Adding old datebase to new forum help

[adriswings]

Hello, I'm not sure If I'm posting this in the right thread, let me know. But, I need help, I had a forum for my fan site that had lot of spam,viruses and so many issues that I couldn't even log in anymore and not even my host knew what to do, they told me to start new forum from scratch, but my old forum was really successful and had lot of posts and topics, I put so much effort in it I want the old datebase to be added to new forum, I asked my host but they said "We may add your old database to your new forums, however, the hacking issue may reappear then or your database may not be compatible with the new version of your forum. Ask at SMF forums how to do this best.'' So I'm asking if anyone can help me with this, how to do it?

[margarett]

Hi and welcome to SMF.

Your host is right. You can add your database to a new set of files. It's pretty much the same as explained here:
http://wiki.simplemachines.org/smf/How_to_upload_a_fresh_set_of_files
(note that your new install/database is to be scrapped)

But they are also right when they say that the hacking might reappear. And this is mostly due to hacked passwords probably. Read also this:
http://wiki.simplemachines.org/smf/I_think_I_have_been_hacked
So be sure to change ALL your passwords, including MySQL, cPanel, FTP, forum admins, etc etc etc.

Finally, in which SMF version were you on?