PART 1
Computers: Revenge of the Nerds

Chapter 1
Navigating the Datastream

Craig was seven when he discovered the catacombs.'' His parents had taken him on a
family visit to his uncle, and while the adults sat in the kitchen discussing the prices of sofas
and local politics, young Craig Neidorf--whom the authorities would eventually prosecute as a
dangerous, subversive hacker--found one of the first portals to Cyberia: a video game called
Adventure.
Like a child who wanders away from his parents during a tour of the Vatican to
explore the ancient, secret passages beneath the public walkways, Craig had embarked on his
own video-driven visionquest. As he made his way through the game's many screens and
collected magical objects, Craig learned that he could use those objects to see'' portions of
the game that no one else could. Even though he had completed whatever tasks were
necessary in the earlier parts of the game, he was drawn back to explore them with his new
vision. Craig was no longer interested in just winning the game--he could do that effortlessly.
Now he wanted to get inside it.
I was able to walk through a wall into a room that did not exist,'' Craig explains to
me late one night over questionably accessed phone lines. "It was not in the instructions. It
was not part of the game. And in that room was a message. It was a message from the creator
of the game, flashing in black and gold...''
Craig's voice trails off. Hugh, my assistant and link-artist to the telephone net, adjusts
his headset, checks a meter, then acknowledges with a nod that the conversation is still being
recorded satisfactorily. Craig would not share with me what the message said--only that it
motivated his career as a cyberian. This process--finding something that wasn't written about,
discovering something that I wasn't supposed to know--it got me very interested. I searched in
various other games and tried everything I could think of--even jiggling the power cord or the
game cartridge just to see what would happen. That's where my interest in playing with that
kind of thing began ... but then I got an Apple.''
At that point, Cyberia, which had previously been limited to the other side of the
television screen, expanded to become the other side of the computer screen. With the help of
a telephone connection called a modem,'' Craig was linked to a worldwide system of
computers and communications. Now, instead of exploring the inner workings of a packaged
video game, Craig was roaming the secret passages of the datasphere.
By the time he was a teenager, Craig Neidorf had been arrested. Serving as the editor
of an on-line magazine'' (passed over phone lines from computer to computer) called Phrack,
he was charged with publishing (legally, "transporting'') a dangerous, $79,000 program
document detailing the workings of Bell South's emergency 911 telephone system
(specifically, the feature that allows them to trace incoming calls). At Neidorf's trial, a Bell
South employee eventually revealed that the program'' was actually a three-page memo
available to Bell South customers for less than $30. Neidorf was put on a kind of probation
for a year, but he is still raising money to cover his $100,000 legal expenses.
But the authorities and, for most part, adult society are missing the point here. Craig
and his compatriots are not interested in obtaining and selling valuable documents. These kids
are not stealing information--they are surfing data. In Cyberia, the computer serves as a
metaphor as much as a tool; to hack through one system to another and yet another is to
discover the secret rooms and passageways where no one has ever traveled before. The web
of interconnected computer networks provides the ultimate electronic neural extension for the
growing mind. To reckon with this technological frontier of human consciousness means to
reevaluate the very nature of information, creativity, property and human relations.
Craig is fairly typical of the young genius-pioneers of this new territory. He describes
the first time he saw a hacker in action:
I really don't remember how he got in; I was sitting there while he typed. But to see
these other systems were out there was sort of interesting. I saw things like shopping
malls--there were heating computers you could actually call up and look at what their
temperature settings were. There were several of these linked together. One company ran the
thermostat for a set of different subscribers, so if it was projected to be 82 degrees outside,
they'd adjust it to a certain setting. So, back when we were thirteen or so, we talked about
how it might be neat to change the settings one day, and make it too hot or too cold. But we
never did.''
But they could have, and that's what matters. They gained access. In Cyberia, this is
funhouse exploration. Neidorf sees it as like when you're eight and you know your brother
and his friends have a little treehouse or clubhouse somewhere down in the woods, and you
and your friends go and check it out even though you know your brother would basically kill
you if he found you in there.'' Most of these kids get into hacking the same way as children
of previous generations daringly wandered through the hidden corridors of their school
basements or took apart their parents' TV sets. But with computers they hit the jackpot:
There's a whole world there--a whole new reality, which they can enter and even change.
Cyberia. Each new opening leads to the discovery of an entirely new world, each connected
to countless other new worlds. You don't just get in somewhere, look around, find out it's a
dead end, and leave. Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher were fascinated by a few winding
caves; cyberkids have broken through to an infinitely more complex and rewarding network.
Each new screen takes them into a new company, institution, city, government, or nation.
They can pop out almost anywhere. It's an endless ride.
As well as being one of the most valuable techniques for navigating cyberspace,
hacking the vast computer net is the first and most important metaphor in Cyberia. For the
first time, there is a technical arena in which to manifest the cyberian impulses, which range
from pure sport to spiritual ecstasy and from redesigning reality to downright subversion.

