Unable to log into VPS

[Cameron Zipp]

I am currently unable to log into our VPS when accessing it via PuTTy. 

I have ensured the password is correct when typing it, however we receive an Access Denied message. 

[wolstech]

Have you tried resetting the password? https://heliohost.org/reset/

If that doesn't work please let me know, and I'll have a VPS admin take a look at it for you.

[Cameron Zipp]

I have reset my password and are still getting the same error. 

[wolstech]

The  password reset shows a message on my side saying that it failed and an admin needs to manually reset it. Escalating.

[wolstech]

This support request is being escalated to our VPS admins.

[wolstech]

Just an update, they're currently working on your VPS. Our normal management tool couldn't login either, and it wouldn't even power off cleanly because open VM tools isn't responding. If you had any websites or other public facing services hosted on there, they'll be down for a little while as they're working on it.

[MoneyBroz]

Your VPS is broken, and most of the critical files are deleted, and it needs a rebuild, do you need any files backed up?

[Cameron Zipp]

No. I do not believe there is anything on the VPS needing to be saved. 

Out of curiosity, what caused the VPS to become broken, and how can we avoid that happening in the future? 
For context, this seemed to happen right as we were doing some tests for a website we were building, that uses a Java Spring API.

[Krydos]

There are supposed to be about 1300 binary executables in /bin for example. On your VPS there are only 19 left. Seems something deleted most of them, which decimated your operating system rendering your VPS unusable. I looked around a bit, but didn't see any obvious signs of being hacked, so not sure what happened. It's possible some code went haywire and deleted the wrong thing if you were running it as root. This is why it's always recommended to run software, even software you wrote yourself, as a user with limitations, not root.