Hacker's Encyclopedia
Paradise Lost, book III, line 18 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% ++++++++++Hacker's Encyclopedia++++++++ ============by Logik Bomb (LSC)========= <http://www.xmission.com/~ryder/hack.html> --------------------(1997-Second Edition)---------------- %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% "[W]atch where you go once you have entered here, and to whom you turn! Do not be misled by that wide and easy passage!" And my Guide [said] to him: "That is not your concern; it is his fate to enter every door. This has been willed where what is willed must be, and is not yours to question. Say no more." -_The Inferno_ by Dante Aligheri; AD 1321 Translated by John Ciardi Acknowledgments ---------------------------- To the many programmers of hacking software everywhere, and all those who disseminate information, forbidden or otherwise. Also, I should note that a few of these entries are taken from "A Complete List of Hacker Slang and Other Things," Version 1C, by Casual, Bloodwing and Crusader; this doc started out as an unofficial update. However, I've updated, altered, re-written and otherwise torn apart the original document, so I'd be surprised if you could find any vestiges of the original document left. I think the list is very well written; my only problem with it is that it came out in 1990, which makes it somewhat outdated. I also got some information from the works listed in my bibliography, (it's in the back, after all the quotes) as well as the works of many SF authors; and many back issues of such e-zines as _Phrack Magazine_, _40Hex_, the _LOD/H Technical Journals_ and _Cheap Truth_ and print magazines such as _Newsweek_, _TIME_, _Internet Underground_, _Wired_ and _2600: The Hacker Quarterly_, as well as various people I've consulted. My alpha testers were Einsteinium, Remorseless and Manual Override and my only beta tester was Space Rogue of L0pht fame; I've also received input from Acid Phreak, John Perry Barlow, Dead Lord and Nightmare. I've also gotten a lot of information on (non-cyber) punks and the surrounding subculture from Ronald DuPlanty II who was in my ninth grade fourth-period drama class, who besides having the most piercings I've ever seen besides that chick in _Pulp Fiction_, writing a really cool monologue that was more cyberpunk than he ever considered, and being an all-around great guy, taught me more about Throbbing Gristle than _Cyberia_ ever came close to, indeed more than I ever wanted to know. I also got lots information on the rave scene from my cousin Sean Krueger. Finally, thanks to Nine Inch Nails, Rage Against the Machine, and the Cure, for giving me good background music while I was writing this. Introduction ---------------------- If anyone has any entries they want me to add, or a newer version of any of the texts in my bibliography, please send it to me at ryder@xmission.com so that I can include changes in the 1998 edition. Don't change anything if you distribute this to other sites (and please do; I want this distributed all over the place); if you find any typos or errors I may have made, notify me and I will make the change in the next edition. I cannot make any guarantees as to the accuracy of any of these entries, but if you see a way I've screwed up, please tell me. All of my information is based on written material by journalists or other writers; I know that often journalists are very, very wrong. I also welcome new information; this document is supposed to be information relevant to "cyberpunks" for lack of a better word; specifically-- SF, hacking, phreaking, cracking, virii and subculture info (I am using my own discretion as far as the latter; while I have chosen to enter such questionable material as information on goths and Zippies, I don't want this to turn into _Mondo 2000: A User's Guide to Being a Fashionpunk_.) I am not including information on basic Net culture, such as IRC acronyms and emoticons; this sort of thing is already covered by people with much more knowledge than I in other files. Also, I'm a Mac user, and even though I have some Wintel and UNIX knowledge and the rest is usually taken up by my alpha testers, I may have some incorrect information, so I welcome corrections. Note: I am using brackets around such info as etymology. I also use brackets for unofficial subtitles; for instance, _Die Hard 2_ is written as _Die Hard 2_ [Die Harder] because though the subtitle (Die Harder) was used in advertising, it is not part of the official title. I am also using aliases that were meant to fool law enforcement and were not meant as handles under the form Lastname, Firstname, but I am using handles, even those in the form of proper names (such as Emmanuel Goldstein), without putting the last name first. Handles that look like proper names are also indexed with last name first, but that just references to the other entry. (What, you want me to write LIGHTNING, KNIGHT and PHREAK, ACID? Doesn't really work, even though John Perry Barlow refers to "Mr. Phreak" and "Mr. Optik.") I can't believe I'm spending my time on this crap. Oh, yeah, and so you know who I am and what my personal biases are, I'm Logik Bomb, pleased to meet you. I'm in high school, I own a Power Macintosh 6100/66 (16/500) (as well as a 28.8 modem, a Zip drive and a triple-speed CD-ROM drive) and I do consider myself a hacker (by definitions 1, 2, 3 and 5 in my entry). I have written for _Phrack Magazine_. I read a lot of cyberpunk fiction. I was a member of a fairly influential group called the Legion of the Apocalypse (LOA), but that group's demise has paved the way for a new group that I founded, the Laughing Skull Clan (LSC). My handle comes from the usually destructive program; however, I use the name more for an affinity for the imagery of the abolition of standard linear logic than interest in virii or similar programs; the "k" is in there in homage to Phiber Optik. (By the way, John Perry Barlow said I had a cool handle. So there.) Finally, I'm one of the very few hacker types in the entire world who knows how to spell. :) ---------------------------------------------------------- ABENE, MARK- see PHIBER OPTIK ACID PHREAK (1970-Present)- Handle of Elias Ladopoulos. Current "leader" of MOD. Could be reached until recently at ap@gti.net, though I think that account may no longer exist. [Name comes from "phreak," as in phone phreak, and "acid," so that it is a pun on acid freak, as in someone who takes a lot of LSD. He doesn't take acid, though; he listens to acid house music.] ACTS [Automated Coin Toll System]- Used in payphones to show that you have indeed put money in, so you can now make a call. Can be fooled by a Red Box. ADMINISTRATION- One of the largest hack/phreak groups to ever exist. It also included a group called Team Hackers '86. Members included Adolf Hitler, Alpha Centauri, Author Unknown, British Bloke, Dark Priest, David Lightman 214, Dr. Pepper, Hewlett Hackard, Major Havoc, Mane Phrame, Mark Twain, Phoneline Phantom 1, Red Baron, Renegade Rebel, Sasha Kinski, The President and Walter Mitty. _ADVENTURE_- An old Atari 2600 video game that Knight Lightning played when he was seven and discovered secret rooms. This led to an interest in finding secrets in computers. Interestingly, the secret room KL found (which contained the initials of a programmer) is often considered to be the first easter egg ever put in a commercial program. AGENT STEAL (1961-Present)- Handle of Justin Tanner Peterson, alias Samuel Grossman, alias Eric Heinz. Hacker and Los Angeles club promotor who apparently worked for the FBI after being jailed for credit card fraud; gathered info on big guns like Mitnick and Poulsen for the Bureau. Went on the run for 10 months before being apprehended in 1994. AGORAPHOBIA- Literally, fear of everything. When a person must be totally isolated from the world. (Among other things, the Finn in Gibson's Sprawl Series in agoraphobic.) [From Latin, "fear of all."] AGRAJAG THE PROLONGED- Former member of the Hitchhikers and the Legion of Doom. He was also a programmer for old gaming machines. [Handle is from a character in _Life, the Universe and Everything_, the third book in the increasingly inaccurately named Hitchhiker's Trilogy by Douglas Adams. I believe the person using the handle has combined the names of the characters of both Agrajag and Wowbanger the Infinitely Prolonged.] AI [Artifical Intelligence]- see ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AL [Artificial Life]- see ARTIFICIAL LIFE ALLIANCE- Former AT&T trademark referring to teleconferencing systems. ALTAIR- The very first personal computer, introduced 1975. Really pathetic by our standards, but the first computer at all available to the common person. [From a destination in the Romulan neutral zone in the classic _Star Trek_ episode "Balance of Terror."] ALT.2600- Hacking Usenet newsgroup. From the magazine, _2600: The Hacker Quarterly_. There are a few variants: alt.2600.moderated, alt.2600.hackerz, alt.2600.phreakz and alt.2600hz. [In USENET form, "alt," for "alternative," and 񓩈," for the subgroup 2600.] AMERICAN TELEPHONE AND TELEGRAPH- see AT&T AMERICA ONLINE [AOL]- Very evil commercial online service that rose from the ashes of a BBS called QuantumLink in 1990, and the largest commercial service. They've had an enormous problem with hackers, and their solution is to try and stop the flow of programs they don't like and shut down any chat room involving hacking, while the child molestor rooms stay. A number of programs have been written to rip them off, most notably AOHell. ANALOG- A way of representing information that uses a continuous range of values. Opposite of digital-- while a CD is digital, a tape is analog; while a computer is digital, an abacus is analog. ANARCHY- (1) Total chaos and disorder. (2) A time in a country, usually after a revolution, where there is no government, the most recent example probably being the former Soviet Union after the breakup of the Eastern Bloc. This condition has never been prolonged for very long. (3) The tenets of the political science of anarchism, the ultimate goal of which is the removal of any rule by anyone or anything. (4) [Anarchy file] A file (usually text) that details such actions as how to brew nitroglycerin and other destructive things. [From Greek, "a," meaning nobody, and "-archy," meaning "rule." The "n" is in there because it's too hard to pronounce "aarchy."] AOHELL- Most famous program for hacking America Online; first coded in 1994 and contains a full suite of utilities. AOL's attempts at shutting down its distribution haven't worked very well. AOL [America Online]- see AMERICA ONLINE APPLE COMPUTER, INCORPORATED- Very large computer corporation whose main product is the Macintosh and its associated system software, the MacOS. Founded in 1976 by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak (incidentally, former phone phreaks) and created the Apple IIe in 1979, which became the standard personal computer. In 1984, they released the Macintosh ("and you'll see why 1984 won't be like 1984"). While the second largest computer manufacturer in the world, the Mac operating system continues to lose market share. APPLEGATE, CHRISTINA- Former model and actress, notably on the television show _Married With Children_. Rumors were spread that Erik Bloodaxe dated her (he says they aren't true), and her credit report was pulled by MOD. AREA CODE- The prefix in a phone number, based on location, to add to the number of possible phone numbers. When two or more hackers have the same handle and it is in dispute as to who had it first or who deserves it, it is used to differentiate, or at least it was in the 1980s. (This is used in this file as well, as with the two Knightmares and Dr. Who.) ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE [AI]- Used to refer to "smart" programs that do their jobs quickly and with minimum of user input, as well as the code written in computer games governing the actions of non-user controlled characters or enemies. Also used to refer to system software that can reason; this has not been achieved. The best examples of this are the insane AIs in _Neuromancer_ and HAL 9000 in _2001: A Space Odyssey_. ARTIFICIAL LIFE [AL]- Living programs or robots; viruses may be the early, primitive forms of artificial life. Maxis makes programs using relatively advanced artificial life (notably _SimLife_). THE ARTIST FORMERLY KNOWN AS PHIBER- see PHIBER OPTIK ASCII ART- Art done in plain text. This is fairly difficult. Portraits of people done in ASCII art usually only work if the person has some major distinguishing characteristics; for instance, while my friend Einsteinium might come across fairly recognizable because he has long hair and glasses, I would not be at all distinguishable because I have contact lenses and fairly normal length hair, and my only really distinguishing feature is my red hair, which cannot be shown in ASCII because it can't support colors. That and my incredible radiating handsomeness, which unfortunately cannot be shown in ASCII either. :) [From American Standard Code for Information Interchange, the set of bits created in the 1980s to represent characters.] AT&T [American Telephone and Telegraph]- Originally American Bell Telephone, the company that started the telephone. It was bought and, under the tutelage of another huge company, became a monopolous phone provider. Huge telco that was the Microsoft of the Seventies and Eighties. It was broken up by the justice department in 1982, which created lots of little baby RBOCS. In 1990 their phone network crashed, which got them into a lot of trouble. See also DEATH STAR ATLANTA THREE- Urvile, Leftist and Prophet, members of the Atlanta chapter of LOD that were thrown in jail during the Hacker Crackdown of 1990. AUTOMATED COIN TOLL SYSTEM- see ACTS AVATAR- From a modern, Internet perspective, the term avatar was first adopted from Neal Stephenson to refer to the psychological persona people take on when they anonymously enter cyberspace. However, it is increasingly being used more literally as a term for the icons representing a user in a certain programs on the Internet. [First used from an Internet perspective in 1992 in _Snow Crash_, by Neal Stephenson, in one of those self-fulfilling SF prophecies. Stephenson got the name from the Hindu concept of avatars, which are the personification of various deities or entities.] AXE- To reformat a disk or delete a file. BABBAGE, [Professor] CHARLES- Professor of mathematics at Cambridge who designed the Analytical Engine, a huge, grinding, steam-driven machine to do mathematical calculations in the 1830s. _The Difference Engine_, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, takes place in an alternate 1855 where the Analytical Engine was advanced nearly as far as our personal computers. BABY- (1) Any program that is less than full-blown. A baby word processor would be a program that does just the bare essentials. (Apple's obsolete TeachText was a baby word processor.) (2) A hardware device that is smaller than normal. BANG- (1) To lose your temper, usually in a very violent manner. In the extreme, actual destruction of hardware may result. [From banging something, or hitting it; also from the onomotopeotic word for a loud noise.] (2) Lots of exclamation points to add emphasis. Sometimes other weird characters are used as bangs. Also used to pronounce exclamation points; for instance, "Go to hell!!!!" would be pronounced "go to hell bang bang bang bang." BANK- Cache memory; a section of memory not normally used that is utilized for high speed operations in certain programs. [From "databank;" I think this word has been replaced by the term "cache."] BARLOW, JOHN PERRY- Grateful Dead lyricist from 1970 until the band broke up in 1995; ex-cattle rancher. Co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation; civil libertarian, "cognitive dissident," buddy of a lot of members of MOD. (After that little misunderstanding with Phiber when Barlow called Phiber a punk and compared him to a skateboarder, and Phiber ILFed Barlow's TRW credit report. Good hack, that.) Also wrote the essay "Crime and Puzzlement," as well as a declaration of the independence of cyberspace and a _Time_ essay (notable for using the word "shit" for the first time in _Time_ without quotes around it. Barlow later said it felt like a revolutionary act.) Also, he's one of the few people I've met over the Net who I've also actually met in person, and the only real description I can give is that he looks exactly the way you'd think that he would knowing that he's a civil libertarian from Wyoming. Currently civil libertarian and contributing writer for _Wired_. BASE- (1) Contraction for the word "database." (2) In most programming languages, (C, C++, Pascal, etc.) a pointer, a set of memory locations that point to the start of an array (another memory location); the pointer is the "base" from which the array starts. BASIC [Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code]- Early programming language for beginners. Used a lot in the 1980s. BAUD [rate]- Obsolete measurement of the speed of a modem; often erroneously used to refer to bits per second because at low rates they are equivalent. It really means "the number of signal events per second occuring on a communications channel." (That's what my modem's manual says.) [Named in honor of Emile Baudot, "telecommunications pioneer."] BBS [Bulletin Board System]- A computer that is set up to act as a system where other people call in using phone lines to post messages; sometimes software is traded, and usually archives are kept of software on the board. The first board worthy of the name was Ward Christensen and Randy Suess's board in 1978. BEDBUG- A virus type program that another programmer inserts into an existing program, with the intention of causing havoc. Usually not serious-- it is coded so the results look like a software bug, not a true virus. May make copies of itself. See also BUG, VIRUS, TAPEWORM BEGINNER'S ALL-PURPOSE SYMBOLIC INSTRUCTION CODE- see BASIC BELL, [Professor] ALEXANDER GRAHAM- Guy who invented the telephone in 1876. The man who created cyberspace, in its early, pathetic stage when no one thought it would be anything. BELLSOUTH- Atlanta RBOC that was supposedly very easy to hack; some rumors claim they eventually spent two million dollars on security. BERNIE S.- Handle of Ed Cummings. Phreak recently released from an uncomfortable and unConstitutional imprisonment for possession of computer programs that "could be used for fraud." Can be emailed at bernies@2600.com. BIG BLUE- Slang for IBM. Comes from their blue logo. BIG BROTHER- Name for a police state government that spies on every aspect of a citizen's life and commandeers their very thoughts. The NSA's not so secret wish. [From the name of the insidious government in George Orwell's _1984_.] BINARY DIGIT- see BIT BIT [Binary Digit]- Contraction of binary digit. Smallest unit of measurement in cyberspace. A 1 or 0; representing on or off, true or false to a computer. BITS PER SECOND- see BPS THE BLACK ANGELS- see THE ELITE LEGION OF HACKERS THE BLACK BARON- Handle of Christopher Pile. British virus author who was sentenced to a jail term under the Computer Misuse Act for writing the viruses Pathogen and Queeg, which included an engine called SMEG. Also apparently a fan of the science fiction/comedy series _Red Dwarf_. BLACK WIDOW- A Java applet capable of sinister acts including uploading files to the victims hard drive and consuming RAM and CPU cycles. _BLADE RUNNER_- 1982 Harrison Ford movie directed by Ridley Scott that many cyberpunks just love to death. It has a great re-creation of Los Angeles in 2019 that William Gibson has said mirrors his vision of the Sprawl in _Neuromancer_; just about every film using a dystopian urban environment has been inspired at least in part by the one in _Blade Runner_. The plot concerns a former bounty hunter/cop that hunts replicants, androids designed for off-world colonies. A sequel that I really didn't care for at all was also written (_Blade Runner 2: The Edge of Human_ by K.W. Jeter, followed by the sequel to that, _Replicant Night_) recently (don't waste your money on it), and Ridley Scott says he is going to make a follow-up film tentatively titled _Metropolis_. [Loosely based on Phillip K. Dick's _Do Android's Dream of Electric Sheep_; title comes from the name of a totally unrelated William S. Burroughs novel about black market surgeons, which was itself based on a story by Alan E. Nourse.] BLANKENSHIP, LOYD- see THE MENTOR BLESSED FOLDER- Slang for the System Folder on Macintosh computers. Comes from the fact that everything is run by that folder, and you mess with at your own risk. BLIND FAITH- see DREW, DALE BLUE BOX- Infamous box that pretty much no longer works, but kicked ass in the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s. It is a device that plays a sound at a frequency of 2600 hertz, which allows all kinds of cool things. See BOXES BOB HARDY- see EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN BOT- Either a benevolent search bot such as an infobot or knowbot, or a Bot which hacks IRC. [Short for "robot."] BOX- A hardware device that allows abnormal telephone operation, like free calls or anti-tracing, used by phreaks. The ultimate box is the rainbow box, which combines the blue box, red box, green box, and black box. There are also a lot of weird variant boxes. Boxes, though the most pure form of phreaking, are rarely used now because of the phone company's changes to stop it, both on purpose and as a serendipitious result of the digitization of the phone system. BPS [Bits Per Second]- Measurement of the speed of a modem. Currently being replaced by kbps (kilobits per second.) See also BAUD BRAND, STEWART- Editor of the _Whole Earth Catalog_ and contributing writer for _Wired_; one of the hippies that decided cyberspace was pretty cool. Described cyberpunk as "technology with an attitude." BRIDGE- A hack into the phone company's PBX. This is often used so that many phreaks can talk in a huge conference; this was a much more common practice in the 1980s, when massive party lines were held, people occasionally dropping out to go to work or school and someone else taking their place. BRUTE FORCE ATTACK- A classic hacking technique; guessing an exhaustive number of passwords to try and enter a system. This does not work as much anymore, probably because even idiot sysadmins don't use quite so simple passwords. It was very successful about ten years ago, though. BRZEZINSKI, DIRK-OTTO- see DOB BUG- A mistake in programming or hardware design that results in unfavorable and sometimes disastrous results. Microsoft Word 6.0 was notorious for this. See also BEDBUG BULLETIN BOARD SYSTEM- see BBS BUM- The act of rewriting a program or section of a program to run in a smaller memory area. May also mean changing the code to remove unused sections and try to improve on the running speed. [From an old MIT hacker term.] BURKE [, Carter J.]- A total asshole who causes more trouble than he's worth. [From the name of a treacherous company man in the film _Aliens_.] BYTE- A sequence of adjacent bits operated on as a unit by a computer. Very small unit of virtual measurement. Usually, a byte is eight bits. (On the Internet, a byte is transferred as seven bits, which sort of fucks everything up.) [Comes from an alteration and blend of bit and bite.] CAFFEINE- Natural "smart drug;" enough of it makes you hyper. Present in chocolate, soft drinks and coffee. Gateway drug. (If you don't know what a gateway drug is, you weren't listening closely enough in D.A.R.E. propaganda class.) CALEA [Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act]- Bill which concerns the development of a government wiretapping infrastracture; notably bans possession of "hardware or software used for altering or modifying telecommunications instruments to obtain unauthorized access to telecommunications services;" used to prosecute Bernie S. This legislation also makes most of the people reading this document criminals, as most of us have a modem or even (gasp) a cracking program of some sort. Yeah, right, like most of us hackers aren't criminals anyway, this just gives them license to lock us up for no provable reason. I wonder if CALEA is what they got Joseph K. on in _The Trial_ . . . CANDYMAN- Archiver of forbidden information; administrator of CandyLand (was, rather; it was recently shut down). Computer science student. His stuff is often cited by Congress and the like as examples of why we should make the Net a police state. CAP'N CRUNCH- see DRAPER, JOHN CAPTAIN BEYOND- see SHADOWHAWK 1 CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT- A Dallas, Texas hacker who, in 1986, cracked an HBO presentation of _The Falcon and the Snowman_ with a message decrying HBO's practice of encrypting transmissions so that they could not be picked up with a satellite dish. According to an unsubstantiated report, he later used this to ask his girlfriend to marry him, and was eventually caught. [Probably