UBB.threads PHP Forum Software Community Forums General Off Topic well this sucks..

my site, which I have had with the same host since 1997 may be dead.
they don't answer emails, their telephone is disconnected....

I have been trying to download my SQL database to have a current backup and it fails every time.. I don't know what to do.
this is depressing and frustrating all at the same time

What provider are you currently with? Is it their web based backup tool failing? Do you have access to SSH on the machine?

I prefer to make all backups from the command line via SSH vs relying on a tool; you can see the commands on the UBBWiki guide "Backup Guide" (similar instructions are also available on the guide "Migration Guide").

Additionally, the backup utility provided by UBB.threads has come a long way in more recent versions and could be utilized to jump to another provider if need be.

But it definitely think it's likely time for a new host if you're not getting any sort of timely responses to inquiries from your existing provider.

I try to connect with PuTTy and it times out... and when I try to use the tools built into UBB it tells me I'm not authorized..? (after testing the download path and passing)

been with your-site.com since 97, they have always been good to me... but now, nobody is responding to emails, or tickets, phone is disconnected, half the stuff on their main page doesn't work...

I sent you a PM on facebook

Well the sites performance is extremely acceptable to say the least.
Not sure what host or plan you are on.

Maybe the host is going through new ownership and changes

But the odd part is the internal backup tool fails.
It just runs a php script that access mysql.

What about other UBB CP validation items like attachment location and avatars. Do they pass also and do they work when posting attachments or updating avatars.

it was acting up last week.. which is what prompted me to open a ticket... and have had no response on that, or any of the emails I have sent, the billing page is gone..

when I run the script, I test the path, it passes, says it's writable.. I start the export, it gets to the address book, and then I get
Forbidden
You don't have permission to access this resource.

the permission checks all pass

I have been looking at this for several hours today and spent some time last night trying to just obtain a copy of your database...
- The UBB.threads backup utility fails after exporting some data, "You don't have permission to access this resource."
- I found and installed 3 PHP backup scripts, all error out 500 when attempting to access system commands to write a database dump
- The SQLYog tunnel provides a 1010 error, which generally would indicate a "Error dropping database" error message in MySQL (which since this is simply attempting a connection, is odd in of itself)
- PHPMyAdmin while able to edit portions of the database fails to dump even a small chunk of data, resulting in a 504 Gateway Time-out error.
- SSH doesn't allow any connections ("You do not have permission to login interactively to this host")

A possible issue could be, since your host uses a separate database server vs hosting it locally, there could be some sort of issue with the bridge between servers, the database server could be having problems, or some unknown variable is at play.

I'm not really sure how to proceed on obtaining a backup at this point if the host is unresponsive... But with the SQL server acting the way it is, I'd be very worried about the completeness of your data; if it is an issue with the SQL server you could end up with a corrupted database.

Your hosts webpage indicates in the footer that its owned by a Fluidsoft, whos linkedin is here (which states their homepage is your hosts url) indicates it has 5 employees, couldn't hurt to try to contact one of them.

I have tried reaching out to anyone I can find associated with it so far, multiple different emails, phone numbers... no luck.
thank you for trying,!

Is your webhost using a webhosting control panel like cPanel? Maybe there is an option to create a backup in the control panel itself?

Was this 403 error? In this case this could be caused by a rule in mod_security. I have seen this quite often with various scripts. You could try to disable mod_security by adding the following lines to the .htaccess file:
This is only working on Apache based installation but there may be also an option to disable mod_security in the webhosting control panel

Error 500 indicates an error in the PHP script. This could be caused by disabled PHP functions. Some webhosts are disabling PHP functions such as system() due to security or performance reasons, especially for websites hosted on a shared virtual hosting plan. If you have no access to the log files, you could try to add after <?php:
This should show the actual error message rather then just an error 500 message. Off course, only for debugging purpose

User indicated the inability to generate a backup via his hosts control panel in the trouble ticket on the matter.

As a part of general troubleshooting various UBB.threads system pages were referenced; the PHPInfo page indicated that mod_security was not loaded but this could vary based on the server handler; the Suhosin status page indicated that Suhosin was not enabled on the server. These pages were added specifically for troubleshooting issues with Suhosin or web server modules and has been a part of the UBB.threads package since at least v7.5.9 (2015).

