The Hacker's Encyclopedia 1998

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┌035──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────035┐ │ │ │ ┘ │ │ / │ ┘ │ │ / │ │ │ ┌──┘ │ ┌── │ Phone Losers of America Issue #035 ┌──┘ │ ┌── │ │ │ ─┘ ───┘ ─┘ ─┘ ─┘ ───┘ ─┘ ─┘ │ │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│ │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/┌────────────TABLE OF CONTENTS:──────────────┐\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│ │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│ │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│ │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│1. Introduction - RBCP │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│ │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│2. Review of DefCon III - by Apok0lyps │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│ │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│3. Review of DefCon III - by Roy │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│ │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│4. Follow-up on the 618 Scene - RBCP │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│ │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│5. The Birth of "Cactus" - RBCP │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│ │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│6. Dealing With False Classified Ads - RBCP │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│ │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│7. This Issue's Featured Support Sites │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│ │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│8. Police Log │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│ │/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/└────────────────────────────────────────────┘\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\│ │\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/│ ├────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤ │ Completed On September 10, 1995 │ └035──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────035┘ ▄▄▄▄▄ ▄█████▄ ▄▄▄███▄▄▄ ▄█████████▄▄ █████████ ▄███████████ ▄████▀▀ ▀████▌ █████████▌ ▐█████▀▀▀█████ ▐████ ▐███ ▐█████████▌ ▐█████ ▐████▌ ███▌ ███▌ ▐█████████▌ ▐█████▌ ████▌ ▐███▌ ▄████ ▐█████████▌ ▐██████ ████▌ ████▄▄██████▀ ▐█████████▌ ▐██████▄ ▄████▌ ▐█████████▀ █████████ ▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄ ▐██████████████████▌ ▐████████▌erfectly ▐██████████████████ame ▐████████▀ ▐███████▌ss- █████████▌ ██████████████████ ████████▌ ███████▌holes ▐▐████████ ▀█▀█████▌██▌███▀█▀ ▐▐██████▀ ███████ ▐█▀███▀▀▌ ▀▀ ▌ ▀▀ ▌▀▀ ▀ ████▀ ▐███████ ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ Introduction - RedBoxChiliPepper │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Well, here it is, issue thirty-five, the final issue of PLA. It's been fun but unless someone else decides to take over, which is doubtful, this will be the last issue ever. Thanks goes out to everybody. Oh, wait, I'm just kidding, PLA's not really shutting down. I bet I got your attention, didn't I? *FREE DISKS!* *FREE DISKS!* *FREE DISKS!* *FREE DISKS!* *FREE DISKS!* There's a great company out there that's giving people FREE 3 1/2" computer disks with absolutely no cost or obligation and no salesman will call! And what's even better is that the company provides a toll free number to call in and get your free disks with. The only catch is that you can only get one disk at a time. You may have heard of the company, it's called Amerika On-Line! (stop ralphing!) You can order a few disks a day by calling 1-800-827-6364 and expressing an extreme interest in becomming an AOHell subscriber. Stop paying for those computer disks, they can be free, dammit! I finally got around to reading Masters of Deception by Michelle Slatalla and Joshua Quittner. Good book, funny, informative, who cares if the story was really accurate, it was good reading. There's just two parts in it that I can't help bringing up. One quote was, "One kid might know how to make a wicked blue box, a device cobbled together from top-secret Radio Shack parts that simulated the tones of coins dropping into a pay phone..." and the other part tells about one of the guys playing with a phone in a book store and finally gets to make a free phone call by using his tone dialer to dial the number he wants. Easy to do, but the author describes, "The device he uses is a tone dialer, which emits a noise that simulates the sound a pay phone would recognize as coins dropping into a slot." Guess they should have done a little more research before they released the book. Other than that, good reading. Go out and shoplift your copy from Waldenbooks today! Me & Colleen Card are in the process of relocating from the stinky town of Corpus Christi, Texas to someplace less smelly. We still haven't decided exactly where but hopefully it'll be someplace where more people speak English. If you're one of the few who use our post office box, you can still write to that address and mail will be diverted for us to pick up. By the next issue we should be moved. (As of this writing we're vacationing in Illinois, ya-hoo.) Oh, this also means that my bbs, Whombat Communications went down but I backed everything up on disk so I'll most likely put it back up in a few months so don't throw away your passwords yet! This issue features reviews of Defcon, the meaning of "cactus" and a follow- up on the 618 scene from the last issue. A reporter was actually desperate enough for material to run a story on the PLA. He's probably out of a job by now, poor sob. So sit back and enjoy the issue. Better yet, just delete it, it's not worth reading. Who am I trying to fool? ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ Review of DefCon ]I[ - Apok0lyps │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Friday Aug. 04 aprox. 12:00: We arrive at the Tropicana Hotel. Check in took FOREVER as we had to stand in a really long line and get checked in. They made us pay a $50.00 damage deposit on the room. We complained, but oh well. 13:00: We get the room, put our shit away, and head on down to the con room. Not too many people had shown up yet, only about 250 reg'ed at that point. Paid the $40.00 and got da 0day ID badge. werd. 13:40: I head to the Tropics Bar (one closest to the con room) and begin to order beer. Sat and drank like two and met Alex Deluge. He was pretty cool. About seven beers later, El_Jefe (Zak) shows up with Xn4rk. He was also pretty cool. We started to mess around with the video poker machines. Xn4rk has this idea that chaos theory has something to do with the winnings. We proceed to drink and conduct "experiments" to the tune of about $12.00 & no one won shit. Started to get loaded. 