Friday, 1945 h: New York in late summer is mad, as usual. Outside the hotel
a van is unloading VDUs. Clearly this is the right place. I’m in the heart of
Manhattan for what’s billed as the biggest two-day hacker conference yet: HOPE
(Hackers On Planet Earth). The programme promises speeches from spies, hacking
into the New York subway system, reading telephone pagers around the city from
the comfort of the hotel, talks by hackers from Germany and the Netherlands,
lessons on cloning cellular phones … none of it entirely legal. It should be
fun.
I check into my room. The TV remote control – tagged by wire to the bedside
table – doesn’t work. Someone’s taken the batteries. I can’t plug my modem
into the phone because there’s no socket, just a mess of wires. It’s
definitely not hacker-friendly. But will it be enough to stop them hacking
into the hotel computer, and staying for free?
2000 h: On the 18th floor, the top one, the conference is being prepared.
In a huge anteroom, beyond the main hall, a young team wires up a computer
network to the Internet. Rows of empty tables sit waiting for terminals. The
people already there, 16 hours before the conference starts, are a mixed
bunch, mostly teenagers, and all go by a “handle”. That’s hackerspeak for
name.
Advertisement
“Hi, I’m `Dr J’,” says one, grasping my hand warmly. Another introduces
herself as “Empress”. She works for Burger King. A guy known as “Madcap”,
wearing a floppy purple and green hat, is selling T-shirts with “HOPE” on the
front and a long screed entitled “The conscience of a hacker” on the back,
price $10. So you can be a hacker and an entrepreneur. Yet another,
dressed in black with as much of a goatee bread as he can muster, introduces
himself as “Satan”.
Gradually it dawns on me why everyone is so keen to say hello to apparent
strangers: they want to know if they have met before in cyberspace, as words
on a screen.
There is a lot of talk of red boxes, 1-800s and COCOTS. Red boxes, I learn,
are bits of electronics that you hold over the speakers of payphones: when you
are asked to insert a quarter, you get the red box to play a rapid sequence of
tones. These fool the billing computer into thinking that you’ve paid. But in
fact, you’re “phreaking”. I also discover that 1-800s are freephone numbers,
which are widely exploited, and that a COCOT is a Common Operator Coin-
Operated Telephone – a payphone to you.
2035 h: A pizza the size of a dustbin lid arrives for those wiring the
network. I follow Dr J, Empress, Satan and someone entitled “Lohtk” across the
street to a fast-food store. As we wait in the queue, Lohtk leans over and
says, “Uh, excuse me, Mr Over-21, would you mind buying me a beer?” He’s
obviously too young to buy alcohol in New York; I’m obviously not. This is a
barrier the hackers and phreakers have yet to overcome.
2310 h: Upstairs it’s getting crowded. There are about 20 terminals on the
network already. Word is there’ll be a thousand people at the conference –
three times more than at any other. But the organisers don’t really know. How
could they?
Outside the room a huge sheet of paper covers a whole wall, intended for
graffiti of all sorts. At least it’ll keep the toilet walls clean. Someone has
put up a contest offering a prize if you “Spot the Fed” – meaning a federal
agent working for the FBI or CIA.
Someone walks in and calls out, “Has anybody seen Stormshadow?” No one
responds. “Well, if you do, could you tell him his mother’s looking for
?”
I get talking to Lauren, one of the few women at the do. She’s in her mid-
twenties. “Phreakers are younger, tend to be still living at home; their
parents pick up the bills,” she explains. With them it’s about getting a “rep”
– a reputation – and being one up, not about meeting people. “Hackers are more
cooperative,” says Lauren, “often working in a job, and many of them have
known each other for maybe a decade.”
Saturday 0100 h: Dr J tells me he wants to try hacking into the city’s
central traffic light controller, if one exists. Jet-lagged, I leave him to it
and go to bed. The real hackers stay up till three, four, five in the morning,
“just doing stuff”.
1000 h: Breakfast in the hotel restaurant. The hackers among the guests
aren’t hard to pick out; they’re the pale, shifty ones, and when they leave
they pay by cash. Credit cards have names; they can be traced. Seems paranoid,
if you ask me.
1100 h: Outside the main conference hall there is a list of rules. Number
1: “Don’t hack, phreak or mess with hotel property, wiring or fire alarms.”
Number 10: “Assume you are being watched at all times by your worst
Ծٳ.”
