Are you stunned as you hear stories such as officers with automatic weapons responding to your friend’s house expecting a drug-fueled mad-man who is demanding money in exchange for detainees? CCTV Don’t get flabbergasted -this is due to “Swatting” or the so called Caller ID Spoofing, which has become a high-tech trend in the 9-1-1 hoaxes.
Swatting is a term derived from the word SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics). This is an advanced method of tricking an emergency service such as 9-1-1 thereby leading to the dispatching of an crisis rejoinder squad.
Caller ID Spoofing is generally perpetrated by young, computer savvy hackers to brag rights or revenge thereby exploiting the precincts of the emergency systems and advances in computer technology to conceal their trajectories.
There are two possible ways swatting; the first one being the spoofing service which is very cheap and are readily available over the internet. One just needs to provide the number they want to call as well as a sham number that they wish to appear on the target’s Caller ID, and the service places the deceptive information into the Caller ID system. The second leeway is the VOIP services. In this the prankster needs to sign in into the internet centered VOIP service and get the victim’s address registered for an emergency number, then call that emergency number and deceive them about anything.
Swatting is very menacing and definitely has the possibility of someone being hurt or even killed.
Innumerable cases of Swatting happen every day in United States. One of the recent incidents being; Hackensack, N.J. — A California couple with a 2-year-old daughter is awakened late at night by heavily armed police storming their home after a false report of a shooting.
On the issues of Swatting, Kolbye, of the FBI, said “law enforcement is becoming more aware of these kinds of incidents” and his office has given presentations to local and state authorities nationwide.
To address this serious issue of swatting, the law enforcement agencies all over in the United States are trying to solve this problem with the help of the telecommunication providers. But still on the personal front one needs to be aware of these hoax calls and in case you are its victim, directly contact your local FBI office.
The internet we know from using search engines like Google or Yahoo is just the visible surface of a vast expanse of information. Like the oceans, the internet has hidden depths – and researchers have coined the term the “Deep Web” to refer to those parts of the internet that the search engines cannot reach. The Deep Web – sometimes also known as the Dark Web, Invisible Web, Darknet or Hidden Web – dwarfs the “visible” internet, but its very nature makes an accurate assessment of its size impossible. What is known is that the Deep Web contains hundreds or even thousands of times the amount of information indexed by the major search engines, and it is growing larger every day. A search for a common keyword on Google can easily turn up millions of “hits” – each with a link to a web page containing that keyword or related terms. But for any particular keyword there are potentially many thousand more relevant pages stored within the Deep Web – but they are hidden from the search engines, either by accident or by design.
The true extent of the Deep Web is so obscure that not even researchers who specialize in charting it can say for certain how large it is, and just what exactly it contains. A recent estimate of the size of the surface internet – based on the index of the largest search engine, Google – gave a figure of roughly 50 billion distinct web pages, or about 200 terabytes of data. But size of the Deep Web is now thought to exceed five million terabytes of data. By way of comparison, the US Library of Congress – which has a collection of almost 150 million books, magazine, newspapers and media recordings, stored on more than 800 miles of bookshelves – is estimated to contain just 3000 terabytes of data.
The vast majority of the material stored in the Deep Web is neither illegal, controversial, nor even very interesting to most people. Much of the hidden information consists of private commercial databases, unremarkable consumer and research data, the content of legitimate passworded websites, social media networks, or simply private and personal material. And in the few decades since the internet was established, large amounts of internet content have also “fallen off the radar” of the search engines, and become hidden simply by accident.
“The Deep Web is huge… According to some estimates, it is more than 500 times the size of the surface web where popular search engines are common…”
But the the nature of the Deep Web also makes it an effective place to conduct shady and illegal activities. Parts of the Deep Web are known to contains illegal information that is purposely hidden from law enforcement authorities – including the communications between organized criminals or terrorists, and banned content such as child pornography. Security researchers cite the example of a crime-syndicate known as the Russian Business Network, which has operated within the Deep Web for several years. The syndicate is known to have exploited redundant or unused “dark” internet addresses to set up temporary websites. These temporary sites are then used to send out spam emails, or in “phishing” scams to steal private information and defraud people of money, before they are taken down and moved to another dark address. The RBN is also said to rent out dark web sites to other criminals, such as terrorist groups, child pornographers, and black-hat computer hackers who want to stage denial-of-service attacks, or to release computer viruses onto the open internet.