15:00: I depart the bar and head back to the con room. Looked around for a while and got the latest 2600 mag. Pretty good, pick it up. Milled around and met Novocain. 16:00: Got some food, got some sleep. By now the time thing is kinda blurry, so here's the rest in a nutshell (or nut case) Hacker Jeopardy started at Midnight and was loads of fun. I would dare to say the best event of the whole con. Questions ranged from stupid to elite, but the beer flowed and free stuff abounded. Round one was a riot as we watched little kids fight for t-shirts and beers. This event hosted by Winn Schwartau, lasted till like 3am. The con closed for the night and me and some people went to hack KU. Here are MY awards picks for best things at DefCon ]I[: ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Best Speaker: Robert Steele (ex-CIA) Topic: Hackers are the country's biggest asset. Kept me very intrested. I'm gonna try to get a copy of his notes from him. Most Entertaining Speaker: Deth Vegetable (cDc) Topic: The Media Sucks Made me laugh, Also took questions about Mr. T!! Most Informative Speaker: Koresh Topic: Hacking a Job. I went away with a lot of good info on that one. Lamest Speaker: Stephen Cobb Topic: Why Hacking Sucks. Best Event of DefCon ]I[: Hacker Jeopardy. Free Beer, free stuff, and El_jefe managed to win a lot of shit. Worst Event of DefCon ]I[: Susan Thunder's Mitnick Party. I didn't go, but I think only three people did. Best Quote: (not sure who said this) "If you were a woman and had a plastic penis, I would touch your nose." Most Commonly used words by Dark Tangent: "Awwwwwwww Yeah!" Most Commonly used words by everyone else: "Throw it!!" Friendliest People: Alex Deluge, Xn4rk, Magsusa (hope I spelled that right) Dead Addict and Novocain. Best Hotel Employee: Thomas. (Offical PLA bartender) Most Creative Outfit: Whoever was dressed like Chun Li. Other Quotes: ──────────── "Here, have one of those beer things." - El_jefe "Alex Deluge: I LOVE those beer things!!" -Alex Deluge "Whoever's got floor space, I'll give them k0dez!" -Capt. Hook "Ok, ticket number 317 wins Dark Tangent." -Death Vegetable "Throw him!!!" -Crowd Greets go out to: DHATE (see ya at H0H0), Alex Deluge, Drew from SGI for getting us the Holy Cow (moo), Thomas, RBCP and Colleen Card (see ya at H0H0 as well) and that's it for me! ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ Review of DefCon III - by Roy │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Hi, my name's Roy, and last week I went to that DefCon3 thing that was in Las Vegas. I heard about all the wicked things and the sinners there so I made sure to bring my bible. I packed everything in my Ford Motherfucker sometime around January so I would be there on time. I got to the Tropicana Hotel around 1pm on Friday afternoon, and got my room so me and my gerbils could get a little privacy over the weekend. When I went to the convention room I about fell over when I saw the carpet, it was this beautiful tropical floral pattern with lots of pretty colors! I LIKE pink and greeny things. Someone was going around trying to give me a copy of a Hustler disguised as a 2600 magazine, so I had to mace him just like they taught me down at the YMCA. That silly man, Dark Tangent made my gerbil pay to get in even though he would just sit in my pocket until I found a cardboard tube. I read that cute little program thing and it said something about hackers playing Wheel of Fortune. Since Pat Sajak is my favorite person in the world I went, but I wondered why he would play Wheel of Fortune at midnight. He must be crazy nuts! I think they should have called the police about this game. Some crazy young man was throwing things at the audience and trying to hurt us for some reason! He was throwing beers to people without making them throw ID back up so he could see if they were 32. I drank half of one of those beer things and I went wild! I don't know what happened then but I remeber passing out on that beautiful hotel carpet, and waking up in my room with a broken gerbil next to me. I guess I'd have to visit the pet store later. I tried to get the bartender to quit selling beer and even showed him the bible, but he just threw ice cubes at me. I know SOMEONE who's going to hell. I bought some beef jerky and went to the convention room. I noticed some guy talking into a microphone but got totally distracted by the beautiful curtains outside! Between the curtains and the wallpaper, I had to go back to my room and change my pants. I felt so awful about doing that, that I had to order some butter and chives from room service and rub them all over myself and everything else in the room before things got better. Me and my gerbil went into the convention room the next day and someone was talking about something but I didn't care, I had to go to the toilet so bad, it just wasn't funny anymore. I found the nearest bathroom and barred the door shut for aboout three hours, and the whole time I was in there I danced all over the toilets. When I came out, a guard was waiting for me and he beat me sensless with his billy club, and that was kind of fun too! Finally, he just gave me a shoe in the ass and sent me back to the convention room where I hid in the curtains for the rest of the evening. The toilets at the hotel were so pretty! I wish I could have taken one of them home with me and mounted it on my 1986 Ford Motherfucker. About that time I realized I had to go back home to New Mexico and feed my gerbils and check to make sure that those kids didn't take my bubble mower or change the greeting on my answering machine like last weekend. I went home and the neighbors told me I was crazy nuts with piss in my pants for going to such a sinful town as Las Vegas, but I brought all my shoes and glasses so it was ok. ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ Follow-up on the 618 scene │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ If anyone actually bothered to read all of PLA034 you probably remember us leaving the 618 area code in total disarray and confusion. Well, a few more developments have happened since that issue and here they are. First, we bring you Scott The Believer's post shortly after PLA034 came out. This was posted in the Sysop Announcements Sub (Wed Aug 09, 1995): Well, It is true. We are shutting Chatterbox dowm Permanently, we are pulling the plug on the Computer at Midnight this Saturday night (8-12-95). I really hate to do this, Mostly it has been fun and a joy to run this BBS. Chatty has done an excellent job for a newbi sysop to keep things running well, and the board interesting and entertaining. AND most of the users here have been really good, posted a lot, played games, had a good time in general. Why then must we shut it down then? I hear all you good users out there asking yourself that question. Well, along with the good users, there have also been a few "Not so good users" out there. They are the ones to spoil it for the rest of you. We have had so many problems in the past few weeks, it is not even funny! We have had users that thought it would be great fun to "STEAL" the users list from here with everyones passwords, phone numbers, address's, ETC and then upload it to other boards. We have had users that would call us voice here at all hours of the night with harrassing calls. We have had a user upset over giving out his phone number to another user (Eventho everybody has our users list by now). We had users ASK to be deleted, then keep trying to log back in as new. We have deleted users who refused to conform to our NO CUSSING rule here, then they got mad at us too. It has just turned into way TOO much hasstle lately. It used to be fun to run this board, but lately it has turned into a BIG headach taking up too much of my time trying to keep users happy, that we have decided to just turn it off, PERMANENTLY! It becomes effective this Saturday night (8-12-95) at Midnight. Chatterbox will no longer be around. For you good users, we are really sorry it has come to this. We appreciate all that you have done to help make this a fun BBS. I am sorry the situation has come to this. And I want to thank all of you good users for your participation in all that this board has to offer. If you could, please post on other boards that Chatterbox has permanently gone down, to rise no more, ok? Just to inform any users that don't log on and read this by Saturday what happened. Thanks. Scott The Believer PS- any replys (Posts or E-mail) is welcome, and Chatty will probably follow this with her own post about the situation. [And before that post, Apok0lyps had gotten the following private mail...] Name: Scott The Believer #2 Date: Wed Aug 09 06:19:24 1995 I am unpopular in the area? Never had any problem before, and I have BBSing for about 6 years now. I always got along pretty good with most everyone, never had a fight with anyone, except 1 sysop who I asked to be deleted from their system and they balked about removing my name from their system. I have had discussions about abortion with a few, but NO real fights. So I sure didn't know that I was unpopular around here. The only people I have had unpopular dealings with are the users of this board, namely Martini, Zak, Zensless1, and a few others I have deleted from here. The way I see it the whole problem started here with this board, and it is gonna end here and now with this board. I thought Amanda was doing a good job making a decent entertaining BBS, when I Dark Requim, I thought we really had a better board than they did. We sure got a lot of calls, 30-35 a day average. I really thought Amanda was doing an excelent job as a newbi sysop. BUT The buck stops here! I too am depressed about this whole incident, it IS boring. But I can stop it at any time. AND Amanda's Mother and I have made the decision, we will NOT put up with all these hasstles anymore. So we are shutting Chatterbox down, Permanently! Midnight this Saturday night is the day and time we pull the plug on Chatterbox. I am sorry to have to do this to Amanda, she really enjoyed runnning a board, but I have had enough midnight-3am calls, new users trying to call in saying OBSENE things in the LOG about Amanda as passwords. I am just sick of this whole month LONG incident that just won't stop. RBCP putting my Apology in one of his PLA text's is the capper, I am sick of him, his childish pranks, and putting my Apology in there was WHAT finally made me decide to do it. So as of Midnight this Saturday night, Chatterbox is History, Permanently. Don't bother calling anymore, it will not be amswering anymore after Saturday....End of discussion. [Needless to say, everyone at Cocktail Lounge and Roy's Place thought this to be really hilarious and everyone counted down the minutes until they went down. Apok0lyps actually managed to get himself deleted about a half hour before the bbs went down but I forget why. Lighten up, Scotty! :) Mr. Hack is still running his amazing phreeeekers' bbs. Here's a chat session submitted to me by Scorpion (with Mr. Hack, using a false account): HACK: i am the god dam exile! SCOR: oh ok why do you let people bash you? HACK: because they r just lamerz who got kiked out of their sisters ass!! SCOR: What I was wondering is why do you have so many enimies? HACK: BECAUSE WE ARE THE ELITE AND THEY ARE NOT AS GOOD AS US SO THEN THEY TAKE PROPER ACTION OF JEALOUSLY AND SAY THAT WE DONT KNOW ANYTHING SO DONT FUK WITH US..........NOT NECCESSARILY MEANING U!! SCOR: Whats that pol group? HACK: PAL? [PLA, of course] SCOR: something like that I always see them bashing you? HACK: THAts just BECAUSE THEY R JEALOUS! SCOR: Oh so there not really a cool group? HACK: FUK NO! SCOR: oh what group were you starting? HACK: OUR PRIVATE GROUP IS THE BRANCH OF THE n.O.c WHICH WUZ ALSO CREATED BY US ALSO! R SPECIAL GROUP IS CALLED D.e.k! SCOR: Are you a really good hacker? HACK: sORRY DUDE, GOTSTA GO TO SOME CHIKZ HOUZE. L8z! SCOR: ok btw is it true the Deter gives it to you up the ass? [After that, Mr. Hack hung up on him. (Can't imagine why) But PLA is taking donations so that we can help our friend, Mr. Hack buy a new keyboard. His CAPS lock seems to be stuck or something. And Greg Carson? He's not had a good month and he no longer posts on bbses at all, just calls them up and does new message scans to see if we're still talking about him. Here's a couple of posts by Zak that I found slightly hilarious:] Name: Zak #21 @6851 Date: Wed Aug 09 00:51:39 1995 [To me...] You're lame or something. Hey I got an idea, fly up here and live here again, and get plastic surgery to look like Greg Carson and we'll kidnap him and you can go to work as him and say "I am Greg Carson and I think you are a poo poo head" Then we'll ruin his life. You can rob banks as him and call people and hang up. Then we can beat up