SuperHack/SuperHack CD.bin/Hack/MISC/XS4ALL.ZIP/XS4ALL

Text File | 1996-05-19 | 10.7 KB | 191 lines

Subject: Interview with hacktic/xs4all
Date: 10 Feb 1995 20:15:58 GMT


In less than two years time, XS4all ('access for all') has grown into one
the largest - though not longer the sole - full Internet provider for
individuals in the Netherlands. Felipe Rodriquez and Rop Gonggrijp are the
directors of XS4all which has been restructured from a foundation into a
commercial venture recently. XS4all started as the Hacktic Network which
was the brainchild of a loosely organised Dutch hackers group which was
also publishing the same-named magazine (1989-1994). Rop Gonggrijp has
been the figure-head of Hacktic since its inception somewhere in the
mid-80s. Felipe Rodriquez, who was running a couple of BBSs himself,
joined in 1990. They are interviewed together by Shuchen Tan of the
respected dutch Daily 'Trouw'.

"WE ARE TECHNOLOGY'S BIOLOGISTS"

>From the techno-anarchist 'Hacktic' to the Internet server 'XS4all'

An interview with Felipe Rodriquez and Rob Gonggrijp

By Shuchen Tan

Fist published in the daily "Trouw" (Amsterdam)

(Saturday 'Media' supplement, February 4, 1995)

It is only a few years ago that Rop Gonggrijp, the founder of Hacktic
magazine, was organizing secret hacking parties in his bedroom, together
with a few friends. By then, he was living in a flat in one of the
drabbest complexes of Amsterdam concrete periphery, the Bijlmermeer. With
him were a band of boys hardly past their twenties, all of them long-haired
nerds with anarchistic ideas. Were those the times of wild, drugs-soaked
parties then? "Forget that one" states Gonggrijp now "These were sedate
get-togethers, with only chips and coke on hand. and the only thing we
talked about, were computers."

Back in 1987 nobody knew what computer-hacking exactly meant. The Internet
was something even less heard of. Hackers accessed this world-wide
communication medium by establishing unauthorized connections. They would
write about these feats in the hackers magazine Hacktic, which Gonggrijp
started in 1989. But 'the magazine for techno-anarchists' was flush with
tips about other topics also, such as how to make free phone-calls on the
ptt-lines, how to crack pin-codes, and news about the latest software for
entering companies' and universities' databases.

"The information contained in Hacktic is for education purposes only." was
the proviso a prudent Gonggrijp put in the zine's colophon. "Making use of
this information might be illegal/criminal/un-constitutional/nasty." The
editors went on to "disclaim any responsibility following from the readers'
use of information contained in the magazine." "It was still the Wild West
at that time" says Gonggrijp today. "There were no laws on computer
criminality, and nobody knew quite well what was on hand. It were only we,
the hackers, who realised the immense potential of such a computer
network."

In the meanwhile, technology has rendered the (concept of) Hacktic magazine
out of date. It was formally disbanded at a big hackers party in the
Paradiso in the middle of January 1995. Gonggrijp: "The paper medium is simply
to slow to keep up with everything that happens on the net. By the time a
discussion had been published in the magazine (whose appearance on the
newsstands was notoriously erratic -transl.), the whole topic had already
long petered out on the Internet."

But then, Hacktic, by now in its new guise of one of the largest Dutch
Internet-providers, has grown into a respectable business, with a real
office and seven full-time employees. In the stately 18th century building
it occupies since a-year-and-half, the floor is covered with sawdust,
discarded computers & screens, and bundles of telephone wire. "It's still
something of a mess here" explains Gonggrijp - 26, long blond hair over his
shoulders, and clad in jeans and a candy bar-coloured jumper - "The
building contractor has had some trouble with the deadlines." Dozens of
computers are purring in the 'office garden', while the hardware-room,
Hacktic's backbone, bathes in a nervous light as hundreds of red lights
flikker on ceiling-high rakes of modems.

For Gonggrijp, real hacking is now more or less something of the past.
"I've never been a truly great hacker myself" he admits. "What matters to
me, are the ideas behind hacking: free access to information for everybody.
In our society, information is no longer stocked in libraries and
archives, but is burrowed in databases and spread over the network. It is
a knowledge machine which ninety percent of the population can never
access. To us, this is a great injustice, and we already stated so in the
final resolution of the Galactic Hacker Party in 1989."

To put these ideas in practice, Hacktic set up the XS4all foundation
(speak: access for all) in 1994. XS4all runs a 'server' on which every
computer-user can legally access the world wide Internet, for a fee of 25
guilders ($14) a month. Together with the 'Balie' cultural centre, the
XS4all foundation was also instrumental in the creation of the 'Digital
City" project (DDS). This initiative is backed by a 60.000 guilders ($
33.000) subsidy from the ministry of economic affairs.