from the 1930s radio show character.] CARBON [or carbon dioxide] CHIP- The 80486 or 65C02 CPU chip. The "carbon" comes from the "C," as in "CO2," (one carbon molecule, two oxygen molecules) which is the chemical formula for carbon dioxide. CARDING- Using illicit credit card numbers. The underground is divided as far as the ethics of this; most think it is common thievery and does not follow the freedom of information ethic that drives other hacking. CASE [, Henry Dorsett]- Anti-hero of _Neuromancer_, the William Gibson SF book; one of his few characters that only appeared in one book. Adopted as a hero by some and an allegory for the hacker; a ueberhacker who stole from his employees, has his nerves damaged so that he can not go back to cyberspace, but takes a deal with an AI to get them fixed. (The first two names are in brackets because one gets the feeling they aren't really his name- he's only referred to by this name once by the Turing Police, and it's sort of assumed that he dropped the names when he became a hacker. Or at least that's what I got out of it.) CASE, THOMAS- see MITNICK, KEVIN DAVID CCC [Chaos Computer Club]- see CHAOS COMPUTER CLUB [CCC] CDA [Communications Decency Act]- see COMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT [CDA] cDc [cult of the Dead cow]- see THE CULT OF THE DEAD COW [cDc] CELINE, HAGBARD- see HAGBARD CELINE CERT [Computer Emergency Response Team]- see COMPUTER EMERGENCY RESPONSE TEAM CFP [Computers, Freedom and Privacy conference]- see COMPUTERS, FREEDOM AND PRIVACY CONFERENCE CHAOS COMPUTER CLUB [CCC]- Infamous West German hacking group founded in 1984 that is now trying to be kind of sort of legit. Members have included Wau Holland (leader), Steffen Wernery, Christian Wolf, Pengo, Obelix, Dob, Peter Carl, Hagbard Celine and Markus Hess (possibly). Can be reached at ccc@ccc.de. CHASIN, SCOTT- see DOC HOLLIDAY CHERNOFF, ANTON- see MITNICK, KEVIN DAVID CHICAGO COMPUTER FRAUD AND ABUSE TASK FORCE- Possibly the first hacker tracker team, formed in 1987 by William J. Cook. A major part of the Hacker Crackdown of 1990. CHIP- Shorthand for microprocessor. The hardware that runs the machine. The PowerPC and the Pentium are examples of chips. CHRP- see PPCP CLASS 10 TOOLS- Really nasty programs that can thouroughly trash a system- if information war is coming, these would be the Stealth bombers and atom bombs. Tsutomu Shimomura built many of these, which is one of the reasons why the SDSC is such a huge target for hackers. [Term coined by Brosl Haslacher.] CLINT EASTWOOD- see EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN CLIPPER CHIP- Encryption plan endorsed by the Clinton-Gore administration that is currently in its third incarnation (the current proposal is sometimes mockingly known as Clipper 3.1.1). The way it's supposed to work, as designed by the NSA, is that we stick this cool thing called the Clipper chip in every computer and fax machine and communications tool ever made, which would save us from commies and those evil hackers. Of course, our benevolent Big Brother the Government of the United States of America would keep the keys to these chips, so in case anyone did anything the government designated to be illegal (or someone did something a government employee wanted to find out), the government could look at all our files and every email we ever sent. Of course, the government would never abuse this, would it? Phillip Zimmermann created PGP 1.0 in response to this. C0DEZ D00DZ [sometimes K0DEZ D00DZ]- The phreak equivalent of a pirate. Someone who finds out phone codes and distributes them to the electronic underground. There is also a derogatory term, "c0dez kidz." COGNITIVE DISSIDENTS- The name of a "chill," or bar where people hang out, in _Virtual Light_. John Perry Barlow and some other people have taken to calling themselves "cognitive dissidents," I believe inspired by _VL_. COMMODORE- A computer company which eventually bought Amiga; popular in the 1980s. People who used their computers were often berated by people with the superior (but still awful by today's standards) Apple IIe. However, according to _The Cyberpunk Handbook (The Real Cyberpunk Fakebook)_, Phiber Optik used a Commodore. That's sort of like turning stone to bread or feeding ten thousand people with one fish. [From the Naval wartime rank, I assume.] COMMUNICATIONS ASSISTANCE FOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ACT [CALEA]- see CALEA [Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act] COMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT [CDA]- Law passed as part of the Telecommunications Bill of 1996 making indecent speech and information illegal in cyberspace in the United States, which AOL, Microsoft and CompuServe (never thought I'd be on their side), as well as the EFF and ACLU, are attempting to overturn. It sparked a day of protest on the Internet (Black Thursday), when many major sites draped their pages in black. A federal court declared the law unConstitutional 3-0, and the Supreme Court has announced that they will review the law and make a decision as to its Constitutionality soon. COMPUSERVE- Very old online service that is the second biggest in America; founded in 1979 and currently owned by H & R Block. It is very conspicuous because edresses are set up with annoying numbers like 76543.1700. They created an uproar when they banned many sexually explicit newsgroups because a German user said they violated Germany obscenity laws and threatened to sue. [Name obviously comes from combination of "computer" and "serve."] COMPUTER EMERGENCY RESPONSE TEAM [CERT]- Anti-hacking group which sets up security and tracks people; managed by Dain Gary. Reachable at cert@cert.org. COMPUTER MISUSE ACT- British law on the books since 1990, among other things outlawing virus writing. The Black Baron was prosecuted with this law. COMPUTER PROFESSIONALS FOR SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY [CPSR]- Group that is what it says it is; notable for vocal opposition to the "Star Wars" defense project on the grounds that it is putting too much trust in computers; and for filing suit with the US government in the 2600 case. COMPUTER SYSTEM FOR MAINFRAME OPERATIONS [COSMOS]- see COSMOS [COmputer System for Mainframe OperationS] COMPUTERS, FREEDOM AND PRIVACY CONFERENCE [CFP]- Annual security/privacy con; in 1994, the FBI arrested Brian Merrill, an innocent man, because it was also an alias of Kevin Mitnick, there. COMSEC [Computer Security]- Network security firm founded by the remnants of LOD; went out of business in 1994. Replaced by the ISP LOD Communications, Inc. CON- A convention; in this context, a hacker convention. Begun in the mid-1980s by such groups as LOD. Recent, high-profile Cons included Hacking at the End of the Universe and HOPE. THE CONDOR- see MITNICK, KEVIN DAVID "THE CONSCIENCE OF A HACKER"- A legendary manifesto written by the Mentor shortly after his arrest in 1986, published in _Phrack Inc._ magazine, volume one, issue seven. It was later reprinted in _Phrack_ again and in _The Hacker Crackdown_, _Teleconnect Magazine_, the film _Hackers_, T-shirts worn at Cons, and numerous ftp sites, web pages and BBS's. CONSOLE COWBOY- A hacker. From SF novels. This term has remained relatively unmolested by the media. See also COWBOY CONTROL C- Infamous hacker and member of LOD who was busted by Michigan Bell and actually did get a security job from them. Also known as Phase Jitter, Master of Impact, Dual Capstan, Richo Sloppy, Cosmos Dumpster Driver, Poster Boy and Whacky Wally. Disciple of Bill From RNOC. COOKBOOK- A detailed document on exactly what to do when hacking a certain type of system, written by piecing together computer manuals and personal experience. [From the type of book giving detailed instructions on cooking.] COOPERATING FULLY- When hackers tell every illegal act and the names of all of their cohorts because they think it will save them. While this occasionally works, to many law enforcement officers, "cooperating fully" generally means you bend over. CORLEY, ERIC- see EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN CORRUPT (1971-Present)- Handle of John Lee. Member of MOD; former member of a New York gang called the Decepticons. VAXEN expert. [Handle obviously comes from the adjective for being morally bankrupt.] COSMOS [COmputer System for Mainframe OperationS]- Database program used by telcos to store information; staple of the elite phreaker; or at least it was. COSMOS DUMPSTER DRIVER- see CONTROL C COUNT ZERO- The handle of several hackers. I know of several; one who wrote an article for _Phrack_ about a lecture by John Markoff; one who said "Information yearns to be free" (quoted at Space Rogue's Whacked Mac Archives a while back, before he changed the quotes); the guy who defined k-rad as "a thousand points of rad" (quoted in _The Cyberpunk Handbook (The Real Cyberpunk Fakebook)_); the member of cDc; the member of Phalcon/Skism mentioned in some issues of _40Hex_; and the writer for _2600_. (Some of which may be the same person.) [All handles come from the name of the protagonist of William Gibson's second novel, also titled _Count Zero_, who also appeared in _Mona Lisa Overdrive_. The character is a cyberspace hacker with the handle Count Zero Interrupt, whose birth name is Bobby Newmark. According to the book, this comes from an old programmer term (probably related to the opening line about returning the marker to zero); however, I am not blessed with this knowledge. Wow, that's scary. Gibson knows something about computers that I don't.] COWBOY- One of the legendary figures hackers tend to latch on to as role-models. Spawned the term "console cowboy." As a result, many hackers tend to give themselves gunfighter-type names (i.e. Datastream Cowboy, Doc Holliday). CPSR [Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility]- see COMPUTER PROFESSIONALS FOR SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY CRACK [sometimes "krack"]- (1) To remove the copy protection from a commercial program, so that the resultant program (or file) is "cracked." Also covers modifying any program illegally, such as when Netscape Navigator 2.0b4 was cracked when the expiration date was surgically removed a while back. See also HACK (2) To crack a password using a cracking program and a dictionary. Involves using crypt-and-compare; the program encrypts various words and compares the encrypted form of the words to the encrypted password. On UNIX the most commonly used crack program is Crack, on DOS it is CrackerJack, and on Mac it is MacKrak. CRACKER- Term given to so-called "malicious" hackers by the original MIT hackers, hoping the media would leave the name "hacker" alone and not damage the original hackers' pristine, snow-white reputation. Never really got picked up, probably because it sounds a lot like a wheat consumable or a derogatory term for a white hick. While (I think, at least) this is a really lame word, it is occasionally used by those wishing to seem knowledgable. (Sorry Erich Schneider. No offense.) [Comes from "cracking" into systems.] CRASHER- Someone who not only hacks systems, he crashes them. Not that widely used. "CRIME AND PUZZLEMENT: THE LAW COMES TO THE ELECTRONIC FRONTIER"- Essay by John Perry Barlow about LOD and hackers and his relationship with Phiber Optik and Acid Phreak. [Name obviously inspired by Fyodor Dostoyevsky's _Crime and Punishment_.] CRIMSON DEATH (1970-Present)- Also known as the Sorceror. Hacker/phreak who was editor of _Phrack_ for a short time. He was also the sysop of Hell Phrozen Over, Missing Link, Skull Kingdom, the Forgotten Realm and CyberWaste; disciple of the Videosmith. He was also known for having a nose ring, back when that was shocking and cool. [Handle comes from _Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Monster Manual II_.] CRUNCH- (1) The act of using a program such as PKZip or StuffIt to compress another program into a smaller disk space. (2) The act of re-writing sections of a program to run in a smaller memory space. CRYP- Used by Rudy Rucker to refer to illegal hackers who do it for money or power in his science fiction. (Not derogatory; Rucker is one of the real scientist hackers who thankfully doesn't look down on us obnoxious punks.) [I'm not sure where this came from, but I'd guess it comes from "Crips," as in the violent street gang, in an amalgram with "cryp[t]," as in cryptography.] _THE CUCKOO'S EGG_- Novel by Clifford Stoll about his tracking down of renegade members of the Chaos Computer Club. Disliked by many