Server was hacked and now I can't remove the attacker's user (off-topic, closed.)
 

Security breach? Reinstall and secure before attaching to network.

Seriously. Especially if it's a newer server so there's no a ton of customization to reimplement.


//Moderator.note: these posts have been pruned from another thread so they won't break the flow.

NO! DO NOT DO THIS!

Dayid, While I understand your advice to be well meaning, LQ Security does NOT advocate this approach. Please avoid making this suggestion!

Yeah, you're right. It'd be stupid to reinstall and secure a server after a security breach. It's much better to just try and rid the user and hope that they didn't leave anything behind... lol

You'll note that I never said to not have backups, to not investigate, to not "find the source" (which is encompassed in "secure server"), etc.

In the LQ Linux Security forum we try to practice incident handling at a level that requires knowledge.
Please avoid posting replies that do not help the OP or support replies by others.
And please leave your lol posts in the General forum.

My advice is sound: Attempting to recover a breached machine is an extreme amount more effort than starting with a fresh slate and making sure that it is more secure. The comment to make it more secure - requires knowledge - and requires an identification of the original breach. That all seems perfectly inline with the sentiment of this forum. I'll play elsewhere though as there seems to be more than enough cooks in this kitchen.

I'll keep my PM's set to mail me though in case you want to discuss this further without us mucking up the thread.