Last week we learned from Dan Kaminsky that DNS servers — computers that translate domain names into the numerical IP addresses machines use to locate each other on the Internet — had a security issue, all around the world, that made them vulnerable to hackers. In fact HD Moore, the man who wrote an exploit for the bug got hacked himsef. Here's a time-lapse video showing the progression of network engineers working overtime to apply software patches to servers.

HD Moore is the guy behind the Metasploit Project. In general, Metasploit helps sysadmins find security holes in their networks. Last week, Moore published an exploit for a weakness in the domain name server (DNS) software used to route Web surfers to the correct machine for, say, www.valleywag.com. On Tuesday, some of the traffic to Moore's employer, BreakingPoint, was rerouted to a fake Google page operated by a scammer running a click fraud racket. The cause? An AT&T DNS server for the Austin, Texas area that had been compromised using ... you guessed it. Moore emailed us, "There is no way to verify now that it has been fixed, but my impression is that it was actually a different exploit."

The website of the National Security Agency went down yesterday. No, it wasn't subject to "cyber terrorism," just bad network management — specifically, its domain-name servers, according to Arbor Networks' Danny McPherson. But don't worry, everyone, the site is back up! Still, the fact that it sports a Flash interface doesn't exactly inspire confidence in the engineering ability of our information overlords. (Photo by Ryan Lackey)