his skanky hillbilly wife. Name: Zak #4 Date: Thu Aug 10 05:47:52 1995 I went into the hotel to sleep as it was very very late (about 2pm!) and greg pulled out a baloney sandwich and beat the shit out of me with it. I'm so scared of lunchmeat now. [And here's a piece of private mail I got from him. I forget what we were talking about.] Name: The Hit Man #370 @6851 Date: Mon Aug 28 22:10:34 1995 Use your mind and what would you say in my situation? I know nothing about you nor does anyone else (your real name even!) You move around alot it seems and I know when I ask questions that I will get no true answer, like your going to screw up and give me that information, but what should I say? WEll RBCP I guess I will talk to you later. well I guess I should say you suck or something but I dont want to start anything else between us. WEll bye-Dont worry I know you dont like me but at least we can talk like adults, right? Go ahead capture it and show the world what a dumbass I am. [I wasn't going to publish that e-mail but since he asked me to, I thought I'd give him a break since he's such a nice guy. But wait, that's not it...Greg, sick of a life of hell (not that I had anything to do with THAT) decided that since the police wouldn't help him, maybe the newspaper would so he called a reporter from the Belleville News Democrat in Belleville, Illinois and I started getting calls to my bbs in Texas from a guy named Grey Mouser. Here's some captures...] Date: 3:32 pm Wed Aug 16, 1995 From: Grey Mouser To : Redboxchilipepper Hi this is grey mouset im a membe Hi my name is grey mouser im a user at roys place. I want membership now :) Date: 6:21 pm Wed Aug 16, 1995 From: Grey Mouser To : Redboxchilipepper Hey, Im a reporter and I want to talk to you about Cactus. my number is 618-234-8420 Call me tonight the story is running saturday and has to be filed tommorrow afternoon. My real name as im sure you know Is Brian. I want to talk to you about the cactus of Hitman, I want to get your side of things to make it a fair story. [Considering his spelling & grammar, of course I was skeptical...] Date: 6:35 pm Wed Aug 16, 1995 From: Redboxchilipepper To : Grey Mouser Get lost, Greg. If you want to hear my side of it, read PLA34.ZIP. Date: 6:42 pm Wed Aug 16, 1995 From: Grey Mouser To : Redboxchilipepper You know for being a supposed Phreaker your not very bright, Im a reporternot greg, I have talked with greg and I am wwriting a story about him that will be running in Sunday's paper, my work number is 1-618-234-1000 extension 626, give it a try it starts with the newspapers name. Im here right now if you want to talk. [At this point during his mail, I broke in for chat...] ME: What paper. GM: The news Democrat in Belleville Illinois ME: I'm not interested. Read pla034, okay? GM: Well Ive read 0-32 but Im more interested in a interview, Im sure the other reporters were as well hooked as I am, I belong to elite/pirate and phreak boards all over the country. ME: Why are you calling my 618 node then? GM: Im not Im calling your 512-883-7543 number from 618 ME: Nope, the local 618 node is busy, I'm afraid and you're wasting my time. Whatever you have to offer doesn't interest me. GM: What do you mean the local node, do you mean a call to or from a 618 number? ME: You figure it out, you're wasting my time. If you want to download pla034 I'll let you stay on here, otherwise, goodbye. [Then I dropped out of chat. His letter was resumed so he continued...] Ok but dont blame me if the article seems slanted I have talked with three poeple who have been catused by the pla, I have tlkaed with the FBI, the corpus christi police and the local phone comapny. Im also talking to internet hackers at #hack and #virus. Ill just say you refused comment. But dont think this is greg, bk iit isnt. [Cactused?? I guess he's trying to relate with us. After toddling around my bbs like a first grader, looking at files, reading messages and making the same stupid mistakes over and over he logged off. Anyway, I called up Roy's Place and checked out his account there and his validation feedback and here it is...] To: Zak #1 @1 Name: Grey Mouser #59 @1 Date: Wed Aug 16 12:24:22 1995 RE: Validation Feedback (141 slots left) Hey, I want elite/pirate access damnit :) Anyway im new to the area and Im joioning all of the boardz aroud. I have elite access i boards all over the country, more specifically oregon, maryland and Illinois and of course the net on #hack and #virus. GM [Well, it finally turns out that he is, in fact, a real reporter and has been going crazy nuts calling up everyone in the 618 scene asking what they knew. He also got ahold of a copy of PLA007.TXT and called every- one on the loser list and tried to interview them all. Colleen Card, Zak and Martini finally ended up on a four-way call with him and had a long conversation with him. Below is a copy of the article that appeared on the front page of the Belleville News-Democrat on Sunday, September 3rd, 1995. Next to the article was a color copy of PLAGIF04.GIF (the altered phone logos and Calvin in an LOD shirt). I put my comments on the story throughout the article in brackets...] Metro-east Families Face Harassment By Hackers - by Brian D. Crecente Seven metro-east families have been harassed by obscene and threatening phone calls, pranks and false telephone charges after running afoul of a computer hackers group. The victims are listed in a computer file distributed by a group called the Phone Losers of America. The victims believe they're on the list because at one time they may have angered one of two members of the group who have ties to the metro-east. One of them is a leader of the group who used to live in Madison County and now lives in Texas and goes by the nickname "RedBoxChiliPepper." He appears to be the writer of the phone list and other computer files that deal with harassment or "cactusing," as hackers call it. Computer users can access the list simply by calling up a local information service called a bulletin board. [By the time the article came out, I'd moved out of Texas and was actually visiting the 618 area when the article came out. I seriously doubt that anyone you meet in #hack would say, "Y0, d00d, 3Y3 ju$+ c4ctus3d this 4ssh0|3 |n my c|4ss!" The whole cactusing thing was just a stupid joke that we're doing our best to run into the ground. And when in the hell did PLA become a hackers group??? I'll do a semi-detailed explanation of cactus in the next section of this issue.] RedBoxChiliPepper gives the following