Crashing the System
David Troup gained his fame in the computer underground for a program he wrote
called The Bodyguard, which helps hackers maintain their chain of connections through a
long series of systems breaches. Through another ingeniously exploited communications
system glitch, we spoke as he relaxed on his living room couch in Minnesota. From the sound
of his voice I knew he was using a speaker phone, and I heard several of his friends milling
about the room, popping open beers, and muttering in agreement with Troup, their local hero.
The fun of hacking lies in the puzzle solving. Finding out what lies around that next
corner, around the next menu or password. Finding out just how twisted you can get. Popping
out of a computer-based network into a phone-based network and back again. Mapping
networks that go worldwide. We watched a system in Milwaukee grow from just two systems
into a huge network. We went with them. By the end, we probably had a more detailed map
of their network than they did. ''
The Bodyguard has become an indispensable part of the hacker's daytrip survival kit.
It's kind of a worm [a tunneling computer virus] that hacks along with you. Say I'm cruising
through fifteen Unixes [computers that run Unix software] to get at some engineering firm.
Every time I go onto a Unix, I will upload my Bodyguard program. What it does is watch me
and watch the system. It's got the names of the system operators. If a system operator
[''sysop,'' the watchdog for illegal penetrants] or somebody else who has the ability to check
the system logs on [enters the network through his own computer], the Bodyguard will flash
an error flag [warning! danger!] and terminate you at that point. It also will send you a
number corresponding to the next place down the hierarchy of machines that you've
penetrated. You'll have your last connection previous to the one where you got canned. It will
then reconnect you to where you were, without using the system that knocked you off. It'll
recreate the network for you. It takes about four or five minutes. It's nice because when you're
deep in a group of systems, you can't watch everything. Your Bodyguard gets you off as soon
as a sysop signs on, before he even knows you're there. Even if they just log in, you hit the
road. No need to take any chances.''
While the true hacker ethic is not to destroy anything, most young people who find
themselves in a position where it' possible to inflict damage find it hard to resist doing so. As
Troup explains, Most kids will do the most destructive thing they know how to do. There's
nothing in there that they need, or want, or even understand how to use. Everybody's crashed
a system now or then.''
Someone at Troup's end coughs in disagreement and paranoia. David corrects himself.
No need to admit he's ever done anything illegal, now, is there? I'd say 90 percent of
everybody. Everybody's got that urge, you know? `God, I've got full system control--I could
just do a recursive rm [a repeated cycle to begin removing things] and kiss this system
goodbye.' More likely, someone will create a small bug like putting a space before everyone's
password [making it impossible for anyone to log on] and see how long it takes the system
operator to figure it out.'' The passwords will appear correct when the system operator lists
them--except that each one will have a tiny space before it. When the sysop matches the
user's password with the one that the computer says the user should have, the operator won't
notice the extra space before the computer's version.
This is the phony phone call'' to the nth power. Instead of pranking one person on the
other end, the hacker incapacitates a big company run by "nasty suits.'' Hard to resist,
especially when it's a company known to keep tabs on us. The events that frightened Troup
out of hacking for a while concerned just such a company. TRW is the Holy Grail target for
hackers. They're into everything, which is why everyone wants to get into them. They claimed
to be impenetrable, which is half the reason why everyone wants to get in. The more you
look into it, the more security holes they have. They aren't so bad.'' One of Troup's friends in
the background chortles with pride. "It's difficult, because you have to cover your tracks, but
it's not impossible. Just time-consuming,'' Troup explains.
I remember TRW used to have those commercials that just said `TRW, making the
world a better tomorrow.' That's all they did. They were getting us used to seeing them.
Because they were into everything. They sent Tiger Teams [specialized computer commando
squads who establish security protocol in a system] into every system the government has,
either to improve the system's security or to build it in the first place. They have back doors
into everything they've ever worked on. They can assume control over anything they want to.
They're big. They're bad. And they've got more power than they should have, which is why
we were after them. They had Tiger Teams into airport security, aerospace security. And the
government gets software from TRW, upgrades from TRW [also, potentially, with back
doors].
When we got all the way up to the keyhole satellite, we said `That's enough.' We
have really good resources. We have people that can pose as nonpeople--they have Social
Security numbers, tax IDs, everything. But we all got kind of spooked by all this. We had a
continuation of our plan mapped out, but we decided not to go through with it. We ditched all
the TRW stuff we had. I gave it to a friend who buried it underwater somewhere along the
Atlantic shelf. If I tell him to get it back, he will, but if I tell him to get it back using a
slightly different phrase, he will disappear ... for obvious reasons.''
Most purposeful hacking is far less romantic, and done simply to gain access to
systems for their computing power. If someone is working on a complex program or set of
computations, it's more convenient to use some corporation's huge system to carry out the
procedure in a few minutes or hours than to tie up one's own tiny personal computer for days.
The skill comes in getting the work done before the sysop discovers the intrusion. As one
hacker explains to me through an encrypted electronic mail message, They might be on to
you, but you're not done with them yet--you're still working on the thing for some company
or another. But if you've got access to, say, twenty or thirty Unix systems, you can pop in
and out of as many as you like, and change the order of them. You'll always appear to be
coming from a different location. They'll be shooting in the dark. You're untraceable.''
This hacker takes pride in popping in and out of systems the way a surfer raves about
ducking the whitewater and gliding through the tube. But, just as a surfer might compete for
cash, prizes, or beer endorsements, many young hackers who begin with Cyberia in their
hearts are quickly tempted by employers who can profit from their skill. The most dangerous
authoritarian response to young cyberian hackers may not be from the law but from those
hoping to exploit their talents.
With a hacker I'll call Pete, a seventeen-year-old engineering student at Columbia
University, I set up a real-time computer conference call in which several other hackers from
around the country could share some of their stories about a field called industrial hacking.''
Because most of the participants believe they have several taps on their telephone lines, they
send their first responses through as a series of strange glyphs on the screen. After Pete
establishes the cryptography protocol and deciphers the incoming messages, they look like
this (the names are mine):

