hello,

The sonic server is back online.

Best Regards,

John Burns