in the electronic underground because of his constant black-or-white approach to computer ethics, painting hackers as totally evil and him as totally good, ignoring the fact that some of his methods are close to being as illegal as those of the hackers he tracks. However, I haven't read it, so I can't comment. THE CULT OF THE DEAD COW [cDc]- Anarchist occult goth hacker group that writes a lot of weird text files with a lot of profanity and ASCII art. Have their own USENET newsgroup dedicated to them- alt.fan.cult-dead-cow, as well as an irc channel, #cdc, and a web page, http://www.l0pht.com/~veggie. Members have included Swamp Ratte (current leader), Count Zero, Deth Vegetable, The Nightstalker, Red Knight, Tweety Fish, Iskra and Basil. CUMMINGS, EDWARD [Ed]- see BERNIE S. CYBER-CHRIST- see ERIK BLOODAXE CYBERDECK- In cyberpunk fiction, notably Gibson (though I don't know where it appeared first; the term has also been used in the works of Rudy Rucker and cyberpunk role-playing games) the futuristic modem that allows characters to run through cyberspace. Though descriptions vary, it is usually described as being keyboard sized, and sometimes has a plug that inserts into the character's head (jacking in). _CYBERIA: LIFE IN THE TRENCHS OF HYPERSPACE_- Novel by Douglas Rushkoff about ravers and hackers and stuff. It was berated by many in the electronic underground, and Erik Bloodaxe said "Imagine a book about drugs written by someone who's never inhaled. Imagine a book about raves written by someone saw a flyer once [sic]. Imagine a book about computers written by someone who thinks a mac is complex [...] and there you have Cyberia, by Douglas Rushkoff. This book should have been called 'Everything I Needed to Know About Cyber-Culture I Learned in Mondo-2000.'" Brutal, but accurate. CYBERNETICS- The study of the feedback loop that informs any control system of the results of its actions; communication theory. Coined by Norbert Weiner of MIT in the 1940's when he was working on anti-aircraft guns. Often erroneously used now to refer to bionic parts. Supposedly (I got this from _The Hacker and the Ants_ by Rudy Rucker) it has meant "bullshit" from the beginning; Weiner was trying to think of what to call his paper, and a colleague suggested "cybernetics" because it didn't mean anything and would intimidate people. [From kybernetes, Greek for "helmsman."] CYBERPUNK- 1) A literary term referring to the new science fiction that was written in the 1980s; specifically, the works of the so-called "Mirrorshades Group"-- Bruce Sterling, William Gibson, Tom Maddox, Pat Cadigan, Rudy Rucker, Greg Bear, John Shirley, Lewis Shiner and others. Cyberpunk fiction is (or was, if you agree with Norman Sprinrad that cyberpunk is dead) concerned with a realistic (sometimes surrealistic), usually pessimistic future where technology is incredibly enhanced and humans are controlled by a System- huge zaibatus or a fundamentalist religion. These are all generalizations; one cyberpunk novel took place in 1855. There hasn't really been a "classic" cyberpunk novel since 1987, with Gibson's _Mona Lisa Overdrive_; the most recent notable cyberpunk work was Neal Stephenson's really weird, theological technological comedy _Snow Crash_ in 1992, in addition to Gibson and Sterling's most recent offerings. [From Gardner Dozois, who first coined the term to refer to science fiction. He is believed to have cribbed this from the title of a short story by Bruce Bethke, who has since proclaimed himself an "anti-cyberpunk," whatever the fuck that means.] (2) A noun for a hacker. This was used just because the media thought it sounded like a good name for a computer criminal. (3) A member of the "cyberpunk subculture." Specific people thought to be part of the subculture are hackers, phreaks, cypherpunks and ravers. _CYBERPUNK_ [2020]- The first cyberpunk role-playing game, created in 1989 by R. Talsorian Games. Originally called just _Cyberpunk_, but that had the possibility of violating copyrights, so the second edition was called _Cyberpunk version 2.0.2.0_, or _Cyberpunk 2020_. [From the literary and social movements described in detail in the rest of this document.] CYBERPUNK BUST- Mocking term used in the science fiction community for the bust of Steve Jackson Games where _GURPS Cyberpunk_ was seized. _CYBERPUNK: OUTLAWS AND HACKERS ON THE COMPUTER FRONTIER_- Novel by Katie Hafner and John Markoff about hackers, specifically, three case studies: Kevin Mitnick, Pengo and Robert Morris. Much better than I'd thought it would be. _CYBERPUNK VERSION 2.0.2.0_- see _CYBERPUNK_ [2020] CYBERSPACE- The Internet or a virtual reality system; most often (and most correctly, in my opinion) to refer to all digital entities that can be entered, including the Internet and BBS's. Overused, but still kind of cool. Popularized by John Perry Barlow around 1990. [Invented by William Gibson in the short story "Burning Chrome;" from "cybernetic" (the science of communication and control theory) and "space" (you know what "space" is, I hope.) He got the idea from watching kids play video games.] CYBERSPACE SERIES- see SPRAWL SERIES CYBORG- A cybernetic organism; an android, or human with machine or computer parts. The term is also metaphorically used to refer to the modern state of technologically advanced mankind, which has figuratively if not literally fused with machinery. [From "cybernetic organism;" a term coined by Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline in 1960.] _CYBORGASM_- Really stupid CD. There are others like it, but this is the most popular. It is a recording of a bunch of people making sounds while having sex. In the words of a reviewer for _Mondo 2000_, in one of their more witty moments, "There is nothing cyber about this. It's a fucking CD. _Literally_." CYPHERPUNK- Someone who thinks that encryption should be used by all, and advocates the removal of all laws restricting cryptographic technology. They are also sometimes called crypto-anarchists, because their ideal of free encryption, many believe, would destroy the effectiveness of government. [From "cyberpunk," as in a member of the electronic underground, and "cypher," a code made up of symbols.] DAEMON9 (1973-Present)- Also known as Route and Infinity. Member of the Guild. One of the current co-editors of _Phrack Magazine_. Owner of Information Nexus (infonexus.com). Can be reached at route@infonexus.com. DANCE- The act of typing very rapidly without errors. DARK AVENGER- Bulgarian virus writer who has achieved cult hero status. His most famous virus is Eddie, AKA Dark Avenger (named after the author). He is a major heavy metal person, and many of his virii contain references to Iron Maiden. DARK DANTE- see POULSEN, KEVIN LEE DARK PHIBER [ninja.techwood.org]- Internet community grown out of a BBS created in 1991 by the White Ninja and Wild Child and shut down (temporarily) in 1994. Currently administered by Decius 6i5 and Musashi. [From a deliberate misspelling of "dark fiber," the term for fiber optic lines in place but not in use.] DARK TANGENT- Handle of Jeffery Moss. Organizer of many hacker cons, including DefCon. Also occasionally writes for _Wired_. DATACOPS- Any agency in charge of keeping information expensive. Notable datacops include the NSA, FBI and the Secret Service, as well as independant agencies such as CERT. [From "data," meaning information, and "cops," a slang term coming from the acronym "constable on patrol."] DATASTREAM COWBOY- British hacker noted for hacking the Royal Air Force; he was tracked when the Air Force OSI hacked the systems he was entering the RAF systems from. Currently the Phrack World News correspondent for _Phrack_. DATA ENCRYPTION STANDARD [DES]- see DES [Data Encryption Standard] DEAD ADDICT- Formerly known as Sugar Addict. Ex-phreaker, Def Con speaker, and Seattle resident. Currently known for his web page, Underground Propaganda <http://www.metrix.net/daddict>. DEAD LORD- Handle of Bruce Fancher. Also known as the Infiltrator, Executive Hacker [?] and Sharp Razor. Good friend of Lord Digital and co-administrator of MindVox; former member of the Chief Executive Officers and the Legion of Doom. (?) Though many press reports say he was in LOD, as well as he himself in a Phrack pro-phile, he is not listed in the official lists distributed in _Phrack_ and _LOD/H TJ_, and a file in an early issue of _Phrack_ quotes a file he supposedly wrote which insults LOD-- heh, DL probably thought no one had so little of a life they'd actually use FindText to scan for references to him in _Phrack_ and read the files. However, that was in a rag file, and I haven't read the file it refers to, so I'm unsure of the accuracy. Can be reached at bruce@phantom.com. DEATH STAR- Term referring to AT&T. [From the post-breakup AT&T logo, which resembles the evil Death Star from _Star Wars_.] DEMON DIALER- see WAR DIALER DENNING, [Doctor] DOROTHY ELIZABETH DAVIS [1945-Present]- Computer security academic and author of _Cryptography and Data Security_. In 1990, wrote a paper ("Concerning Hackers Who Break into Computers") which gained a fair amount of notoriety defending hackers and suggesting that they be worked with closely to understand their motives. She then went and spoke with some security professionals, and immediately changed her mind and decided hackers were evil after all, if not the ones she'd spoken to, then the vast majority. She became further villified by the Hacker Nation when she began supporting the Clipper initiative, which to this day she defends in the face of extreme criticism. DE PAYNE, LEWIS- Alias Sam Holliday, also known as Roscoe, also known as Lewcifer. Phreaker buddy of Kevin Mitnick, interviewed in _Cyberpunk_. Can be reached at lewiz@netcom.com. DES [Data Encryption Standard]- The current encryption used by the United States Government. Becoming more and more obsolete. THE DESTROYER- see REDRAGON DETH VEGETABLE [sometimes shortened as Deth Veggie]- Handle of Eric Skoog. Member of the Cult of the Dead Cow. Wrote a number of anarchy files when he was 15. Interviewed by _Dateline_. DETH VEGGIE- see DETH VEGETABLE DeWITT, PHILIP-ELMER- Writer for _TIME_ magazine who writes virtually all of their stories about computers. Wrote cover stories on cyberpunks, cyberspace, and cyberporn. Actually, I don't recall him writing about anything that didn't have the prefix "cyber." Also occasionally works as a correspondent for the _MacNeil-Lehrer Newshour_. DIALED NUMBER RECORDER [DNR]- see DNR [Dialed Number Recorder] DICE- To separate a program into two or more files to allow loading under the OS. [From cooking slang, meaning to chop.] DiCOCCO, LEONARD MITCHELL (1965-Present)- Ex-friend of Kevin Mitnick, eventually narked him to the FBI. Former employee of Voluntary Plan Administers (VPA). THE DICTATOR- see DREW, DALE _DIE HARD 2_ [Die Harder]- 1990 Bruce Willlis action movie that included hacker/terrorists taking over an airport. Notable because Congress held a hearing on it and its possible realism, just as they did almost ten years prior for _WarGames_. _DIET PHRACK_- see _PHRACK MAGAZINE_ DISK OPERATING SYSTEM [DOS]- see DOS [Disk Operating System] DIVERTING- Hacking corporate PBXs and dialing out of them for free. DNR [Dialed Number Recorder]- Device that cops use to know who you call so they know who to question. Not to be confused with the TCP/IP component DNR, for Domain Name Resolver. DOB (1960-Present)- Handle of Dirk-Otto Brzezinski. Former member of the Chaos Computer Club. One of the renegade members who hacked for the KGB. DOC- Contraction for documentation or document. A file that contains information on how to use a program. Usually a plain text file, but may be in a specific, proprietary word processor format. Also the DOS suffix for a word processing file, usually Microsoft Word. DOC HOLLIDAY- Handle of Scott Chasin. Former member of LOD and good friend of Erik Bloodaxe. [From the nickname of the dentist/gunfighter.] DOCTOR DISK- see REDRAGON DOCTOR WHO [413] (1967-Present)- Also known as Skinny Puppy and Saint Cloud. Former member of the Legion of Doom. [From the character on the British 1970s TV show of the same name.] DOS [Disk Operating System]- Usually used to refer to MS-DOS, or Microsoft Disk Operating System, which got to version 6.22 before Microsoft recently abandoned it in favor of Windows 95. Other DOS's exist or existed; besides the OS's that have long since gone away like Apple DOS and Commodore's DOS, there are the unofficial versions of MS-DOS, such as DOS 7.0 and DOS Shell. DOWNLOAD- To transmit via modem a program or