Subj : Re: archives.thebbs.org files gone
To   : Nightfox
From : jack phlash
Date : Fri Jun 10 2022 14:23:28

on 10 Jun 2022, Nightfox said...
 
 Ni> Digital Man (author of Synchronet) said he was able to download from
 Ni> archive.thebbs.org recently using Internet Explorer.  I just tried that,
 Ni> and sure enough, it was able to download from their FTP site.  It make
 Ni> me wonder what Internet Exporer is doing differently, because it
 Ni> appeared to me that the files on their FTP site were all gone..

Yeah, I thought that might have been one of the things that was happening to you but I figured it was easier to link you to that archive than go into that rabbit hole. :P

I believe it's an ugly combination of what seems like some measures put into place to prevent mirroring (temporarily blocking IP that connect improperly and/or too often) as well what I assume is a now outdated HTTP agent string checking scheme (I had the most success with spoofing a very old Internet Explorer version.)

Honestly, I'd love to know more about exactly what he's doing, as some of the behavior I've observed makes little sense to me despite the hours I poured into this and having some professional experience in this area myself. I never quite figured out the interplay between the HTTP agent and the FTP server or 100% nailed down a pattern for the IP bans but obviously I figure out *enough* to get around it. Even still, I only did a bit at a time out of respect for his server's resources just in case that was part of what he didn't want people mirroring it in the first place.

What I *do* know is that as an end user it all feels practically unusable these days, and I seriously question the value of putting up a file archive if you won't let people, you know, download from it. :P Honestly, I never intended to mirror the site in the first place, but I got so annoyed with simply trying to use it casually to grab a few files that it kicked off this whole scheme of trying to figure it out and get around it.

Fun times.

|08j |15A C K |08p |15H L A S H |08!

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