#1: The Purist
Industrial hacking is darkside hacking. Company A hires you to slow down, destroy,
screw up, or steal from company B's R&D division [research and development]. For example,
we could set up all their math wrong on their cadcams [computer aided design programs] so
that when they look at it on the computer it seems fine, but when they try to put the thing
together, it comes out all wrong. If all the parts of an airplane engine are machined 1mm off,
it's just not going to work.

#2: The Prankster
There was a guy in Florida who worked on a cadcam system which used pirated
software. He was smart, so he figured out how to use it without any manuals. He worked
there for about a year and a half but was fired unfairly. He came to us get them shut down.
We said Sure, no problem.'' Cadcam software companies send out lots of demos. We got
ahold of some cadcam demos, and wrote a simple assembly program so that when the person
puts the disk in and types the "install'' or demo'' command, it wipes out the whole hard disk.
So we wrapped it up in its package, sent it out to a friend in Texas or wherever the software
company was really from, and had him send it to the targeted company with a legit postmark
and everything. Sure enough, someone put the demo in, and the company had to end up
buying over $20,000 worth of software. They couldn't say anything because the software we
wiped out was illegal anyway.

The Purist
That's nothing. That's a personal vendetta. Industrial hacking is big business. Most
corporations have in-house computer consultants who do this sort of thing. But as a freelancer
you can get hired as a regular consultant by one of these firms--say McDonnell Douglas--get
into a vice president's office, and show them the specs of some Lockheed project, like a new
advanced tactical fighter which he has not seen, and say, There's more where this came
from.'' You can get thousands, even millions of dollars for this kind of thing.

#3: The Theorist
During the big corporate takeover craze, companies that were about to be taken over
began to notice more and more things begin to go wrong. Then payroll would get screwed up,
their electronic mail messages aren't going through, their phone system keeps dying every
now and then in the middle of the day. This is part of the takeover effort.
Someone on the board of directors may have some buddy from college who works in
the computer industry who he might hire to do an odd job now and again.