I walk into the huge back room, now thronged with people, load up my camera
and stand on a chair to take a picture of the scene. When the flash goes off a
lot of faces turn round; few of them look happy. An organiser comes over: “If
you’re taking photos close up of people, then you have to get their
permission.” Yeah, these people really are paranoid. They can’t think I’m a
Fed, or can they?
There’s a mobile disco with huge speakers spilling out rock music at a
tolerable volume. The rows of tables are filling up with people who have
brought their computers to show off what they can do – to get one up,
establish their rep. Some have brought some pretty serious equipment with
them. One has a Silicon Graphics Iris workstation – a very expensive, very
powerful machine. It’s a rep in itself.
1200 h: The first conference speech is given by Robert Steele, a former CIA
agent. “I spent nine years in the CIA,” he tells the enthralled audience. “But
in computers the threat doesn’t come from the military or the government, it’s
from the whole country. I would like to see you guys write a book about what’s
wrong with the system, and what we should do about it. But I don’t want you to
publish how to do it, because although I trust you, I don’t trust the people
who would read it.” People nod.
I wander back into the anteroom. There’s no coffee, though there’s lots of
Coke, and pizza, hamburgers and fries. The crowd out here still all look below
twenty – and they’re all about 20 pounds overweight. It’s all those hours at
the keyboard.
1415 h: The conference’s key challenge gets under way – to crack the New
York Metropolitan Transit Authority’s Metrocard. It’s about the size of a
credit card, and has a magnetic strip – though no-one is quite sure if that is
what it is. The cards provide up to $80 worth of subway rides, which
cost $1.25 a go. The hackers want to be able to control the cards, so
they can have everlasting rides, or recharge their card for free whenever they
want.
The speaker introduces himself as an MTA ticket clerk – and hacker. He is
wearing a baseball hat, glasses and has a polo-neck jumper rolled over his
mouth. You can see as much of his face as Robocop’s. He wants to keep his job,
he says.
He explains the mechanics of how the card operates, how it appears to work,
what he has to do as a clerk. In that job, he says, he has tried every means
available to get under the skin of the computer that programs the cards in the
booth, including an “accidental” coffee spill. Nothing worked. The MTA is
clearly well-prepared.
The audience and speaker throw ideas around. What and how much data does
the magnetic strip hold? Could you put two cards through a reader or charging
machine at once? What would happen if you “created” two cards with the same
serial number? Although there aren’t any card readers there, the speaker has
tried so many methods that he can answer almost any suggestion.
Overall, it reminds me of some of my more enjoyable university lectures,
the ones where you did some thinking rather than just being told things.
Except that these guys make university undergraduates look middle-aged.
1630 h: Wandering around the anteroom, I come across someone soldering
chips together. I’m now acclimatised, so I know that these are phreaking boxes
– either red, or blue (to make the billing computer think the call hasn’t been
connected while you’re talking), or black (for free international calls). The
solderer – in black jumpsuit, Mohican haircut and a chip apparently stuck to
the side of his head – says that they’re red boxes. He’s “Malice”, and he’s
22. He got started after reading William Gibson’s Neuromancer, the seminal
cyberpunk novel that revolves around the exploits of a genius hacker in a
future world. “The new thing to hack will be interactive TV.” I ask him where
he’s from. “Umm … the 617 area,” he replies elliptically, referring to his
local telephone dialling code. I’m not sure why he’s being wary. If the police
were that serious about arresting every hacker in sight you wouldn’t get far
walking around with a chip stuck to the side of your head.
I chat with Winn Schwartau, an ebullient American author with a handlebar
moustache, who is promoting his latest book, Information Warriors. It’s about
people who have hackers’ skills but not their good intentions. There should be
an Electronic Bill of Rights, he says, to set out what constitutes private
information and what rights you have over it. “Some people think I’m nuts,
specifically politicians in Washington. But there are people out there who
have another, nastier agenda. I know how to shut down just about anything, so
thank God I’m a good guy.”
1950 h: The demonstration of how to read everyone’s pager passes off
peacefully, not to mention dully, since the speakers don’t actually hack into
anything, they just explain (with diagrams) how you might do it … after all,
hacking is illegal in New York state. More shades of university lectures, but
the boring ones this time. I wander off.
One guy is showing off a card reader that can read magnetic strips. It’s
amazing how many things do have magnetic strips on them, and how much
information they contain. I don’t offer him any of my things. He might just be
collecting it all for later use … paranoia is catching.
