Symptoms
After a number of failed login attempts, the admin account locks and you get the following message: "Your account has been locked due to too many failed login attempts. Please contact the site administrator."
Cause
This is by design. Manually unlocking the admin account is not a VISA PA-DSS compliant action. The proper method would be to have another super admin user unlock the account through the admin site, or wait the specified timeout period.
Solution
To unlock the admin account:
1 - Connect to your DB using MS SQL Server Management Studio, Enterprise Manager, or your host's web-based query tool
2 - Run the following query against the DB:
UPDATE [Customer]
SET [LockedUntil] = DateAdd(mi, -1, GetDate())
WHERE [Email] = 'your admin email address here'
UPDATE [Customer]
SET [BadLoginCount] = 0
WHERE [Email] = 'your admin email address here'