instructions: "Please keep in mind that this isn't a list of places to cactus...just list of numbers for you to call when you're bored or have some time to blow. Harassment is optional," he wrote. "Included are pay phones, businesses, people who need to have the hell bugged out of them, weirdos, phreaks, dweebies, sluts, security personel, etc. If you have any other numbers to add to this list, please contact me and I might just add the number to the list. Have fun!" Greg and Carolyn Carson of Fairview Heights are among seven local familes on the list. "We have been having big problems," Carson said. "Two weeks ago, I came home from work and had 20 calls on my answering machine." Greg Carson, an active computer user, said he engaged in a war of words with the group on one of the local computer bulletin boards. "They ordered five pizzas to my work in Fairview Heights," he said. "They called all of the local papers and placed ads in my name with my home number, saying I have houses for rent, computers for sale or that I'm giving away my Rottweiler." [The list of course, was PLA007.TXT. War of words, my ass. He insulted every user on a bbs and dared us to do something horrible to him.] After a month of this, Carson paid Ameritech $50 for an unpublished number. That solution lasted a week. "The ad came out today," Carolyn Carson said recently. "It was a computer ad with our unpublished number listed." The Carsons are frustrated. "The police can't do anything. Ameritech can't help. So what are you supposed to do, not have a phone?" she said. A spokesman for the FBI in Fairview Heights said the bureau will investigate only if the calls become overt threats. He would not confirm whether the FBI is investigating the Phone Losers. RedBoxChiliPepper responded to attempts by the Belleville News Democrat to reach him through a computer bulletin board by stating, "No comment." [A week? Funny, I remember calling Ameritech Assignment and getting the new phone number the next morning. "No Comment" was sort of an under- statement. It went more like this... I called Brian (the reporter) at his home and said, "Hi, this is RBCP." and he said, "Oh, hi, how ya doing?" and I screamed as loud as I could, "NO COMMENT!" and slammed down the phone. Hey, we thought it was hysterical, okay? Almeda Lahr-Well of Glen Carbon said she was harassed in 1994 after she expelled the other local group member from a private school she owns and operates. She said she was having problems with the student, who lives in Granite City and goes by the nickname Zak. Lahr-Well and her family received a series of harassing phone calls - mostly hang-up calls. One of the last calls was a bomb threat about the school. The calls stopped for a few months but have resumed within the past three weeks, she said. [Zak was expelled from there for being a major pain in the ass. He was actually responsible for causing a rule that stated no one was allowed to say the word "cactus" during class time. He never really did explain to me exactly how that happened. The bomb threat wasn't by us, but by another student there named Jason Crews who was trying to frame us. Daniel Tomkinson of Granite City said the harassment he has experienced began after he allowed a teenage girl who was a friend of his son Chris to stay at their house for a month after she had been kicked out by her former boyfriend. The boyfriend, it turned out, was RedBoxChiliPepper. "Almost immediately after she started living here, someone listed our house for sale, for rent, ordered pizzas to our house," Tomkinson said. "We started getting calls at all times of the night threatening my 9-year- old daughter, saying he was going to kidnap and rape her." A long-distance calling card in Chris Tomkinson's name was then distributed around the country, netting thousands of dollars in false charges. Someone began renting video tapes in Daniel Tomkinson's name without returning them. Someone also called in a false drug tip to police about Chris' friends. "This really ruined Chris' social life," Tomkinson said. "All I did was display a little kindness to a young lady from Texas." [First of all, Daniel Tomkinson has never lived in Granite City, he lives in Rosewood Heights and always has. (You were only off by about 25 miles, Brian!) The girlfriend in question wasn't kicked out, but left me because she was sick of my shenanagens, I guess. And the problems with Chris were never related to this girl, he just assumed they were. Threatening a nine year-old kid doesn't really sound like something I do a lot of. These people have to remember, they're on the Loser List which is distributed nationally. Anyone could have called them. Although renting video tapes under Chris Tomkinson's name sounds really appealing, it never happened. What actually happened was that I was sitting in a bus station in Indiana talking on a pay phone talking to Zak. (As usual) He decides to call Chris up at home to annoy him. Chris answers and Zak goes into a long conversation with him basically saying, "I'm Dave from Very Video here in Wood River and we're just wondering when in the hell you're going to return your videos...what, you don't have a video card here? Well that's funny, I show on my computer here that you checked out three copies of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and an old Stooges movie...Yes, we have your signature right here and you've had these tapes since last week...Well, we have closed circuit cameras in here and our security tapes go back one month. Would you like to come in and we can see for ourselves that you're telling the truth?" Chris is more than happy to come in because he says he knows exactly who's responsible for doing this and he can easily identify RBCP on the security tapes and he says he'll be there in 15 minutes. The funny thing is, Zak was just trying to be stupid and didn't even sound convincing, yet Chris still believed him. So after that call we phoned the video store and I said, "Yeah, my name's Chris Tomkinson and I rented a tape there and it was totally fucked and I'm PISSED OFF! I'm going to come in there and kick your fucking ass right now! I'll be there in 15 minutes mother fucker! When you hear me tell you that I'm Chris Tomkinson, you'd better run because I'm going to start throwing the punches at you! You got that!?!?" We never did get to see the end results on that one...] Richard Ahler of Granite City was the leader of a Boy Scout troop that included the student kicked out of Lahr-Well's school. Some problems led to a confrontation