A second shows off the walkie-talkie he modified to operate on 16 channels,
instead of just two. The modification was absurdly small. He simply bought
one, opened it up, and found that the chip inside had been lobotomised to two
channels but would happily support 16. Think of all the people who bought that
system and never knew what it could do.
2100 h: Another speaker turns up, a hippy in his late 40s, with wild grey
hair and a slightly manic, laughing light in his eyes. “Cheshire Catalyst” is
here to give us the history of TAP, a radical magazine for hackers. As he’s a
senior citizen of the hacking world (Cheshire used to do it on the Telex
network), the question-and-answer session following his talk consists of
people seeking wisdom. “Be careful. Don’t do anything really dangerous, and
don’t get them really worrying about you, because they will come down
.”
The name of Kevin Mitnick comes up. He was the boy who hacked into the US
military’s computers as a teenager (inspiring the film War Games) and then
went on to bigger things, mostly unrevealed. Now he’s a fugitive from the law.
Before the conference, he had eluded some FBI agents who were after him by
tapping their phones. No-one knows where he is; few people know what he looks
like. He agitates even the hackers.
I want to know more. But if I ask more than two questions about anything,
people give you that look – the one that means (I am learning) they are
weighing up whether you are a Fed.
2200 h: Next comes the editorial team of 2600 magazine (subtitle: “The
Hacker’s Quarterly”), which is named after the basic tone used for phreaking.
They set up this conference by advertising it on their Internet bulletin
board. I flick through an issue: “This article is an attempt to teach the
reader the basics of CCITT-5 international signalling …” Other pieces
include elaborate schematic diagrams, perhaps like those used by a phreaker
such as Malice to build his boxes. Another article looks at how to hack
digital locks. It’s remarkable how boring hobby magazines can be if they’re
not about your hobby.
Being known as a hackers’ magazine has its excitements. The FBI called
round in the 1980s, wanting to use the mag to encourage Soviet hackers to
divulge their secrets. Editor Emmanuel Goldstein and his five-strong editorial
team refused.
Now the magazine’s success is the problem. From being run by hackers in
their spare time and distributed by a few anti-establishment independents,
it’s now available on news-stands nationally, selling about 20 000 copies per
issue. “A lot of people read us for shortcuts, which worries us, because we
want people to understand hacking,” Goldstein tells the attentive audience.
(The room is full again.)
2245 h: The first signs of dissent. A rambling question from a woman
worried that everyone will be arrested “for conspiracy” elicits mumbles from
the audience, even boos.
The topic of Phiber Optik comes up. He was, or is, a 2600 staff writer
who’s in prison for hacking. “It was a sobering experience,” says Goldstein.
“He didn’t do anything malicious, just spread information about.”
2355 h: Now it’s the cryptography session, featuring how to make sure no
one ever traces your name or whereabouts on the Internet. You are on computer
A, sending to computer C via network B … diagrams proliferate, with circles
and arrows going back and forth. I can’t handle this.
Back in the anteroom they are still trying to hack into things on the
Internet. I watch a thin, fidgety character in his late teens who wears
bottle-glass spectacles. He’s trying to set up a fake user account on the
Well, the California-based network widely known for its sociability and
openness. I watch over his shoulder. He seems to be making good progress; he’s
got into the registration program. It asks for a credit card number. He puts
in a row of 9s. It asks if he wants to pay now. He declines, choosing instead
a few weeks’ free use before deciding. It asks for a daytime phone number; he
provides a row of 1s. Now he must choose a password.
Passwords on the Well, it explains, must be at least six characters long
and contain at least one number or punctuation symbol. He enters six p’s. The
machine rejects this. “Uh?” he says, as the same screen comes up. He enters
six p’s again. The same thing happens. He literally jumps in his seat.
“U??”
I point out his mistake as gently as I can. “Oh,” he says. He enters a
valid string. It thanks him and says that his new account will be set up as
soon as … Again, he doesn’t bother to read the message. He just hits a key
to return to the Well’s main level, and enters his new, fake username. It asks
for his password. He keys it in. “Unknown user ID,” flashes the screen.
“Access denied.” The would-be hacker just stares.
I point out what he must have missed by not reading the messages on screen
– that the account will be set up only after his card number has been
validated and his telephone number has been called to check his identity. You
can’t just set up a free account at midnight on Saturday, not even in New
York. “Nah, nah,” he mumbles, not believing me, and hacks on.