file from a BBS or network to a computer. See also UPLOAD, TRANSFER, XFER DR. DISK- see REDRAGON DR. WHO- see DOCTOR WHO DRAKE, FRANK- see FRANK DRAKE DRAPER, JOHN- Birth name of Cap'n Crunch. Also known as the Pirate, also known as the Crunchmeister. One of the very early phreakers; got his handle because he once used a whistle that came with Cap'n Crunch cereal to hack the phone system. He currently writes custom Mac applications, but spends most of his time raving. Can be reached at crunch@well.com. DREW, DALE- Also known as the Dictator and Blind Faith. Paid Secret Service informant who turned in Knight Lightning and videotaped "SummerCon '88," the hacker's conference, even though it turned out no illegal activity occurred. He has remained an unrepentant bastard. DRUNKFUX- Major Con organizer and hacker. Don't know much about him other than that. DUAL CAPSTAN- see CONTROL C DUB- The act of making a backup copy of a program (or disk) in the event the original copy becomes unusable. [From sound and video editing slang.] D00D- A person, a guy. "Dude" in warez speak. Not used as much as it once was. E- see ECSTASY THE EAVESDROPPER- see THE PROPHET ECSTASY [AKA "X," among other names]- Drug that's very popular with ravers, like acid without the hallucinations. It was made illegal in 1987. However, "Herbal Ecstasy," an organic version, is still legal. [Technical name: MDMA- don't ask me what it stands for.] See also EPHEDRINE EDDRESS- Email address. Eddresses are usually in the format username@domain.type.country. EFF [Electronic Frontier Foundation]- see ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION [EFF] EIGHT LEGGED GROOVE MACHINE [8lgm]- see 8lgm 8lgm- English hacker group that currently runs a security mailing list. Busted in 1994. It stands for alternately Eight Legged Groove Machine and Eight Little Green Men (the latter is unproven, but I've heard it used). The members were two hackers named Pad and Gandalf. EIGHT LITTLE GREEN MEN [8lgm]- see 8lgm ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION [EFF]- A civil liberties group created in response to the unConstitutional actions of the United States Secret Service during the Hacker Crackdown of 1990. They have a newsletter, the _EFFector_. Some of the more notable or influential members include Bruce Sterling, Mitch Kapor, John Perry Barlow, John Gilmore (early employee of Sun) and Steve Wozniak (co-founder of Apple). THE ELECTRONIC PRIVACY INFORMATION CENTER [EPIC]- Net civil libertarian group who handled the 2600 case for the CPSR; also vocal opposition to the Clipper chip proposal. THE ELECTRONIC UNDERGROUND- see THE UNDERGROUND ELH- see THE ELITE LEGION OF HACKERS [ELH] ELITE [or elyte or 3L33T or eleet or a million other spellings]- Adjective (over)used to describe the best hackers, because something has to separate the truly good ones from the mediocre ones. THE ELITE LEGION OF HACKERS [ELH]- The Elite Legion of Hackers is a second-tier group founded by Lord Nemesis in 1996. The group's current membership is made up of Lord Nemesis, Death Vegetable, Panik, Brain Freeze, Zophar, Digital Ignition, Kwantam Pozeetron, od|phreak and Cyber Toast. The group has also spawned an elite "strike team" led by Kwantam Pozeetron, made up of the best members, called the Black Angels. EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN (1961-Present)- Handle of Eric Corley. Also known as Howard Tripod, Sidney Schreiber, Bob Hardy, Gary Wilson, Clint Eastwood and 110. The editor-in-chief of and writer for _2600: The Hacker Quarterly_, host of the New York phreaking radio show "Off the Hook," and relentless advocate of the computer underground. Often shows up at meetings of computer companies just to unnerve people. In his honor, the film _Hackers_ had the character Cereal Killer's real name be "Emmanuel Goldstein." [Handle came from the name of the hated, possibly non-existent rebel in Orwell's _1984_.] ENCRYPTION- The practice of encoding data into an unreadable form, which can only be converted with the same code. Recently, Netscape Communications built fairly strong encryption into their browser, though security errors have been discovered several times. ENGRESSIA, JOSEPH [Joe]- Blind phreak who could whistle the 2600 tone; eventually got a job at a Denver RBOC. EPIC [Electronic Privacy Information Center]- see THE ELECTRONIC PRIVACY INFORMATION CENTER [EPIC] E911 DOCUMENT [Official name: "Control Office Administration of Enhanced 911 Services for Special Services and Account Centers"]- Document written in 1988; liberated by the Prophet and contributed to _Phrack_. Originally written by Richard Helms and the Society of Inpenetrable Prose. Knight Lightning almost got sent to jail for it, seeing as how the telco valued it at over $72,000. (I'm sure Knight Lightning enjoyed himself flipping through his illicitly gained thousands of telco money...) The case was dropped when it was proven that the same info could be bought for about $13. EPHEDRINE- Psychoactive drug sometimes used by ravers. Among other things, it is one of the ingredients in herbal Ecstasy and crank and (in obviously small dosages) non-prescription medicines like Nyquil. ERIK BLOODAXE (1969-Present)- Handle of Chris Goggans. Also known as Cyber-Christ. Former member of the Legion of Doom and The Punk Mafia. Former editor of _Phrack Magazine_. Former employee of Dell Computers. When he took over _Phrack_, it gained more purpose and seemed to pull together more than it had since the departure of Knight Lightning and Taran King; he left after a few issues because of lack of time and desire. He's also got a bad reputation as a nark. [Handle came from the name of a Viking king of Denmark in the 10th century; revealed to Goggans in a book entitled _Vikings_.] EXON, [Senator] JAMES- Democrat Senator who is freaking obsessed with techno-indecency. Sponsored the CDA. EXPERIAN- Known as TRW until late 1996 (they changed their name to get away from the negative PR surrounding their activities), Experian is an evil megacorporation that is favorite target of hackers, including MOD, in one of the more publicized incidents. It is a target in large part due to the fact that their job includes catologing the credit history of private citizens and selling it to other corporations; thus, both a tempting target for malicious hackers out to pull credit histories, and a target that most ethical hackers have no problem subverting. Supposedly sets up Tiger Teams for the government. EXTASYY ELITE- Short-lived phreak group destroyed when Poltergeist turned in everybody after he was busted for carding. Its membership included Bit Blitz, Cisban, Evil Priest, Crustaceo Mutoid, Kleptic Wizard, the Mentor (the only guy who went on to do anything with his life, hacking-wise), the Poltergeist and the Protestor. FAKEMAIL- Mail intended to trick the recipient into believing that it was sent by a person other than the actual sender. Very, very easy. FANCHER, BRUCE- see DEAD LORD FARGO 4A- One of the earliest phreak groups, a sort of precursor to LOD. Membership included BIOC Agent 003, Tuc, Big Brother, Quasi-Moto, Video Warhead and the Wizard of ARPANET. [Name comes from a city in North Dakota they re-routed calls to; incidentally, the same town was used for the name of the 1996 drama _Fargo_, though most of the movie takes place in Minnesota and it has virtually nothing to do with the town, though it begins there.] FEDWORLD- The largest BBS in the world. Huge board with government info, operated by the United States government. FERNANDEZ, JULIO- see OUTLAW FEYD RAUTHA- see SHADOWHAWK 1 FIERY, DENNIS- see THE KNIGHTMARE _FIREWALLS AND INTERNET SECURITY: REPELLING THE WILY HACKER_- Security book outlining Net security; haven't read it yet, but plan to buy it. 5ESS- The fifth-generation electronic switching station currently used by telcos. _40HEX_- Virus zine that contains source code for many virii and interviews with prominent virus writers. It is mostly staffed by members of Phalcon/Skism, and was first edited by Hellraiser, then by DecimatoR, and then sort of by nobody. I believe the magazine has become defunct; the web page no longer exists. [I don't really know what the name comes from because I'm not particularly advanced in my virus knowledge; the "hex" part comes from hexadecimal (as in hex dump), which is base sixteen, but I don't know why the number ൰" is there in particular.] 414 GANG- Hacker group formed on the 414 Private BBS that gained notoriety in 1982 for intrusions on Los Alamos military bases and the Sloan-Kettering Memorial Institute. [I assume the name comes from the area code of the BBS, a common practice.] FRACTAL- Supposedly a symbol for cyberpunk (though I don't buy it-- does cyberpunk have to have a symbol, when it is concerned with outlaws and undefinable fringe elements?). A part of chaos theory, proposed by mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot in the 1960s. FRANK DRAKE- Handle of Steven G. Steinberg. Hacker and former correspondent for _Phrack_. Currently one of the section editors for _Wired_. FREED, BARRY- see HOFFMAN, ABBIE FRY GUY- Hacker, buddy of some guys in LOD, and Motley Crue (sorry, I can't make the little dots in a plain text file) fan. Busted in 1989 by the universally despised Tim Foley. He was, however, a carder and he offered to testify against LOD, things that are not really exemplary. See also TINA [Name comes from manipulations he did in the McDonald's computer system.] GAME OVER- The end. Time to give up and try something else. [From a line by Private W. Hudson in the movie _Aliens_, which itself came from video games.] GARFINKEL, SIMSON- Contributing writer to _Wired_ and editor of _Internet Underground_; author of articles on privacy and technology issues, as well as author of a book on PGP. GARY WILSON- see EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN GATES, WILLIAM HENRY III "BILL" (1955-Present)- Chief Executive Officer of Microsoft. The richest man in America, at almost 18 billion dollars. Author of _The Road Ahead_. And, if you haven't heard yet, the ASCII values of the letters in his name add up to 666. GIBSON, WILLIAM- Science fiction author and contributing writer for _Wired_ who invented the term "cyberspace." Author of the anthology _Burning Chrome_; the Sprawl Series (_Neuromancer_, _Count Zero_ and _Mona Lisa Overdrive_); one of the many scripts for what was then called _Alien III_; _Virtual Light_; the screenplay for _Johnny Mnemonic_, based on his short story; and, most recently, _Idoru_. He also co-wrote _The Difference Engine_ with Bruce Sterling. Ironically, he didn't own a computer until he wrote _Mona Lisa Overdrive_, he's not at all technical, and he's not online in any form. GIGABYTE [abbreviated as "gig" or "Gb"]- Very large unit of measurement. Usually only used when referring to hard drive space. A gigabyte is one billion bytes, or roughly 1048.576 megabytes or 1.024 million kilobytes. GLOBAL KOS [GkOS]- Possibly the most influential hacker group currently in operation, GkOS claims to be the only truly international group. Current members include Shadow Hunter, Spidey, That Guy, AcidAngel, glitched and Silicon Toad. Name is pronounced "chaos." GLOBAL OUTDIAL- see GOD GOD [Global OutDial]- An Internet outdial (modem connected to the Internet you can call from) that allows long distance calls. GODWIN, MICHAEL- Attourney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation; also writes articles on Net civil issues. Contributing writer for _Wired_. GOFFMAN, KEN- see R.U. SIRIUS GOGGANS, CHRISTOPHER- see ERIK BLOODAXE GOLDSTEIN, EMMANUEL- see EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN GOTH- Cyberpunk offshoot (well, not really; the net.goths are a cyberpunk offshoot; the regular, non-net goths are a punk offshoot) which is into vampyres and infinite sadness and wearing black. I suppose you could call me a goth (well, as much as you can be a goth when you have short red hair), because I have pale skin and wear black and watch _The Crow_ a lot and listen to the Cure. [Okay, take a deep breath- the name of the subculture came from the name of a punk offshoot music movement pioneered by Siouxsie and the Banshees, which came from the Gothic books and movies (such as _Dracula_), which came from the name of the scary dark medeval architecture, which came from a derogatory name given to the Gothic architects comparing them to Goths, who were a tribe of barbarians.] GREENE, [Judge] HAROLD- The judge who busted AT&T and is now in charge of telecommunications for the government. GROSSMAN, SAMUEL- see AGENT