The Purist
I like industrial hacking for the idea of doing it. I started about a year or so ago. And
William Gibson brought romance into it with Neuromancer. It's so do-able.

#4: The Pro
We get hired by people moving up in the political systems, drug cartels, and of course
corporations. We even work for foreign companies. If Toyota hired us to hit Ford, we'd hit
Ford a little bit, but then turn around and knock the hell out of Toyota. We'd rather pick on
them than us.
Most industrial hackers do two hacks at once. They get information on the company
they're getting paid to hit, but they're also hacking into the company that's paying them, so
that if they get betrayed or stabbed in the back they've got their butts covered. So it's a lot of
work. The payoffs are substantial, but it's a ton of work.
In a real takeover, 50% of the hacking is physical. A bunch of you have to go and get
jobs at the company. You need to get the information but you don't want to let them on to
what you're doing. The wargames-style automatic dialer will get discovered scanning. They
know what that is; they've had that happen to them many times before.
I remember a job that I did on a local TV station. I went in posing as a student
working on a project for a communications class. I got a tour with an engineer, and I had a
notebook and busily wrote down everything he said. The guy took me back where the
computers were. Now in almost every computer department in the United States, written on a
piece of masking tape on the phone jack or the modem itself is the phone number of that
modem. It saves me the time and trouble of scanning 10,000 numbers. I'm already writing
notes, so I just write in the number, go home, wait a week or so, and then call them up (you
don't call them right away, stupid). Your local telephone company won't notice you and the
company you're attacking won't notice you. You try to be like a stealth bomber. You sneak up
on them slowly, then you knock the hell out of them. You take the military approach. You do
signals intelligence, human intelligence; you've got your special ops soldier who takes a tour
or gets a job there. Then he can even take a tour as an employee--then he's trusted for some
reason--just because he works there, which is the biggest crock of shit.

DISCONNECT
Someone got paranoid then, or someone's line voltage changed enough to suggest a
tap, and our conversation had been automatically terminated.
Pete stores the exchange on disk, then escorts me out onto the fire escape of his
apartment for a toke and a talk. He can see I'm a little shaken up.
That's not really hacking,'' he says, handing me the joint. I thank him with a nod but
opt for a Camel Light. "That's cracking. Hacking is surfing. You don't do it for a reason. You
just do it.'' We watch a bum below us on the street rip a piece of cardboard off an empty
refrigerator box and drag it away--presumably it will be his home for tonight.
That guy is hacking in a way,'' I offer. "Social hacking.''
That's bullshit. He's doing it for a reason. He stole that cardboard because he needs
shelter. There's nothing wrong with that, but he's not having such a good time, either.''
So what's real hacking? What's it about?''
Pete takes a deep toke off his joint and smiles. It's tapping in to the global brain.
Information becomes a texture ... almost an experience. You don't do it to get knowledge.
You just ride the data. It's surfing, and they're all trying to get you out of the water. But it's
like being a environmental camper at the same time: You leave everything just like you found
it. Not a trace of your presence. It's like you were never there.''
Strains of Grateful Dead music come from inside the apartment. No one's in there.
Pete has his radio connected to a timer. It's eleven o'clock Monday night in New York, time
for David Gans's radio show, The Dead Hour. Pete stumbles into the apartment and begins
scrounging for a cassette. I offer him one of my blank interview tapes.
It's low bias but it'll do,'' he says, grabbing the tape from me and shoving it into a
makeshift cassette machine that looks like a relic from Hogan's Heroes. "Don't let the case
fool you. I reconditioned the whole thing myself. It's got selenium heads, the whole nine
yards.'' Satisfied that the machine is recording properly, he asks, You into the Dead?''
Sure am.'' I can't let this slip by. "I've noticed lots of computer folks are into the
Dead ... and the whole subculture.'' I hate to get to the subject of psychedelics too early.
However, Pete doesn't require the subtlety.
Most of the hackers I know take acid.'' Pete searches through his desk drawers. "It
makes you better at it.'' I watch him as he moves around the room. Look at this.'' He shows
me a ticket to a Grateful Dead show. In the middle of the ticket is a color reproduction of a
fractal.
Now, you might ask, what's a computer-generated image like that doing on a Dead
ticket, huh?''