between Ahler and Zak, and the student was kicked out of the Boy Scout troop as well. Ahler and his family began receiving harassing phone calls. "For a while, the calls were obscene. Now they are just a nuisance," said Ahler's wife, Linda. "We had lots of pizzas sent to our house. We received telephone books from Texas that we didn't order, and in the beginning, they tried to get us to pay for phone service we didn't order." The harassment died down but resumed about two weeks ago when someone in Sweeden tried 19 times to make collect calls to the family. [Zak got kicked out of the Boy Scouts?? News to us. The only person we know from Sweeden would be Demon Phreaker from OC, so we assume he's responsible for the nineteen collect calls, although I wasn't able to get in touch with him to find out for sure. He was a member on my bbs and probably got their number from the Loser List... Good job, DP!] Sometimes obscene messages are sent through a special phone service provided for hearing-impaired people called a TDD Relay Service. In that systen, a hearing-impared caller -or in this case a hacker- types a message on a TDD machine that a phone operator must read to the recipient of the call."On one obscene call we received from a relay service, the operator was sobbing and crying while she tried to read the message," Ahler said. Another victim, Elizabeth Colwell of Granite City, lives near the expelled student. She said the youth called to harass her once and she asked him why she was chosen. "He said he doesn't have a life," she said. The harassment ended with a bomb threat, this time to a Hardee's restaurant where Colwell's son used to work. [Neither me or Zak could remember making a TDD operator cry so if someone out there reading this is responsible for this one, drop me a note. I'd really like to know what it takes to make an operator sob! I don't know why everyone thinks we're terrorists who make bomb threats everywhere. I'm a civil enough person to not cause the fire department to run around town looking for non-existant bombs. I did hear that Colwell's son, Danny, was fired from Hardees because some heartless hooligans were calling him constantly at work and being mean to his manager. Who could that be...] The other local harassment victims declined to discuss the matter openly for fear of retaliation. All the victims made one common claim - that police and telephone companies have been unable to stop the harassment. Ameritech spokes- man Mike Brand said the telephone company has specialists who handle phone harassment complaints. Customers should avoid giving their phone number to strangers, he added. "You want to zealously guard your number," he said. "The telephone is a tremendous convenience, but people choose to use it as an instrument of torture at times." Who are the Phone Losers of America? The group considers itself an electronic magazine dedicated to freedom of information. Local victims of telephone harassment believe it has more to do with revenge and kicks. The group has issued 36 computer text files that deal with harassment or "phreaking," which generally means raiding phone company computers to steal services and manipulate records. The files include tiles such as "Getting Revenge the Phreakers Way," "Information Gathering on Anyone," and "A List of Number to Call When You're Really Bored." [Guard your number, Mike? It's not the customers who are at fault there, the Ameritech employees are the idiots who will give you unlisted and confidential information just because you claim to work for them. Better advice would probably be "don't go on a private bbs system and dare people to harass you." PLA has issued 36 computer text files? Funny, when this article came out we were only up to 34. I guess he's counting the index and Summer '95 Fone Directory.] The latter file features the group's list of people to harass, which includes 36 residential phone numbers, 95 business numbers and other assorted numbers for pay phones and computer bulletin boards nationwide. Another file explains how to build a "red box," which allows users to make free calls from pay phones. Another explains how to break into computer systems, and another gives details on how to steal services from telephone company service boxes located outside of homes and businesses. The text files are distributed to 23 computer bulletin boards in the U.S. and one in Canada, known as PLA distribution sites. A leader of the group, who used to live in the metro-east and goes by the name RedBoxChiliPepper, claims to have written much of the material. [A few things that Zak tried to stress during their short phone interview was that we're not a group, it's a damn text file publication and that we're not computer hackers nor do we pretend to be but I guess none of that sank into Brian's head when he wrote the article. Hey, I guess if it sells the paper it's okay... I'm not the "leader" of this "group" I just happen to write practically everything that goes in each issue. I guess Brian is the leader of the Belleville News-Democrat since he wrote this story. At the time of this writing we had well over 60 published distro sites on Earth, not 23. And I didn't talk to this guy, let alone "claim to have written much of the material" as he said. Oh well, despite all my griping about how misleading the article was, everyone seemed to enjoy it, including myself. We're still debating on whether or not to add Brian to the infamous Loser List. Then someone could write a story about him! One last thing is Quinbus's rebuttal concerning the article. Quinbus is a local bbser who wrote the following and sent it in to the newspaper. In my opinion, the article mentioned above is possibly the best example of 'yellow journalism' that I have ever seen in my life. Not only did Mr. Crecente fail to present a balanced, non-biased article, but he also failed to get the facts which he presented correct. Mr. Crecente states that local residents are being harassed by a group of local 'hackers' who call themselves the Phone Losers of America (PLA). But, if he had done any research at all, he would know that computer hackers are people who penetrate computer systems for the purpose of exploring it, and gathering knowledge and information. Hence, the PLA are not hackers at all. They are in fact a small group of 'phreakers' who started distributing informational text files a short while ago. A 'phreaker' is best described as someone who exploits flaws in the telephone systems to their advantage. Also, he refers to