Real Trends 500 website hacked hours after new rankings debut
“Real Trends President Steve Murray announced the hack Wednesday afternoon in an email, saying that “someone who didn’t want you to have access to our REAL Trends 500 report hired a hacker to attack the REAL Trends 500 website.” Murray did not identify the hacker, but said that “we will be rebuilding the website which will likely take a few days.”
Inman News
“This was a planned, vicious denial-of-service attack on the premier ranking report in the industry and an attack on our company,” Murray also said. “The timing lets us know it was not a random attack but one that was planned to disrupt the ability of the industry to access this valuable information.”
The site seems to be back up now. Seems odd that anyone would want to attack Real Trends. I mean, Real Trends? Seriously?
But if anything was hacked I would look at the report itself. If you take a look at page 2, it features a full page ad, of what appears to be a one star review of a well respected Chicago brokerage. The gentleman in the ad is photographed with a dead animal wrapped around his neck, complaining about only having one day to clean his closet.
I’m not making this shit up. See below. His name is listed as “Kristoff A.”, what more evidence of hacking do you need!!
I don’t doubt it, and it does seem like a low return, high risk venture for the hacker.