What's with the "Badware" label? If you typed "Barn Owl Band" into Google recently you may have seen a warning saying that "This site could harm your computer" and been cautioned to try another site. [NOTE: as of 3/31/07 this flag has been removed -- see below.] The "Badware" flag is thanks to a new organization, StopBadware, that has been working with Google to flag sites containing malicious software (termed "badware" or "malware") that can install itself in the user's computer and log keystrokes, send spam email, etc. (see Stop Badware's web site at www.StopBadware.org for details.)

But... The Barn Owl Band? Malware? Gee, we thought we were a pretty clean act (except for playing a few wrong notes, banjos, and an off-color song here and there...) Well, early this week we were just as surprised as you may have been to see our site labeled as harboring malicious software... unfortunately, as we discovered, we were in fact the victims of a malicious hack to our site that installed what may have been a malware entry point, probably starting in early January 2007. We sincerely apologize to anyone who may have been affected by this. IF YOU VISITED OUR SITE IN THE RECENT PAST USING A WINDOWS PC, BE AWARE YOUR COMPUTER COULD HAVE BEEN COMPROMISED. We recommend you install and use a good malware and virus-detection program, and then make sure you install all the latest Windows upgrades to your operating system. (If you are a Mac user, you are relatively safe from malware attacks at this time, but you may still want to install a good antivirus package.)

We have removed the hacks to our site , improved our site security, and notified our web host of the site compromise so they can take any appropriate security action. We also informed StopBadware.com that our site is now "clean" and that they should remove our badware label. As of March 30, the flag has in fact been removed from Google search results linking to our site, and we will do what we can to make sure it stays that way.

The Internet is a wonderful thing , but like most wonderful things there is always someone ready to take advantage of it for dishonest purposes. We applaud what Stop Badware is doing, and we will be extra vigilant in future to guard our site from any hacks. We encourage you to learn more about internet security to protect yourself and your family from the worst of the web, so you can better enjoy the best of the web!

Sincerely,

The Barn Owl Band

March 30, 2007 / rev. March 31, 2007