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[RavenWolf]

Everything was fine this morning, but tonight there's a weird situation with my forums: http://www.potterincantatem.com/forums

IE users cannot post or log in, however Firefox users can log in and post just fine.

This has never happened before and I was wondering if this is something Surpass can fix (if it's related to something they might have done) or what can I do to fix it if that's not the case? I can't even access the admin panel, but I can log in. I can't post either.

I haven't added any kind of script to the forums for the record, so I really don't understand why this is happening.

Anyone has an idea? What can I do?

Thanks!

[Geoff]

it might be helpful if you posted what the problem specifically was, simply "cannot post or login" doesnt tell us whether they get an error, or the login simply doesnt take effect, or some other random situation

And uh, i dont use IE, so i cant go give it a shot.

[Brandonnn]

operator error... being that they are still using IE... make them upgrade (haha upgrade)

[pizzicar]

Some questions that might help.

Same version of IE or multiple versions?
What forum software are you usnig and what version is it?
What specific error message are you getting (if any)?

Because the site is in spanish, if you wanted to make a temporary login account and post the username/password - might be able to help you test it.

[RavenWolf]

Apparently the problem has now spread to Firefox too! Yesterday only IE users couldn't register, log in nor ost on the site. We get the following message: (I'm translating it to English, 'cause we get it in Spanish)

"Not authorized. Not authorized. You have been restricted the access to this forum. Please contact the webmaster or administrator for more information".

Not even administrators can log in, post, enter the admin panel, etc. We can still view the forum and everything, except log in or post anything. So apparently is not just a IE thing...

[MarkH]

This might sound a little daft or a bit too simple but the first thing I would consider is that the cookies have somehow become corrupt.
Try deleting the cookies in your browser that have been set by your forums, and clear your browser cache.
If it's just something simple like the cookies being corrupt, you should be able to get back in fine.

Otherwise you might have to think about restoring your database from your latest backups.

I hope you manage to sort it though, and don't lose too many posts etc if you have to restore from a backup.

[RavenWolf]

Do you think that upgrading the version might help? Because this is happening to everyone who uses the forums and I don'tknow if they would be willing to clear their caches...

[Skipdawg]

What version do you have? It is always best to try to stay currant. Older the version the more available exploits there are to hack.

[MarkH]

Originally Posted by RavenWolf

Do you think that upgrading the version might help? Because this is happening to everyone who uses the forums and I don'tknow if they would be willing to clear their caches...

As Skipdawg rightly says, staying current is usually your best bet for security reasons. On the forums I run, I stay with the latest stable release of the software, and keep up with any notifications of possible exploits.

Have you managed to get access to the control panel etc again yourself now? If you have, and it was done by clearing cookies and cache, then at least you have found a cure, upgrading may help, but what if it doesn't? Your users are still going to be in the same position.