In the past several hours, we have seen attacks against two different clients who use WordPress. These clients are unrelated, and their sites are not hosted in the same location, or even using the same provider. Therefore, we do not believe that the attacks are related.

However, it is urgent that you make sure your WordPress installation is protected from such attacks. We urge all CHCS clients to take the following steps immediately.

1. Change the passwords for all WordPress users. Make sure that the new passwords are strong.
2. Update WordPress to the latest version.
3. Update all WordPress plugins that you may be using.
4. Make sure that you have installed and set up the Better WP Security plugin. 
5. Make sure that you have installed and set up a cache plugin. Use either WP Super Cache (setup instructions) or W3 Total Cache (setup instructions).

One of our providers will be performing server upgrades beginning Tuesday, May 1 at 8:00 pm, and ending on Wednesday, May 2 at 4:00 am Pacific time. We are informed that the actual downtime will be from 10-30 minutes.

Email services, and CHCS customers on other servers, will be unaffected.

Thank you for your patience.

CHCS customers who use Formstack for online forms should have received this notice:

We just wanted to give you a heads up and notice that on Friday, July 29th AND Saturday, July 30th between the hours of 12AM and 6AM EST, our data center provider will be upgrading their networks. This upgrade will cause brief downtime for your online forms and our website causing your forms and admin area of your account to be inaccessible. Each downtime should be no more than 30 minutes.

The downtime will be caused by our data center to upgrade switches and VLAN equipment which will result in better performance for our system.

We are very sorry for any inconvenience this may cause you. Please contact our Support team if you have any questions.

Thanks,

The Formstack Team

Most CHCS email customers are using email from Google Apps. Google is making changes that will allow you to access to a myriad of other Google services. This was announced a year ago, and the transition is being completed shortly.

If you are a Google Apps administrator, you have been receiving notifications that all Google Apps accounts will become "enhanced" with the additional services in the next couple of weeks.

Please contact CHCS if you have questions. Detailed help about the transition is available from Google.

In another change, effective May 10, companies that sign up for the no-cost version of Google Apps will be limited to 10 users. Organizations with existing free Google Apps accounts will continue to be able to create up to 50 accounts. Schools and other nonprofits using the Education version will not be affected.

We thank all our friends, colleagues and clients for making 2010, our 25th anniversary year, an excellent one.

Our offices will be closed on Friday, December 24 and Friday, December 31. We'll be operating with reduced staff through Tuesday, January 4, but will be available if immediate assistance is needed.

All of us at CHCS wish you a joyous holiday season, and success and prosperity in 2011.

This morning, some web sites hosted by CHCS were unavailable because one of our servers could not connect to the internet as normal.

The company where the server is located traced the problem to an error caused when they updated their router hardware. They have corrected the issue, and a similar problem should not occur again.

CHCS thanks our customers for your patience and understanding.

Here's the short explanation. Here's the technical explanation.

Some CHCS clients reported issues connecting to mail accounts. We regret the disruption.

Monday, May 11, 9:00 pm Pacific Time

All CHCS servers are operating normally.

One of our suppliers will be performing upgrades on May 13, 2009 at around 8:00 pm Pacific Time. This will only affect the small group of CHCS web hosting clients who do not use our content management system.

During the upgrade, your sites may be slow to load. The web servers may be unavailable for approximately 20 minutes. Thank you for your patience.

This information is also available at http://www.chcswebservices.com/ and by phone at 206-686-2777, option 5.

Saturday, May 9, 3:00 pm Pacific Time

One of our providers will be performing hardware maintenance this evening betweem 1:00 and 4:00 am (Sunday morning). This maintenance may affect access to some of our services. Thank you for your patience.

This information is also available at chcs.com/support and by phone at 206-686-2777, option 5.

Tuesday, February 17, 12:01 pm Pacific Time

All CHCS servers are operating normally.

Some CHCS Gmail (Google Apps) users have reported difficulty reaching the web interface with Temporary Error 500 or 503. This problem does not seem to affect receiving email through POP or IMAP using email client programs like Thunderbird or Outlook. Google is aware of the issue, but has not yet posted an ETA.

If you need additional assistance, click here. For information about the status of CHCS email accounts using the new email server, see the Google Apps Email Discussion Group.