I’m starting to feel weary, and go downstairs in search of that older
hallowed elixir – cold beer.
I find some. Unfortunately it’s in a video Karaoke bar. I’ve swapped people
who can’t read words on a screen for people who can’t sing words off one.
Sunday, 0125 h: Refreshed. The hackers are still going strong, both in the
session (still rowing upstream through cryptography) and on the terminals.
“Zoran!” exclaims one. “What channel are you on?” He needs to know this so he
can send Zoran some e-mail, along the lines of “How is it, dude?”
To find out what channel Zoran is on, he turns round in his seat. Zoran is
sitting a metre away. I’m starting to think hackers are less of a threat to
national security than to each others’ sleep patterns. Certainly they are
wrecking mine.
1430 h: Cheshire and Goldstein are back, this time to talk about “social
engineering” – also known as getting people to tell you things they shouldn’t.
With them on the platform are “Captain Crunch” and someone going by the name
of John Draper.
Draper is going to try to get someone at the local phone company to give
him the freephone number of the database containing the names and addresses of
its customers. This allows a caller to dial the database and key in any
customer’s number to retrieve a computerised voice giving that customer’s name
and address. The freephone number is supposed to be top secret, known only to
nominated company employees. In fact, every hacker in the New York telephone
area knows the number for the CNA (customer name and address) database, and
Draper reads it out before he begins the demonstration so that the rest of us
know what the target is, too.
On a phone wired up so we can all hear both ends of the conversation,
Draper calls up directory enquiries and tries to adopt the breezy tone of
someone working on Sunday in the phone company’s computer department. Being
breezy in front of a thousand people who are hanging on your every word isn’t
easy. He tries to charm the operator, but his voice wavers a little, and when
he asks for the CNA number, she sounds doubtful and puts him on hold.
Draper rings off at once.
“When people put you on hold, that’s a bad sign,” says Cheshire. “It means
they’re referring things upwards.”
Draper tries again. We hear: “Enquiries. This is Marcie.”
“Hey, Marcie, how’s it going, this is John over in CIS,” he drawls. “You
busy today?”
“Kind of, yeah,” the operator replies.
“Oh, Sundays, I know how it is,” he sympathises. “Listen, I was just
calling because we’ve got a glitch over here, the systems just went down, and
I can’t pull the CNA number up. I just need it to complete this job. Have you
got it there?”
“The CNA number? The freephone?”
Ԩܱ.”
“Sure …” There’s a pause, and then she comes back and gives him the
number. “You need the PIN [code number] too?”
“Noo, that’s fine, we got it here,” says Draper. The PIN would be very
valuable, but getting it would also be a touch irresponsible, since any hacker
here could then make unlimited use of the system, including unlisted numbers.
He puts the phone down, beaming, and the audience bursts into applause.
1610 h: A panel of writers (magazine, book and film) face their fiercest
critics – the people they write about. They are joined later by three men who
are making a film about hackers. They tell the hackers to develop a new
attitude towards the media: not to distrust its members outright but, equally,
not to jump at the slightest chance to have their name in lights.
Where in society, someone asks, does the panel think hackers and their
pursuit will be in five to ten years? “I don’t know,” replies Julian Dibbel,
who has written on hackers for the Village Voice and Spin. “It depends on what
hackers’ self-image is: do they get comfort from thinking that it’s a minority
thing? It’s poised right now: it could go either way, staying small or really
ǻ徱Բ.”
2000 h: The conference is winding down. On the graffiti wall, someone has
written, in large letters, HACKSTOCK. Which in a way it is – more like the
first Woodstock than the second. A haphazard registration; a rigorous
timetable, which went awry almost as soon as the event began; high ideals, but
low reality. No violence, unless you count the man who was arrested for
phreaking some mobile phones. Not many police, unless you count the six
government agents that Steele swore he noticed (recognising them by their
abstract interest and overshined shoes).
Instead of free love, free Internet bandwidth. Well, what do you expect in
cyberworld?
I catch a word with “Ed”, who is packing his computer into a bag. What’s
the point of it all, I ask? Why get together? Couldn’t hack the Metro card,
didn’t make any earthshaking decisions, so …?
“In this country, it doesn’t matter if 500 people stand up and say `Let’s
get rid of the government’,” he replies. “But it does if 500 people know how
to get into the phone system.”
The conference’s organisers reckon that at least 1500 turned up. Any maybe
that is the point: “Spreading knowledge is a political act in itself,” says
Ed.