Some basic checks using the UBB.threads System Requirements Test (also written for basic troubleshooting of the UBB.threads script) indicated no usage of suhosin on the machine or any other detectable server issues that it was designed to detect.

Disabling items in apache is only allowed on a system that allows Allowoverride to disable them, which in most shared hosting environments is not allowed.

And as stated in my response, the 500 error was encountered only while attempting to utilize system commands.

Suhosin and mod_security are not the same thing

Suhosin was a security extension for PHP 5 and has been discontinued a long time ago.

ModSecurity is a popular extension for Apache, Nginx, and IIS webservers that is completely independent from the PHP installation: https://github.com/SpiderLabs/ModSecurity

A typical sign that mod_security is running are the infamous 403 errors. If you see this error, one of the mod_security filter rules has been triggered. Some of the stock mod_security rules are overly cautious

I don’t know which hosting control panel Bad Frog is using, but it looks like cPanel has an option to disable mod_security:
Maybe worth a try?

I just found an easy way to check whether ModSecurity is present. Just add cmd.exe somewhere in the URL.

For example: DOMAIN/forums/ubbthreads.php/cmd.exe

This will trigger one of the more ridiculous ModSecurity rules and should return 403 Forbidden on server with enabled ModSecurity. Servers without ModSecurity will ignore this.

so...
I did some more detective work and actually got a working cell # for the former sysadmin..
they are supposed to call me.
but the story so far is... owner/sysadmin diagnosed with terminal cancer and they just dropped everything, but are leaving all sites on their servers up and running for free
hopefully someone does get back to me so I can get my data backed up properly.

stay tuned!!

that results in Forbidden
You don't have permission to access this resource.

That's Mod Security. You could try to disable it either over cPanel (if available) or .htaccess. Instructions are above

Mod Security can be a very powerful tool to block incoming attacks, but it need a lot of tuning/tweaking to run properly with scripts like UBB.threads.

It's not a cpanel option, there are very few options there. I'll give the htaccess method a try later today

so adding
<IfModule mod_security.c>
SecFilterEngine Off
SecFilterScanPOST Off
</IfModule>

to my htaccess didn't help.

I get

Forbidden
You don't have permission to access this resource.
still when trying to run the backup, it gets to the address book and then kicks out that error.

where would I add that PHP snippet?

You can use the PHP snippet on any PHP file that you want debug. However, this will not help with Mod Security.

I just installed Mod Security on my test server and tried the UBB backup. It failed with the 403 error after the first refresh. I checked the logs and this issue is related to the dumpdir (Absolute PATH to Backup Storage Directory) field.

I found a workaround. Create a directory backup in your UBB admin directory and then use just backup as your new backup directory:


At least this solved the problem on my test server.

ok, just tried that.

var/www/virtual/v/a/vanning.com/www/threads/admin/backup/
directory test passed

backup still fails at the same point.

thanks for trying :\

Have you used the full path (var/www/virtual/v/a/vanning.com/www/threads/admin/backup/)? Just set it to "backup" like in the screenshot.

tried both, still get forbidden when running the backup

Again, mod security in general cannot be disabled on most servers, it does not make sense from a security standpoint to install a security module and allow your users to disable it outright. And yes mod_security is still used to this day by shared hosts.

This was all tested weeks ago, we attempted to make backups of the full path and a virtual path with the built in tools, this was all part of standard testing with what little access is allowed on the machine.

The end result is he must obtain a backup of his MySQL database directly from the host as an SQL dump in order to migrate to another provider. There is no way we're going to be able to get this data elsewhere.

I am quite aware that executing system commands are what is proving to be the issue here, we've already exhausted all of these tests weeks ago.

All that it seems you're attempting to do is provide false hope on an already stressful situation by completely ignoring that hands on services have already been attempted in the matter and ignored by you providing the same information that's can covered on my responses on the issue.

For note, this thread is outside of the scope of UBB.threads support, it has been left as a courtesy to the user. If the same posts are going to be just repeated this thread will be locked.

Have you access to the log files? Any Mod Security error should be logged there including the exact pattern that cause the error.

Did I say something else? I was taking about Suhosin.

Another testament to why making regular full backups are important.
Looks to me that every possible method has been tried to resolve the issue.
But without the host's intervention it is not going to happen.