Tyler Businesses Affected by Go Daddy Hack

Indy racer Danica Patrick’s #7 car has become a well-known symbol for the company Go Daddy. Turns out, nobody could navigate Go Daddy out of yesterday’s hack that shut down millions of websites, including several in Tyler.

If you went to a website on Monday and you got an error message, chances are it wasn’t your internet connection. A hacker group has claimed responsibility for shutting down Go Daddy-hosted sites and causing millions of small businesses to have a hard time functioning. Why?

The group Anonymous claimed responsibility, saying they did it because Go Daddy supported federal anti-piracy legislation called the Stop Online Piracy Act, which they consider censorship of the Internet.

Several East Texas companies were affected, including Personalweb.com based in Tyler, and a new social media site for students at UT Tyler called Study Pods.

My spouse’s company was affected too. Their website and email were both completely useless after the hack.

Go Daddy is working on the problem, and if affected sites aren’t back up yet they will be soon.