STEAL _GREY AREAS_- Hacker-oriented magazine whose topic is the "gray areas" of society, such as hackers and technology, underground music and bands, drugs, etc. Can be reached at greyareas@well.sf.ca.us, among other addresses. HACK- (1) to change a program so that is does something the original programmer either didn't want it to do or didn't plan for it. Hacking a program is not neccessarily cracking, and vise versa. See also CRACK (2) To code a program. "I hacked out version 1.0a1 last week." (3) To break into a computer. (4) To alter in a clever way the status quo. (5) What you do; if you were a pilot, you could say "I hack planes." As far as I know, this was first used in 1994 by Bruce Sterling in _Heavy Weather_. #HACK- The hacking irc channel. _THE HACKER CRACKDOWN_ [Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier]- Nonfiction novel by Bruce Sterling about the Hacker Crackdown of 1990. Posted to the Net in 1993 because of extensive legal maneuverings between Sterling and his publisher. THE HACKER CRACKDOWN OF 1990- Name given to the massive crackdown, of which Operation Sundevil was the largest part. HACKER- There are about 20,000 definitions of a hacker floating around. These are some of the most common: (1) Any computer user. It drives everyone else crazy when anyone refers to a novice user as a "hacker." (Am I the only one who cringed when, in _Jurassic Park_, that girl goes "We prefer to be called hackers"? Really, am I the only one?) (2) A computer user who spends a lot of time on the system with an almost fetishistic approach. Usually refers to someone who knows a lot about computers, even if they are not a programmer. (3) Any user of an online service, such as CompuServe, AOL or the Internet. That's another sort of annoying one, since just because some businessman goes on AOL to send email to grandma, that does not mean he is a hacker. (4) A programmer. (5) A computer user who uses his skills unlawfully in any matter, usually to "break into" another system through a network. (6) A master programmer capable of things that seem "magical." [All of these are from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's programmers in the 1960s, who called themselves "hackers," to refer to making a program better and more efficient, or making it do something it was not originally intended to do. The media overused this to an incredible extent, which added all the other definitions.] _THE HACKER FILES_- Comic book limited series published by DC Comics; gathered some press. It was well-researched and included characters based on Gail Thackeray and Robert Morris. _HACKERS_- 1995 film about... well, hackers. Response in the underground was mixed; many (possibly most) hated it and couldn't stand the many technical errors, while others liked it, even though it was incredibly unrealistic. (Let's face it, any movie that has someone get into a supercomputer with the password "GOD" and has UNIX apparently replaced by some sort of cyberspatial three dimensional GUI has some realism problems.) Also notable because "Jack Devlin," claiming to be an independant contractor from the ILF after "faking his death at the hands of Sandra Bullock" (see _The Net_) hacked MGM/UA's system and messed with the home page. MGM was pretty nice about it though, and even kept the page and linked it to the official page. Of course, it would have been pretty stupid and hypocritical of them to track down whoever did it and prosecute him. (While his original bravado-filled message has been widely spread on the Net, was is not so publicized is a second letter, which may have been made up to save face by the people who set up the page-- but I kind of doubt it-- apologizing and asking not to be prosecuted.) Also, Emmanuel Goldstein was one of the "hacking consultants," and Phiber Optik said that it was the most accurate movie Hollywood's made about hacking, which isn't very hard. Many members of MOD and ex-members of LOD were consulted for the original script, but most became upset with how the film actually turned out. If you want my opinion, which you probably don't, I thought it was okay despite the technical inaccuracy, because it was an entertaining movie with a cool soundtrack. I hope that the fact that it barely made back production costs shows studio executives not to try and find the next trend, make a movie on it and flaunt the small amount of knowledge they gained through research. (What was the deal with _Wipeout_, that video game? And, hmm... Gibson, what a sneaky reference! What in-joke could they possibly be making? And Da Vinci virus-- could that be a sly allusion to the infamous Michaelangelo virus?) The most ironic thing about the film is that at the end AT&T gets thanked. _HACKERS: HEROES OF THE COMPUTER REVOLUTION_- Novel by Steven Levy about the original MIT hackers. Haven't read it yet. HACKERS ON PLANET EARTH- see HOPE _HACK-TIC_- The Dutch equivalent of _2600_. Published by Rop Gonggrijp. (I want a Dutch name really bad, just so people would go crazy trying to spell it.) You can reach _Hack-tic_ (or rather the editor) at rop@hacktic.nl. HAFNER, KATHERINE M.- Co-author of _Cyberpunk_; technology journalist for _Newsweek_. Can be reached at kmh@well.sf.ca.us. HAGBARD CELINE [19 -1989]- Handle of Karl Koch, a German hacker and member of the Chaos Computer Club. Mentally unstable, in part due to his heavy use of drugs. Committed suicide (probably; murder has been suggested) by dousing himself in gasoline and setting himself on fire on the twenty-third of the month, fulfilling _The Illuminatus! Trilogy_'s quote that "All the great anarchists died on the 23rd day of some month or other," and the recurrence of the number 23. [Handle comes one of the characters in _The Illuminatus! Trilogy_ by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, a Discordian anarchist pirate; unlike most hackers who take handles from SF, Koch believed he actually was the protagonist of the novel.] HANDLE- A pseudonym or nom de guerre. [From CB radio.] HAPPY HARDCORE- Handle of Nicholas Ryan, a Yale University student. As programmer of AOL4Free, Hardcore commited "computer fraud" throughout 1995 and released his program to the Net, and as a result was convicted by the Secret Service and the US Justice Department in early 1997. The Secret Service and InJustice Department have become corporate whores who prosecute anyone who threatens the interests of powerful companies like AOL-- in the words of AOL's "Integrity Assurance" vice president, this case is a "legal milestone." HAQR, HAQUER, HAXOR- Variant spellings of "hacker." All of them are pronounced like "hacker." HARDY, BOB- see EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN HEADLEY, SUSAN- see SUSAN THUNDER HEINZ, ERIC- see AGENT STEAL HESS, MARKUS [1962-Present]- Alias Matthias Speer. Former member of the Chaos Computer Club. Hacked for the KGB. Currently a professional programmer. HOFFMAN, ABBIE- Alias Barry Freed. Possibly the first phreaker, a yippy who died under suspicious circumstances in the 1989. Supposedly had the largest FBI file ever. Author of _Steal This Book_, about how poor hippy anarchists could survive (my suggestion- enlist as an extra in _Hair_), as well as _Revolution For the Hell of It_ and _Woodstock Nation_. Started the infamous _TAP_, or "Technical Assistance Program." HOLLAND- see THE NETHERLANDS HOLLAND, WAU [full name: Hewart Holland-Moritz]- Founder of the Chaos Computer Club and German hacker. HOLLAND-MORITZ, HEWART- see HOLLAND, WAU HOLLIDAY, SAM- see DE PAYNE, LOUIS HOPE [Hackers on Planet Earth]- Recent convention, sponsored by 2600. HOWARD TRIPOD- see EMMANUEL GOLDSTEIN IBM [International Business Machines, Incorporated]- Zaibatsu that at one time completely controlled computers; really fucked up when they licensed Microsoft to market DOS (which was, by the way, a product that was acquired by them from another company). Because DOS backfired on them, they created OS/2, which was largely ignored. Most recently they've allied with Apple (previously their bitter foe) and Motorola with the PowerPC chip and have regained some of their reputation in the hardware world with the IBM ThinkPad, one of the best laptops available. IBM-PC- International Business Machines Personal Computer or compatible. Refers to one of the five gazillion machines that run Microsoft DOS or the variants; Microsoft Windows or Microsoft Windows for Workgroups; Microsoft Windows 95; LINUX or IBM's OS/2. 90% of the marketplace is taken up by these machines. These systems include many basic types of machines, usually run on Intel's chips. By the way, the term IBM-PC is becoming more and more of a misnomer; almost all are not actually made by IBM, especially since IBM is trying to challenge Microsoft and Intel with PPCP and the PowerPC chip now. ICE [Intrusion Countermeasure Electronics]- Used in _Neuromancer_ and other novels (I don't know where first, but I know it was coined by Tom Maddox, who refuses to answer my emails as to where and how he first used it. Come on, Tom! :) But I digress) to be the graphical metaphor of computer security. IDOL, BILLY [that's not his real name, but I don't give a fuck what it really is]- Punk singer who was a success in the 1970s and '80s; former member of Generation X. Supposedly he used to be cool, but everything I've ever seen him do after Generation X was pretty lame. Jumped on the "cyber" bandwagon with his album _Cyberpunk_, which was a total failure as far as I can figure. You can reach him at idol@phantom.com. IL DUCE- see PHIBER OPTIK ILF- Alternately the Internet Liberation Front, the Information Liberation Front, and Information Longs to be Free. Net "terrorist" group, possibly started as a joke. Rerouted Josh Quittner's message system and left a politically motivated message. (This incarnation probably included MOD or LOD members, because Quittner had just written a book on the MOD/LOD war) In 1995, one or more people claiming to be doing "independant contracting" for the ILF hacked MGM/UA's _Hackers_ home page. It is also used as sort of an international brotherhood; when confidential or proprietary information is released to the Net, the ILF sometimes gets the credit. There is also now the network available at <http://www.ilf.net/>, which I recommend. INDUSTRIAL- Techo's evil twin; style of music that has begun to go mainstream; considered cyberpunk or marginally so. Grew out of the late 1970s British punk scene with Genesis P. Orridge's Throbbing Gristle; was later watered down and combined with other styles of music to be more palatable. Skinny Puppy, Ministry and Nine Inch Nails are all considered industrial. Gareth Brandwyn called it "the sounds our culture makes as it comes unglued." INDUSTRIAL HACKING- Industrial espionage using hackers, sometimes freelancers, though mostly corporate employees. Appears in SF more than in real life, though it does occur. INFOBAHN- see INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY INFORMATION LIBERATION FRONT- see ILF INFORMATION LONGS TO BE FREE- see ILF INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY [or Infobahn or several other cutesy phrases]- Pretty stupid metaphor for the Internet, popularized by (then) Senator Al Gore. INTEGRATED SERVICES DIGITAL NETWORK [ISDN]- see ISDN INTEGRATED SPECIAL SERVICES NETWORK [ISSN]- see ISSN INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES, INCORPORATED [IBM]- see IBM [International Business Machines, Incorporated] INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES PERSONAL COMPUTER [IBM-PC]- see IBM-PC INTERNET LIBERATION FRONT [ILF]- see ILF INTERNET PROTOCOL [IP]- see TCP/IP INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDER [ISP]- see ISP INTERNET WORM- The worm created by Robert Morris in 1988 that replicated out of control due to bad programming and took down a lot of computers. News stories persisted in calling it a "virus," which pissed everyone off. INTERZONE- A cultural area where "the street finds its own uses for things;" from the hallucinogenic hell which appears in William S. Burroughs' _Naked Lunch_. Also the title of a British SF magazine. INTRUSION COUNTERMEASURE ELECTRONICS [ICE]- see ICE [Intrusion Countermeasure Electronics] ISDN [Integrated Services Digital Network]- Technology to completely digitize the phone service that was abandoned after much work (it began in the early 1980s) in the early 1990s because it was too expensive. It is currently used for high-speed Internet access, slower than T1 but faster than a modem. It is just becoming widely used by phone networks. ISP [Internet