404 Messages & Looking for Ecommerce Pages

[gouri]

I was looking at my log file and I received a lot of visits from an ip address that returned many 404 messages.

It appears that they were trying to find ecommerce pages on the site that do not exist.

Some of the file names that returned a 404 message are the following:

www.example.com/b2b/admin/includes/stylesheet.cs...
www.example.com/shop/admin/includes/stylesheet.c...
www.example.com/cart/admin/includes/stylesheet.c...
www.example.com/eshop/admin/includes/stylesheet....
www.example.com/zshop/admin/includes/stylesheet....

I am not sure what this even means. Does this mean that someone is trying to look for ecommerce pages on the site and essentially just taking a chance?

I looked up the ip address on the internet and I found some info saying that this means someone is trying to find hacks and your admin folder name. Can someone please explain to me what this means and what I can do about it?

Also, it said on the internet that this is a dynamic ip address.

I would appreciate if someone can help me to understand what is going on?

[gouri]

One thing that I didn't mention in my opening post that I think is important is that I received 15 404 messages of the type that I mentioned above in one day.

I think that is a lot of 404 messages to receive in one day and I would appreciate if anyone can tell me why this may be happening?

Thanks.

[Receptional]

Yes, it COULD be a scan to identify security holes, but then it could also be more benign... Say a scan to work out your shopping cart layout so the products might be added into a price comparison engine.

In itself, it is nothing to worry about. Happens to all of us, and the scan was random, not targeting you. That said, it may well be a scan with a view to a hack, but since your site doesn't have those pages, your site isn't open to security holes on those pages. If you want to get paranoid, the worry would be where the same IP number called up pages that Got a 200 response... But life's too short!

15 404s in a day is not alot. Most sites get many more.

[gouri]

Thank you for that response. I have a better understanding of what might be happening.

I had a question. On the day that I received 15 404s in a day as well as on other days more recently, a number of my 404s everyday are coming from ip addresses that go back to China.

Do you think this might have anything to do with the attack on Google properties recently by individuals in China? Is there some sort of connection?

I have not gotten 404s from Chinese IP addresses before this began.