the PLA's version of harassment as "cactusing," which in all honesty is the most ignorant statement I have heard in a while, but I guess it fits in with all the other nonsense in the article. It's true that some members of the PLA like to use the word 'cactus' more than most people, but they usually just throw it in sentences where most people would 'a','the', or any other common words. The bottom line is that there is no such thing as cactusing, and that it is just another piece of information fabricated by the reporter. Although it may be true that the PLA is or has been harassing certain local residents, it is done only in retaliation. Harassment is defined as "disturbing or irritating persistently." If this is true, then the PLA is only rewarding harassment with counter-harassment. For instance, the case of Greg Carson is particularly relevant. Mr. Carson - mentioned in the article sited above - is known in the local computer BBS scene as The Hit Man. Aside from the obvious implications drawn from his alias, Greg has seemingly only had one purpose since I saw him appear in the scene a few weeks ago. This purpose being to cause trouble. He repeatedly made instigating remarks, threats, and other immature ramblings in public areas of at least one local BBS. And when he made such comments to the PLA, they took action. So why is it so bad that this group took such action and counter-harass someone who harassed them? As I said before, the PLA does distribute informational text files. And in the article, it discussed how one local family reported that someone from Sweden was trying to bill telephone calls to them. The PLA can't be held responsible for other people's stupidity. The files are to inform the public only, they are not commanding anyone to do anything for them. If someone from Sweden is trying to do these things, they should go to Sweden and find them, not bother the PLA. I sincerely believe that if it weren't for people like the members of the PLA and other phreakers around the world, who have learned enough about the phone systems and their flaws, the telephone companies of the world would not be able to make advances in technology and security for the consumer. Let's face it, if there aren't enough people doing something that hurts their company's profit, they will not spend the money to develop new systems. Telephone companies have spent large sums of money trying to make the phone systems as secure as possible because of people like the PLA, but the systems are much better because of it. As for the other major allegations made in the article, they were thrown in to make the story just that much more interesting. I think with all the hype of the Internet and the public's newfound knowledge of the computer underground, Mr. Crecente was trying to make his story just that much better by turning simple phone phreaks into sex crazed, bomb happy psychos. The allegations that members of the PLA called and threatened to kidnap and rape a 9 year old girl are horrendous. Not to mention implying that the PLA is responsible for not one, but two bomb threats. I believe that in all, this reporter used the public's suspicions of the newly discovered computer underground as a canvas to paint a very distorted picture of the situation at hand. I agree that the public should be aware that there are certain bad aspects in the online community. I do not, however, believe that they should be made to feel that just because they go online, that they are going to be harassed. Just like the real world, if you harass or threaten someone online, you run the risk that they will retaliate. In general, everywhere in life, the old Golden Rule "Do unto others, as you would have done unto you" applies. If these local residents would not have done something harassing to the PLA, the PLA would not have harassed them in return. In conclusion, if Mr. Crecente would have done more research into this story, he would have found that there wasn't much of a story at all. Perhaps only the headline "Telephone Geniuses Get Even." Instead, he ran a story which was filled with half-truths, and worse yet, complete lies. -quinbus-flestrin- ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ Just What In The Hell Does "Cactus" MEAN?? - RBCP │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Every once in awhile I get e-mail from people wanting to know what cactus means and where it came from and why we're so obsessed with it. The original meaning of cactus was just to call up a person at random and say absolutely nothing to them except "cactus". For some reason, this really gets to people so it can be fun if you're bored enough. I first heard some get cactused when a friend of mine, Amigados (618) came to my house about four years ago and he started calling people and cactusing them. So I decided to give him a call and ask him about the origin of cactus. In a phone interview, here's what was said... "Me and some friends of mine were sitting around a friend's room and bored out of our minds. We picked up the phone and were pranking this girl that Steve used to like and she blew him off. At the time we were playing a game called Hero's Quest, but we were playing a really screwed up version that they invented one night when they were tripin' and there were cactuses sprouting up out of the ground because they were making up really stupid creatures. "I called her right as my character was enveloped by a cactus so I said to her, 'cactus?' and she said, 'who?' and I said, 'oh, cactus.' and that's how it started. After that we kept calling her back and saying cactus because it seemed to really get on her nerves. All night we picked random numbers out of the phone book and cactused people and we did it for days and the next thing you know it just became a way of life." That's the story, Brian Crecente, you shouldn't have tried to base all your knowledge of the computer underground on a couple of PLA files. Just go into #hack and ask tr1be about us and you'll hear, "They know nothing! They are lame!" Try reading Phrack next time. A few more things about Amigados, he used to drive around in car that had a big cactus drawn on the front side of it along with the word, "cactus" and he told me that they went around stealing those gigantic real estate magnets off the side of cars (those huge advertising magnets, you know?), took them home and cut them out in the shapes of cactuses to stick on their own cars. "To live the cactus is to live like no man." -Amigados, 1995 ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ Dealing With Evil Hackers Cactusing You With A Classified Ad - RBCP │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ We all learned from Brian Crecente's informative newspaper article that those evil hackers that hang out on the information superhighway's #hack and #virus can do horrible, nasty things to you, known to everyone in the under- ground world as "cactusing!" One of these things would be to put an ad in the paper (or several papers) causing your phone to ring non-stop with people wanting to buy your house, car or rotweiler named Carolyn. Well, our friend Greg Carson finally decided that the only thing to do was to fight back with our own methods and place a few ads in some papers with Zak's home voice number. One was a car for sale and one was a house. What Greg didn't know, is that we routinely put ads in the paper ourselves, giving our own phone numbers so that we can answer the phone and freak out the people that call. (Sort of reverse prank calling. Too lazy to dial numbers? Make the people call you!) Greg's ads made for an interesting weekend at Zak's house and everyone there fought to be the first to answer the phone. Here are a few clips of transcripts: CUSTOMER: I'm calling about the car for sale. ZAK: Oh, I'm glad you called! I slipped on a jar of mustard and I'm trapped here under the shelf. Can you come over and rescue me? CUSTOMER: Oh, my goodness! [The lady ended up calling 911 to help Zak and 911 called Zak's house to find out what the problem was.] CUSTOMER: Yes, is Zak there? I'm calling about the apartment. COLLEEN CARD: That's my dad, he's in the bathroom taking a shit. CUSTOMER: Oh, well, I'll just call back later then. COLLEEN: Yeah, it's a big, gross brown one, I believe... CUSTOMER: That's not really necessary. <click!> A half-hour later I got his number from the caller I.D. and called him back, yelling in a hick accent. RBCP: Yeah, this is Zak! You called about the apartment!? CUSTOMER: Uhhh... RBCP: I'm takin' a major shit right now but my daughter brought the cordless phone to me so you go ahead and ask your questions! It's a big, brown, stinky shit! What do you need to know!? CUSTOMER: <click!> CUSTOMER: Hi, I'm calling about the apartment for rent. RBCP: Well, it's funny, a wrecking crew was supposed to knock down the house next door but they got the address mixed up and knocked down my house instead so I can't really rent it anymore. CUSTOMER: You serious? RBCP: Yup. CUSTOMER: Boy, that's crazy. You know, I'm a carpenter and once I was doing some work for a fellow up in O'Fallon, roofing some houses and I went to the wrong house, pulled up a roof and re-shingled the damn thing. And you know what? It was- RBCP: (inturrupting) Yeah, yeah, yeah, like I really give a shit about your life, pal. Quit babbling to me. <click!> ZAK: The apartment? Well, see, a misguided ICBM missle accidentally crashed into it and the whole block was nuked. I've still got a nice pile of rubble to rent out if you want. I'll give you a discount. ZAK: Oh, the apartment? The funniest thing happened, an airplane crashed into the house. CUSTOMER: An airplane? You're kidding! ZAK: No, I got there this morning and there was the tail of an airplane sticking out of my house... So you see, harassment isn't so bad if you have a sense of humor. I remember one ad we placed a few years ago using my own phone number and I kept convincing people that I wasn't home but they could go look at the house by themselves and just look in the windows to see what it's like. Then I gave them the address of some guy who lived close by and was always home and probably wouldn't be too happy with people peering into his windows. So the next time you're singled out and can't get any sleep because your phone rings non-stop, don't get mad, get creative and have fun. Do it again, Greg! ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ This Issue's Featured Support Sites │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Not a whole lot of new sites this issue. Hope I didn't leave anyone out, I've been busy. Send me e-mail if you'd like to be added to this list... 415-648-9489 Reality Check...........................San Francisco, California 603-293-0580 Tower of Destiny..........................Glendale, New Hampshire 609-637-9565 Byte This II..................................Trenton, New Jersey 613-736-7909 Crazed Illusions..........................Ottawa, Ontario, Canada 708-256-5928 0Day Warez Palace..........................Chicago Area, Illinois 801-763-7889 The Cardboard BoXXX...........................American Fork, Utah ███▀███ ███▀███ ███ ███ ███▀███ ███▀███ ███ ███▀███ ███▀███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ▀▀▀ ███ ███ ███ ███ ▀▀▀ ██ ┌███▄███─███─███─███─███─███─███─────███████───────███─███─███─███─███▐███───┐ │███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ▄▄▄ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███ ██│ │███ ███▄███ ███▄███ ███ ███▄███ ███▄███ ███▄███ ███▄███ ███▄███ │ │ │ │ │ A Seattle man was arrested Tuesday │ Kenneth Milner from the 63rd block of │ │ after finding the home addresses │ Lincoln was mugged early this morning │ │ of six AT&T employees and killing │ by two white males. He was hit over │ │ them and their families and their │ the head with a balogny sandwich and │ │ dogs. Alex Carbon, age 304, is │ they made off with seven dollars in │ │ being held without bail and re- │ cash and Ken's brand new red box. All │ │ fuses comment. │ residents should be wary of males. │ │────────────────────────────────────┴───────────────────────────────────────│ │ If you can solve either of these crimes of the week, please call Crime- │ │ Stoppers today at 618-398-7124. And help take a bite out of crime! │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ ┌─────────────Contact─The─Phone─Losers─Of─America─Nearest─You!───────────────┐ │ 512-703-8910.................................PLA Voicemail System (RBCP) │ │ 314-995-1261..................................PLA Voicemail System (Zak) │ │ 618-797-2339.............................................Roy's Place BBS │ │ FTP.FC.NET.....................................pub/deadkat/phreaking/PLA │ │ ETEXT.ARCHIVE.UMICH.EDU............................pub/Zines/PhoneLosers │ │ rbcp@big12.metrobbs.com...............................RedBoxChiliPepper) │ │ cactus@basenet.net....................................Zak a.k.a. el_jefe │ │ collcard@big12.metrobbs.com......................To contact Colleen Card │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