Hi all,

I'm currently hosted at Tera-Byte (plan #4). It's a good compagny, cheap, and they have good support.

But:
I've a small-medium site (about 4000 pageviews in total each day) and I use about 120-150 megabytes of bandwidth / day.

When I checked my bandwidth in the beginning of the month, I had already used more than 4 gigabytes, while I normally use +-5 gigabytes / month. I went to the support-chatroom to ask more info about it since I didn't have more pageviews/day than the previous months. I was told that it was probably caused by the Code Red Worm. They adviced me to check the stats daily and so I did.

It seemed to be under control, I used my normal 120-150 meg / day. Because I thought it was under control I didn't check my bandwidth usage the 20th of August. When I checked it the 21st, I couldn't believe my eyes: between August 19 and August 21, I would have used 7 gigabytes!

I checked my siteadmin, and according to those stats, I'd used 1.5 gigabytes in 2 weeks. I checked my visitors-stats and I didn't have more visitors/pageviews than normal.

I've called to their support, i've written several mails in order to find the reason of that excessive bandwidth usage, but I didn't get a reply with the answer in it.

I had to check the web.log but that was only the log from yesterday till now. I was told that "Cobalt offers daily logs only". But I want to know how / what used all that bandwidth.

You can probably understand that I don't want to pay for something I didn't (in my opinion, as I don't have any proof of it, no logs, ... whatsoever) use.

My site is a site about a PCgame, we don't have any downloads on the Tera-Byte server, nor large images. The site has a total size of about 25 megabyte. I've discussed this with other webmasters (who have similar sites like mine and who run large gaming networks) and they all agree that it is impossible that our site would have used 7 GB in 2 days.

I hope some of you know:
- what could have caused this excessive bandwidth-usage
- how I can find it out
- what I should do against it.

Kindest regards and thanks in advantage,

Dieter Van Hassel

This is just my opinion, but I would say you have a right to access monthly comprehensive statistics with any host that charges for transfer usage. Although the RAQ control panel is certainly limited, plenty of alternative programs exists which could be easily installed for your usage with a cobalt raq.(such as say webalizer or traffic light) I wouldn't pay a dime to a host that did not provide previewable reports, and I think it's reasonable for you to demand them. Otherwise you can't be sure if it's validity.
It is possible for a site, however, to have large amounts of traffic within a few days. I have seen this happen with some client sites when they received unexpected publicity in magazines and other media.

Good luck:)

David Kiley

I had the EXACT SAME PROBLEM at the beginning of the month, and they told me it must be related to Code Red.

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=17716

That is the thread I posted. I would really like to get a decent explanation on what is happening as this is a very disturbing trend.

Well... I had the same problem 2 days ago.

Normally I use 600-700 meg per day, but between 20th and 21th August I used 6 Gig :eek:

I'm leaving tera-byte so I didn't ask them the reason but the log is showing a lot of "default.ida?xxxxxxxxx" which is typically Code Red virus...

oh my heavens

I was studying my logs and have seen those URL's come up in a "recent visitors" script from my CPanel. Something like default.ida then a long list of characters after that. I never knew it had soemthign to do with the code red thing. Is this happening to alot of sites? I havn't noticed a huge bandwidth increasment from before on my site though.

is this somethign to worry about? I don't knwo much about this code red worm thing.

Originally posted by FFx
Well... I had the same problem 2 days ago.

Normally I use 600-700 meg per day, but between 20th and 21th August I used 6 Gig :eek:

I'm leaving tera-byte so I didn't ask them the reason but the log is showing a lot of "default.ida?xxxxxxxxx" which is typically Code Red virus...

It seems that you've encountered just the same problem, same day, almost same amount of bandwidth wasted, ...

I'm for asking my billing history now, because I'm also thinking of leaving them. It's a shame, they are good, but 7 gigs of bandwidth can't vanish ....

Originally posted by hitspot

It is possible for a site, however, to have large amounts of traffic within a few days. I have seen this happen with some client sites when they received unexpected publicity in magazines and other media.

But I would notice that I'd have more paeviews for those days and well, I didn't have more pageviews those days...

Dieter

Originally posted by dgessler
Something like default.ida then a long list of characters after that. I never knew it had soemthign to do with the code red thing. Is this happening to alot of sites? I havn't noticed a huge bandwidth increasment from before on my site though.

is this somethign to worry about? I don't knwo much about this code red worm thing.


No need to worry if it's a Linux machine. Those are "only" infected system seraching for other systems they can infect.

I am currently hosted by tera-byte. Its hard to find another host that gives you that much quoted bandwidth with their kind of support. Do you have any suggestions on a new host? I might move in a few months when I will be in need of more bandwidth.