Strange Files in Awstats 404 List

[sgiandubh]

Today when looking in Awstats, at the bottom of the page under Status Codes, I noticed a lot of code 404's - Doc. not found. When I looked to see what these files were, the list included a bunch of files not in my folders, mostly ending in: /include/install.lock.

Any idea why these files are showing up as not found, when they are not anything I have on my pages? (and what they might be?)

Thanks,
Buck

[Early Out]

I usually have a collection of one-shot 404s on that list, too, with strangely mangled URLs, and references to files that aren't on my site, and certainly aren't linked from my pages. I've never quite understood where they're coming from, but since they're almost all single occurrences, I just ignore them.

I've never seen the /include/install.lock variety, however - perhaps those will ring a bell with someone.

[sgiandubh]

Yeah, I've seen the occasional one or two before, but there were about 30 of these, with various names before the install.lock, so it seemed a little unusual...

[farcaster]

My guess would be that the hits you are seeing are from hacker scripts looking for install.php's that are left behind and renamed, or other files that would allow them to gain access to your site.