Service Provider]- The local networks most normal people have to dial into to reach the Internet; ISPs, in turn, make deals with such Internet backbone owners as MCI to connect to the Internet. ISSN [Integrated Special Services Network]- In a phone system (notably AT&T), controls special user features and customer control options. Not to be confused with ISSN, the serial number used by the Library of Congress used to register magazines. JAPAN [Nippon]- Country code ".ja;" East Asian nation, population 125.2 million, which is the subject of many cyberpunk novels due to an odd history and its high technology. Pursued a highly hierarchal samurai society until the mid-1800s, yet retained a strong Imperial warlike spirit until 1945, when they were totally defeated in World War II by the dropping of two atom bombs. Now an extremely successful producer of consumer goods, particularly electronics. (This doesn't have too much to do with hacking, but Japan is a notable country from an electronics standpoint, as well as the fact that much of SF currently involves Japan, and its preponderance of zaibatsus.) JOHNSON, ROBERT- see THE PROPHET JOLT [Cola]- Soft drink famous for having twice the caffeine of any other major soft drink (still less per pound than coffee, though), invented and distributed by the Jolt Company, Inc. By the way, did you know you can type on average five words a minute faster than normal if you drink two bottles of MegaJolt in succession? JUDGE DREDD- British comic book character currently published by DC that has some cyberpunk concepts; it's about a semi-fascist anti-hero in the 23rd century. Sylvester Stallone made a flop movie from it that the sets and special effects were cool, but not much else. There was also a hacker in the early 1990s with this handle, as well as another one (who may be the same guy) who was a member of the 2300 Club. KRACK- see CRACK K-RAD- ("A thousand points of rad" -one of the Count Zeros) Extremely cool; very rad. [From one thousand times- "k," standing for kilo-; and "rad"- short for "radical," skateboarder-type slang term in the 1980s meaning cool.] KAPOR, MITCHELL- Co-founder of the EFF. Ex-hippy, founder of Lotus, and original programmer of Lotus 1-2-3. KARL MARX- Handle of James Salsman. Phreak and ex-member of LOD. Former sysop of Farmers of Doom BBS. [Handle came from a mention in the comic strip "Bloom County" about Communists.] KILL- The act of deleting a file or stopping a program while it is running. KILOBYTE [abbreviated as Kb or K]- Small unit of measurement, usually used for measuring small programs and cache memory. Contrary to what the word would imply, a kilobyte is 1024 bytes. KING BLOTTO- Former member of the Legion of Doom and the 2300 Club. Phreak who invented several variant boxes. KINGDOM OF THE NETHERLANDS- see THE NETHERLANDS KNIGHT LIGHTING- Handle of Craig Neidorf. Former member of the 2600 Club. Co-founder of _Phrack Magazine_. He was put on trial during the Hacker Crackdown of 1990 for publishing the E911 document in _Phrack_, a document stolen in a hacker raid. When the Electronic Frontier Foundation got the case dropped, he decided he wanted to become a lawyer. He is now working for the EFF and as a writer for _2600_. (According to Lightning, handle came from a combination of the Legion of Super-Heroes comic book character "Lightning Lad" and the character "Michael Knight" from the lame television show _Knight Rider_.) THE KNIGHTMARE- Handle of Dennis Fiery. Author of a book on computer security entitled _Secrets of a Super Hacker_, and sometimes writes for _2600_. I haven't read his book. Not to be confused with the Arizona hacker. KNIGHTMARE [602]- Arizona hacker and sysop of the Black Ice Private BBS who was one of the first to be busted in the Hacker Crackdown. KROUPA, PATRICK K.- see LORD DIGITAL LADOPOULOS, ELIAS- see ACID PHREAK LAMER- A jerk idiot loser. That pretty much sums it up. [From "lame," weak.] LASS [Local Area Signalling Services]- Special numbers, preceded by a *, which allow special operations such, which usually cost a small amount of money. Includes such services as trace (*57), callback (*69) and caller ID disable (*70). L.A. SYNDROME - Lamer behavior. Means the person doesn't support the group. Usually associated with BBS's and posting thereupon. [From a user named the L.A. Raider and his activities on several Ohio boards.] THE LAUGHING SKULL CLAN [LSC]- Recently formed (1997) group that was created by myself after the retirement of LOA, my previous group. The Laughing Skull Clan follows an anarchistic rule based on previous, successful groups such as LOD, MOD, L0pht and GkOS, and a philosophy that is equally inspired by the Mentor and the Cult of the Dead Cow, if you can imagine that combination. Current members include Logik Bomb, Hyper Viper, the Loath, Omega X, Kwantam Pozeetron, Rusky, Technics, KoDiaK, visual trinity, the Professor, Hack-and-Slay, Cpt. Nemo and Nemesis Enforcer. We maintain a web page at <http://www.hackers.com/hacking/> [Name comes from the name of a traitorous Orcish clan in Blizzard Software's _WarCraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal Expansion Set_.] LAW ENFORCEMENT ACCESS FIELD [LEAF]- see LEAF [Law Enforcement Access Field] LEACH- Someone who copies a large amount of software and doesn't return the favor. Used by BBS's and users, but also applies to those who physically copy software. [From "leach," the disgusting creature that sucks your blood.] LEAF [Law Enforcement Access Field]- Major part of the encryption in Clipper. A scrambled group of numbers including the chip's serial number, a session key number and a checksum number; allows government agencies to bypass Clipper encryption. LEARY, TIMOTHY (1920-1996)- Ex-Harvard professor and West Point-graduate who turned hippy in the 1960s and encouraged students to "turn on, tune in, drop out." Popularized LSD, and was eventually imprisoned for almost ten years for marijuana possession. He became a cyberpunk about fifteen years after his dropping out, and his new sound bite became "the PC is the LSD of the 1980's." (He later updated that to the 1990s when he discovered that computers now make the Apple IIes, 386s, Mac 512ks and Commodores of the 1980s look like abacuses.) He became one of the editors of _Mondo 2000_. In 1992, he discovered that he had prostate cancer. Being the weird guy that he was, he thought this was great news because he was going to die; after toying with the idea of somehow killing himself over the Internet and coming up with elaborate suicide plans, he succumbed to cancer on May 30, 1996. LEE, JOHN- see CORRUPT THE LEGION OF DOOM [LOD] [Full name: "The Fraternal Order of the Legion of Doom (Lambda Omega Delta)"]- Legendary hacking group that existed from 1984-1990, created on a board called PLOVERNET, founded by Lex Luthor, a former member of the Knights of Shadow. Also inspired the short-lived groups "Farmers of Doom" and "Justice League of America." It subsumed the membership of a group called the Tribunal of Knowledge. Began as a phreaking group, and when it later gained more members who were more proficient with computers, it became LOD/H (Legion of Doom/Hackers). When many members dropped out, the "H" migrated from the name, but their newfound ability with computers stayed. Its official membership included, at various times: Lex Luthor, Karl Marx, Mark Tabas, Agrajag the Prolonged, King Blotto, Blue Archer, The Dragyn, Unknown Soldier, Sharp Razor, Doctor Who 413, Erik Bloodaxe, Sir Francis Drake, Paul Muad'Dib, Phucked Agent 04, X-Man, Randy Smith, Steve Dahl, The Warlock, Silver Spy, Terminal Man, Videosmith, Kerrang Khan, Gary Seven, Marauder, Bill from RNOC, Leftist, Urvile, Phantom Phreaker, Doom Prophet, Jester Sluggo, Carrier Culprit, Thomas Covenant, Mentor, Control C, Prime Suspect, Prophet, Professor Falken and Phiber Optik. Some members were busted by Operation Sundevil, others created a security firm called ComSec (which went bankrupt, and eventually was reincarnated as LOD Communications, Inc), and many just disappeared. Also, in the early 1990s, a "new" Legion of Doom was created, because since the group was defunct, logically anybody could use the name; it was, however, pretty much looked down upon and was eventually forcefully disbanded by members of the original LOD. (Doesn't that sound creepy? Like Mark Tabas and Erik Bloodaxe had them killed or something.) [The group's name came from the _Superfriends_ cartoon series (using characters from Superman/Justice League comic books), where the villains were the Legion of Doom.] THE LEGION OF DOOM/HACKERS- see THE LEGION OF DOOM [LOD] THE LEGION OF THE APOCALYPSE [LOA]- Florida-based hacker group of which I was a member; existed from about 1995 to 1997. Its members included, at various times; Revelation, Phreaked Out, Electric Jaguar, Hack Attack, Logik Bomb, Silicon Toad, Phreak Show, Phuck Phish and Fallout. No relation to the more infamous Legion of Doom. Its retirement led to the creation of the Laughing Skull Clan. LEVY, STEVEN- Writer and journalist; one of the original 1960s MIT hackers who is disdainful of us latter-day hackers. Author of _Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution_, among other things. Currently contributing writer for _Wired_ and _Newsweek_. LEWCIFER- see DE PAYNE, LEWIS LEX LUTHOR- Legendary hacker/pheaker and founder of LOD. [Handle came from the comic book villain who was Superman's arch-enemy; the hacker Lex got it from the 1979 movie version with Gene Hackman.] LOA- see THE LEGION OF THE APOCALYPSE [LOA] LOCKED (1) When a computer system shuts down and stops operation, usually without the operator wanting it to happen. (2) A protected program. (3) A file that has been changed by the OS so that it cannot be changed or deleted; often very easy to unlock. (4) A floppy disk which has been physically locked to prevent accidental alteration or to prevent stupid people from modifying the contents. LOD- see THE LEGION OF DOOM [LOD] LOD/H- see THE LEGION OF DOOM [LOD] _LOD/H TECHNICAL JOURNALS_ [LOD/H TJ]- Hacking philes written by the Legion of Doom/Hackers, beginning in 1986. Four issues were made. The form and content owed something to what was then called _Phrack Inc._. [Name is a parody of _AT&T Technical Journals_.] LOD/H TJ- see _LOD/H TECHNICAL JOURNALS_ [LOD/H TJ] LOGIC BOMB- A program that performs a certain action when certain conditions are met, such as deleting all files on Christmas eve, although it is not necessarily malevolent. Though it is not technically a virus, it is often grouped that way. There is some speculation that the turn of the millenium will set off tons of logic bombs that lie dormant in computers. LOOMPANICS- Publishing company (in)famous for publishing such "questionable" information as bomb plans and guerrilla techniques; also published _Secrets of a Super Hacker_, though according to everyone I've heard from the subject, it's pretty worthless. THE LONE GUNMEN- An group of three fictious hackers (Byers, Frohike and Langly) on _The X-Files_; first appeared in the episode "E.B.E" in 1992. Editors of a paranoid publication called _The Lone Gunmen_. An honorary Lone Gunman was a hacker named the Thinker who eventually got killed by the government because he uncovered information on the existence of extra-terrestrials. Apparently the government keeps its files on the existence of extra-terrestrials unencrypted on an Internet connected network. [Name comes from the oxymoronic flipside of the "lone gunman" theory in the Kennedy assassination, which is that Oswald acted alone.] LOOPS- Phone numbers used by the telco for testing. Can be manipulated to make free calls, which are billed to the telco. L0PHT- A Boston-based group of hackers interested in free information distribution and finding alternatives to the Internet. Their web site houses the archives of the Whacked Mac Archives, Black Crawling Systems, Dr. Who's Radiophone, the Cult of the Dead Cow, and others. Current membership includes Dr. Mudge, Space Rogue, Brian Oblivion, Kingpin, Weld, Tan, Stephan Wolfenstein and Megan A. Haquer. (Entry suggested by Space Rogue.) LORD DIGITAL- Handle of Patrick K. Kroupa. Former member of the Apple Mafia, the Knights of Shadow and the Legion of Doom. (Like Dead Lord, he claims he was officially inducted in 1987, but he is not listed in any of the official lists.) Good friend of Dead Lord and co-administrator of MindVox. Can be reached at digital@phantom.com. LSC [Laughing Skull Clan]- see LAUGHING SKULL CLAN MACINTOSH- A type of computer that currently takes up a little