Giving FTP Access to Your Forum

[CharterSchoolForums]

Hi guys,

Quick question. I am using Fiverr to find someone that can help me make some corrections to my phpbb forum. I asked him what sort of access he needs to make the correction and he said ftp access and forum admin. Have any of you done this? Is it safe? What safeguards can I take?

 

[John]

Take an offsite backup. I wouldn't trust a random person off of Fiverr, personally.

 

[mav3n]

Yeah, don't do it. Just have him explain the steps. That's sketch

 

[Thomasss]

Unless he's a top rated seller, I could take extra precautions for this. Take an off-site backup of EVERYTHING and monitor what he does whilst he completes the tasks at hand. I would never give someone database access, though, given you're giving other peoples information out and that can be illegal depending upon how you go about doing it.

 

[Maestro]

I use Fiverr, for offering services, and Buying I would never want to give or get that access, you can allow him to use teamviewer or another screen share platform to complete the task.

 

[Zion]

Be smart about it. Simply put:
1. Backup your entire forum (all files, databases, etc.)
2. Create a temporary FTP account (temporary, because you should delete it after use)
3. After work is done to your community, continue to back your forum up as often as possible

-----------------------------------

Unfortunately, people can and will compromise your community, provided the opportunity. Giving someone FTP access is definitely a golden opportunity to do some damage. However, as long as you have your site backed up properly and know how to fully restore everything, you should be at ease that you can restore anything anyone attempts to do to harm your forum.

 

[CharterSchoolForums]

Be smart about it. Simply put:
1. Backup your entire forum (all files, databases, etc.)
2. Create a temporary FTP account (temporary, because you should delete it after use)
3. After work is done to your community, continue to back your forum up as often as possible

-----------------------------------

Unfortunately, people can and will compromise your community, provided the opportunity. Giving someone FTP access is definitely a golden opportunity to do some damage. However, as long as you have your site backed up properly and know how to fully restore everything, you should be at ease that you can restore anything anyone attempts to do to harm your forum.

This is the route I took. Deleted the temp ftp account after the work was done. Not going to lie I was nervous about doing it.

 

[KnownSyntax]

Take an offsite backup. I wouldn't trust a random person off of Fiverr, personally.

100% agree with. They can always do things locally and transfer the files and database information to you through a .ZIP or .TAR.GZ file. I'd never give anyone any FTP access or SSH access who wasn't someone I knew and trusted with everything.

 

[Cierra]

Besides myself, only my forum developer has FTP access. Like others said above, I wouldn't trust any other people offsite with access because there is too much risk.