"DANGEROUS TERRORISTS"

"From a band of infamous computer-anarchists we have evolved into very
respectable citizens indeed" says Gonggrijp, not without some irony. "We
are even considered important to the Dutch economy." Hacktic has worked
purposely to bring about this swing in opinion, explains Felipe Rodriquez.
He is part of Hacktic's core group since 1990 and he was closely connected
with the establishment of XS4all and the Digital City project. Rodriquez:
"A few year ago, if you heard the name Hacktic, everyone would think of
dangerous terrorists. In the yearbooks of the Dutch internal intelligence
service (BVD), we would be portrayed as a band of nefarious anarchists,
bent on disrupting society. But now they have come to see that we are nice
and quiet people really, with the best of intentions."

The finest hour came undoubtedly when CRI Inspector Harry Onderwater
himself gave acte-de-presence at Hacktic's magazine farewell-party (CRI,
the criminal investigation unit of the national police, co-ordinates
computer-'crime'-fighting in the Netherlands. -transl.). Gonggrijp is not
overly surprised: "We have come to know each other better over the years
and the hostile image we had of each other is simply becoming untenable.
Better still, they even quite admire what we are doing." The line between
hacker and security expert is a thin and difficult one to draw, according
to Gonggrijp. "Basically, we spring from the same nest. I know personaly
of a number of security experts who were subscribers to Hacktic. That's
because in order to secure effectively, you first must be able to hack. It
is a cat-and-mouse game, and we both know we are dependant upon each
other."

The most important thing about hacking is the 'mindframe' you have when
looking around you", says Gonggrijp "Was it only because there's a lot of
things wrong with the technology we trust so much. When the Dutch Telecoms
bring a new invention on the market, like the digital telephone guide last
month, we are the first to show the flaws in the system (Hacktic
immediately spread a programme uncovering the purportedly hidden
address-information contained in the digital phone guide, eds.). You would
never get this kind of information from big corporations. Never, never
take what is written in the users manual for granted is another of our
paroles. Hack it. And only then you'll know how secure it is. I myself
always take a look at where the weak points of a system might be. The
whole world around us is fast changing into systems. It is important that
we learn to think about it for ourselves, and not to trust blindly that
small self-appointed elite that allegedly knows-it-all."

While the average computer-user is quite satisfied if sHe manages to get an
access into the Internet, Hacktic is already immersed into the problems of
the 21st century. Main concerns here are cryptography and privacy
protection. Gonggrijp: "Basically, the whole discussion about privacy in
the network is something of the past. Due to the massive use of credit and
bank cards, all kind of personal information is already floating in the
network. Marketing specialists are able to get any kind of intelligence
about you they want: what's your car make, where did you eat out last week,
what kind of stuff did you buy in the K-mart yesterday."

Gonggrijp singles out the "Airmiles" (recently introduced in the Netherlands
with much fanfare - and very scant information. -transl.) campaign as the
"biggest 'privacy-scam' of the century". "It is about time we would simply
come to terms with the fact that privacy in the general sense does not
exist any longer. The only privacy that exist is the privacy you create
for yourself."

This is the reason why Gonggrijp is strongly in favour of cryptography -
and the government so much against it. This is a kind of electronic code
that enable sender and receiver, and them only, to decipher the content of
a message. Rodriquez, on his side, is more concerned about the "pollution"
and "over-exploitation" of the Internet. Rodriquez: "I tend to visualise
the Internet as an ecological system. It has all the characteristics of a
living organism, that is constantly adapting itself to changes in its
environment. We are technology's biologists." Henceforth, Rodriquez
intends to concentrate on enhancing the quality of the Internet. "Just
like you cannot go on cutting down the Amazon forests, you cannot go on
overloading the network. We must realise that we cannot go on forever
using the network, without ever giving it something in return."

Rodriquez: "Many people still tend to see the Internet as yet again a new
mass-medium. I rather would see it as a natural evolution in human
communication. Here you have, at long last, again a medium with which
people can communicate with each other." Gonggrijp: "The time of the
mass-media, whereby one provider is going to decide what everyone else is
going to see, that time is gone now. for a bleedin' half century we have
been looking at sitcoms like zombies! That's not to-day's world any
longer, the people want to decide for themselves what they are going to
look at, and they want to become providers. The Internet can play an
important role here, because it is in itself an anarchistic system, without
central authority. The mass-media are still working in terms of that big,
middle-of-the-road cluster. The media are tame because they believe their
public is tame.

It's about time we put a bomb under those 'keep-it-tame'
filters."

translated by Patrice Riemens

--
 Felipe Rodriquez           - XS4ALL internet
 http://xs4all.nl/~felipe/  - [e-mail]