less than 10% of the marketplace. Sometimes called derogatorily "Macintrashes" or "Macintoys." First made by Apple in 1984, notable for its ease of use; successor to the failed Lisa, which was the successor to the Apple II. All Macintoshes run the MacOS, which is currently in version 7.6 (however, some Macs can run Windows, DOS, MachTen and/or LINUX). Apple licensed the MacOS in 1993 so that Mac clones can be made; they have not fully caught on yet, though Power Computing, UMAX and DayStar are doing fairly good business on them. Macs run on two families of microprocessors: the Motorola 680x0 chips, and the joint Apple-IBM-Motorola PowerPC chips. MARKOFF, JOHN- Co-author of _Cyberpunk_ and _Takedown_. Ex-husband of Katie Hafner, technology journalist for _The New York Times_. Can be reached at markoff@nyt.com. MARTIN LUTHER KING DAY CRASH- The huge crash when AT&T computers embarassingly went down on Martin Luther King Day due to a bug in UNIX System VII, though speculation existed that malicious hackers had done it. MASTER OF IMPACT- see CONTROL C MASTERS OF DECEPTION- see MOD _MASTERS OF DECEPTION_ [The Gang That Ruled Cyberspace]- Novel by Josh Quittner and Michelle Slatella about the LOD/MOD feud. A portion was printed in _Wired_ and really pissed off a lot of people, most vocally Erik Bloodaxe. Not that badly written, but I wonder about the accuracy and who was interviewed on some of the details. MASTERS OF DISASTER [MOD]- see MOD _MAX HEADROOM_- Science fiction TV show that was cancelled after one season. The concept began when a British music video station wanted to use a computer-generated host, but some American network picked it up and made a TV show. Supposedly it was wonderful and great, but I've never seen it. MDMA- see ECSTASY MEAT- The physical body, the bag of flesh and mud and water that we are constrained to. Derogatory. MEATSPACE- Real life, as opposed to cyberspace. MEGABYTE [abbreviated as "meg" or Mb]- Fairly large unit of measurement, usually used for measuring RAM or storage memory or large programs. One megabyte is roughly 1.049 million bytes or approximately 976.562 kilobytes. MEGAHERTZ [MHz]- In computer terms, a measurement of the clock speed of a CPU. For example, the 486DX2 runs at 66 megahertz. It was known in hacker slang occasionally as "hurtz" or "warp," where a 90 megahertz computer would be called Warp 90. MENTAL CANCER- see SHADOWHAWK 1 THE MENTOR- Handle of Loyd Blankenship. Also known as the Neuromancer. Elite hacker and former member of the Legion of Doom, the PhoneLine Phantoms, the Racketeers and Extasyy Elite. Writer of the legendary "Conscience of a Hacker." He also used to work for Steve Jackson Games, where he wrote _GURPS Cyberpunk_. He is currently a freelance game designer/electronic musician. Currently available at loyd@blankenship.com. [Handle is from the Grey Lensman series by E.E. "Doc" Smith.] MERRILL, BRIAN- see MITNICK, KEVIN DAVID and COMPUTERS, FREEDOM AND PRIVACY CONFERENCE [CFP] METAL COMMUNICATIONS- A short-lived hack/phreak group (is there any other kind, besides LOD, MOD and L0pht?!) that created several underground BBSs and wrote many philes. Members included Cobalt 60, Crimson Pirate, Dr. Local, Red Pirate, Shadow Lord, Angel of Destiny, Apothecary, Byte, Byte Byter, Dark Wizard, Duke, Dutchman, The Man in Black, the Prophet, Pink Panther, Voice Over, the Radical Rocker, the White Knight and the Warlock Lord. It also had a smaller sister group called the Neon Knights. MEXICAN FLAG- Red grenadine, white tequila and green creme-de-menthe. Multilayered, set on fire, and sucked through straws. A favorite of the Legion of Doom at parties before they broke up. [From the colors of the Mexican flag.] MHZ- see MEGAHERTZ MICHAELANGELO VIRUS- The much over-hyped virus that erased the hard drives of several computers, named for becoming active on the Renaissance artist Michaelangelo's birthday. MICROSOFT- Software megacorporation, founded 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen; writer of MS-DOS, Windows (3.x, 95, NT and CE), Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Bookshelf, Encarta and about a zillion other programs, most of which are made for business. Possibly the most evil force on the planet. Also used by William Gibson, without permission, for the name of addictive chips that plug into character's heads in _Neuromancer_. [Name comes from "microcomputer" and "software."] MINDVOX [mindvox.phantom.com]- Manhattan-based Net provider where a number of ex-LODers (and Billy Idol :( ) reside; has the domain name phantom.com. Motto: "Jack in, rock out, and feel your head." Administered by Dead Lord and Lord Digital. MINOR THREAT (1972-Present)- Former member of Public Enemy (the hacker group, not the band). Co-programmer of ToneLoc (with Mucho Maas), which he began in 1990. Available at mthreat@paranoia.com. [Handle comes from the name of an early 1980s Straight Edge punk band.] MITNICK, KEVIN DAVID (1963-Present)- Birth name of the Condor. Also known as N6NHG, alias Anton Chernoff, alias Fred Weiner, alias Lee Nussbaum, alias Brian Merrill, alias David Stanfill, alias Thomas Case. Former member of the Roscoe Gang (name given by _Cyberpunk_). Teenage phreak who grew up and didn't quit. First arrested at age 17. Rumors claimed that he cracked NORAD (inspiring _WarGames_); generally disproven, though Markoff has been trying to resurrect it. Became famous, especiall when in 1995 he went on a hacking rampage that included deleting several files on the WELL, possibly because of a typing error. Tsutomu Shimomura (and a number of datacops and John Markoff, who claims he was just an observer) eventually tracked him down after Mitnick hacked Shimomura's system. When he was caught he told Shimomura "I respect your skills." John Markoff and Tsutomu Shimomura just wrote their version of the events, which will serve as the screenplay for a movie by Miramax about it, entitled _Takedown: The Pursuit and Capture of Kevin Mitnick, America's Most Wanted Computer Outlaw-- By the Man Who Did It_. (Apparently, it was the longest and most grandiose title they could think of.) Jonathan Littman wrote his own version, with the help of Mitnick, entitled _The Fugitive Game_. Also inspired the most objective retelling, _The Cyberthief and the Samurai_, by Jeff Goodell (who can be contacted at jg@well.sf.ca.us). While he obviously cannot be directly reached by email as he is in federal prison, 2600 maintains a mailbox for him where they forward him interesting data and fan mail at kmitnick@2600.com. [Handle came from the 1975 Robert Redford movie _Three Days of the Condor_, about an ex-CIA guy who escapes the government, in part by manipulating the phone system.] MOD [Motto: "Summa Sedes Non Capit Duos," Latin, literally "The Highest Does Not Seat Two," figuratively "There is Only Room for One at the Top;" a reference to the LOD/MOD struggle]- MOD, a New York rival of LOD, was known at various times as Masters of Deception and Masters of Disaster, I suppose depending on their mood. Its current membership is Acid Phreak, Scorpion, Nynex Phreak, HAC, Wing, Outlaw, Corrupt, Supernigger, Red Night, Seeker, Lord Micro, Crazy Eddie, Zod, Peaboy, n00g1e, Ella Cinders and Plague, and previous members have included Thomas Covenant and Phiber Optik. (List of current members provided by Acid Phreak.) Southwestern Bell busted them and some wound up in jail. It was formed when Phiber Optik was kicked out of LOD, supposedly because of his ego. He then formed MOD and recruited some of his friends. They were a major exception to the stereotype of the hacker as a wealthy, suburban white guy. They had what was described by some as a "hacker war" with LOD until they got busted, when there was something of a truce and LOD sort of made up. Well, at least they made up with Phiber Optik. They are still around, at least according to their web page, which of course claims they are reformed. They can currently be reached at mod@gti.net. Definitely not to be confused with the Amiga sound format .mod. [Besides the acronym, the term also supposedly refers to being like a second iteration of LOD; "M" is after "L," get it? However, I got that out of Quittner and Slatella's book, and I don't know how much truth is in it.] MODEM [MOdulator/DEModulator]- Hardware that allows digital info to be carried over analog lines. The first modems were acoustic (usually 300 bps); you had to put the phone receiver on the modem. The current standard speed is 14.4 kbps. (Phone lines can hold a maximum of 35 kbps.) ISDN modems are becoming more and more common. (Even though ISDN modem is an oxymoron; ISDN is already digital, and a modem by definition converts digital to analog.) MODULATOR/DEMODULATOR [MODEM]- see MODEM [MOdulator/DEModulator] _MONDO 2000_- "Cyberpunk" magazine. Successor to a short lived zine entitled _Reality Hackers_. Never as good as it should have been. The three major brains behind it were R.U. Sirius (AKA Ken Goffman), St. Jude (AKA Jude Milhon) and Bart Nagel, all of which have since resigned, at least as editors. Timothy Leary was one of the editors, and there's a really psychotic dude named Xandor as well. I think it's way too much style and way too little substance, but it has some good book reviews and interviews about weird technology. [From the Italian word "mondo," meaning world; AD 2000 is supposedly the "expiration date."] MOREU, RAFAEL- Screenwriter for _Hackers_; interviewed many prominent hackers for research. According to Acid Phreak, he was less than happy with how it turned out. MORRIS, ROBERT TAPPAN II- Cornell graduate student who created a worm which exploited the UNIX sendmail bug as an experiment to see how fast it would spread through the Internet; due to a programming error, it went out of control and took down hundreds of computers. MOSS, JEFFERY- see DARK TANGENT MUDGE- Leader and sysop of the L0pht. Can be reached at mudge@l0pht.com. NARK- (1) Someone who turns people in to law enforcement. (2) The act of turning in someone to law enforcement. NATIONAL INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE [NII]- see NII [National Information Infrastructure] NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY [NSA]- see NSA [National Security Agency] NECRON 99- see URVILE NEIDORF, CRAIG- see KNIGHT LIGHTNING NEON KNIGHTS- see METAL COMMUNICATIONS NERD- Derogatory term for a computer geek; has been adopted as a badge of honor for some. Reminds that no matter how cool the stuff we do with computers is, we're still geeks, so get over it. :( [I just looked up the etymology of the word "nerd" in the dictionary, and my main conclusion was that etymologists must have a lot of spare time on their hands, because apparently there's this huge controversy over where this word came from, and the earliest reference is in a Dr. Seuss book, and then it became a slang term in the 1950s, and some people say it's a coincidence and others say there's some complicated relation, and all I can say is that it's just not that important, but these etymologists have enough time to learn UNIX security, and if they'd just read some books on TCP/IP, they could probably be really good hackers. Suggestion-- if any evil foreign governments out there want to hire some people to train to be hackers, get etymologists. They have tolerance for the tremendously boring. That is all. End rant.] _THE NET_- Sandra Bullock's 1995 cyberthriller, in which she tries to escape from evil hackers. Can be recommended because it has Sandra Bullock in a bikini. NETCOM- I believe Netcom is the largest Internet access provider in the world. As a result, it has users of all types. [From "Net" (short for Internet) and "commercial."] THE NETHERLANDS [Kingdom of the Netherlands]- Country code ".nl," European nation, population 14.6 million, currently known for its libertarian laws regarding drugs, nudity, prostitution and notably computer hacking (which, until recently, was totally legal.) Home of _Hack-tic_. ("Do you know what they call a quarter pounder with cheese in Holland?" "They don't call it a quarter pounder with cheese?"...) THE NEUROMANCER- see THE MENTOR NII- National Information Infrastructure. Hard to say. (I mean, literally, "en-aye-aye"? Really not phonetically friendly.) 1984- A mystical year for computers. LOD was formed; _Neuromancer_ was published; _2600_ was first published; _The Whole Earth Software Review_ was created, which led to the WELL; the Chaos Computer Club was formed; and the Macintosh computer was released. Also, George Orwell's 1949 SF novel was titled this, and some would sa