Rockies Restore Online Ticket Sales After Net Attack

A denial-of-service attack kept the Colorado Rockies from selling World Series tickets.

The National League champion Colorado Rockies ticket sales Web site is back up and running and briskly dealing World Series seats after an external malicious attack shut down the system.

"We sold more than 50,000 tickets today over 2½ hours," Rockies Media Relations Manager Jay Alves told eWEEK. The Rockies are limiting sales to four per person per game and are diligently checking IDs to guard against scalpers buying more than the allowable limit, a Rockies staff member said.

The system apparently has been repaired and is operating as reliably as it did Oct. 21, when season-ticket holders were able to buy World Series tickets online with no problem, said a staff member of Paciolan, the Rockies Internet service provider, which handles the teams online ticket sales. Prices for the World Series tickets range from $65 to $250.

"Yesterday was the first public day [for ticket sales]," said the staff member, who asked not to be identified. "And thats when the attack occurred."

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On that day, there were some 8.5 million attempts to connect with the Paciolan computers in the first 90 minutes after sales started, a Paciolan staffer said. Only a few hundred tickets were sold before the ticket-sales system had to be shut down temporarily.

Two hours after tickets went on sale Oct. 22, numerous fans reported that they could not get access to the ticket-sales Web site.

Paciolan staff members huddled most of the day Oct. 23 at the companys Irvine, Calif., offices in an effort to determine what caused the Oct. 22 attack that brought the system to its knees.

The World Series opens in Boston with games with the Red Sox Oct. 24 and 25. On the mound, Rockies lefty Jeff Francis will face Red Sox right hander Josh Beckett in Game 1.

The three games at Coors Field in Denver—including Game 5, if necessary—are scheduled for Oct. 27, 28 and 29.

Dave Butler, Paciolans CEO, told the San Jose Mercury News Oct. 22 that the crash affected the companys entire North American system.

"This is not the Rockies fault in any way whatsoever," Butler said. "We are working hard to address it."

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