Several seemingly well-intentioned groups also utilize features of the Deep Web. These include the Freenet and Tor software projects, which both claim to champion the principles of anonymity and freedom of speech on the internet. Freenet is a peer-to-peer software application that hosts a network of anonymous “freesites”, and has been known to contain illegal material such as child porn – but it has also been used by political dissidents in countries such as China, where internet use is closely monitored by government authorities. Freenet’s founder argue that the anonymity offered by their software permits true freedom of speech, and say the beneficial uses of Freenet outweigh its negative uses. The Tor network works by concealing the true internet address of its users, so that their activity on the internet cannot be tracked – although some security researchers have recently exposed what they say are weaknesses in the Tor system. The Tor developers claim their software is used by law enforcement agents to surf questionable websites without leaving tell-tale tracks – and also by political activists, industrial whistle-blowers, and environmental groups who fear their activities are under surveillance. The Wikileaks organization, which states its purpose is to bring secret government and industrial information to public attention, encourages the use of Tor by people submitting material to its website. And while both Freenet and Tor have been known to host illicit material, they have also been used by private individuals to expose illicit activity – one Freenet site, for example, maintains a list of known child pornographers, and attempts to track their activities and report on their locations. Recently, the hacktavist group known as Anonymous successfully attacked Freenet, thus deleting several gigabyte’s of child porn and releasing users information to the FBI.
While project like Freenet and Tor strive to maintain some of the mystery of the Deep Web, new search engine techniques and technologies are trying to index the vasty deeps of hidden material. Researchers admit that no search engines will ever be able to index everything on the internet, simply because there is just too much information. But the line between search engine content and the Deep Web has started to blur, and an increasing amount of Deep Web content is opening up to public view. Many publishers and libraries have made agreements with the search engine companies to access database material that was previously available only to their registered users. Several newly-developed “vertical” search engines now offer Deep Web searches for data about specific subjects: MedNar and PubMed, for example, specialize in vertical searches of medical topics, and the major search engines can now access the content of social web services, like Twitter and Facebook, which once blocked search engine spiders. The software to access the Freenet and Tor networks is also publicly available for download, in line with the stated intentions of their developers to make anonymity on the internet available to anyone who feels they need it – and without presuming to judge what their reasons may be.
Anonymous is a group in the internet known for its behavior in hacking into websites of different companies and agencies for the benefit for those who are abused and are helples victims. The Anonymous Hacktivist group started in 2003. Their main goal is to promote freedom. The Anonymous have been known to take down websites that they believe to be doing illegal activities… for example, they took down one of the major hosting companies such as Freedom Hosting which supports child pornography. Whenever the Anonymous group is in public, they wear the Vendetta masks as portrayed in the 2006 dystopian thriller film, “V is for Vendetta”. They have an ongoing campaign called “operation payback.” This article will clearly and critically discuss the Hacker group called “Anonymous,” who they are, what they do, and why they do the things they do. Initially they did it for fun but lately it appears to be a serious activity directed towards the violation of freedoms that are directed towards the global community.
Anonymous and their activities have been considered to be an illegal group that tempers with people’s privacy in their computers. In spite of these, Anonymous can be considered as a group that fights for peoples writes by confronting companies and government agencies that do illegal or immoral things especially against the public that no one else would dare challenge. It was reported that Anonymous threatened a couple of large companies such as Facebook and Sony to name a few. For example, they threatened to reveal secrets about the Zetas drug group. (Hooray! Stick it to the Zetas!!) This is a drug group that is known for kidnapping, drug trafficking, murder, terrorism and many more illegal activities than ruin the lives of many innocent people.
Anonymous, in this case, is not just a “hacking” group as one would think, such as CHAOS, or Legion of Doom, or the cDC, but also a group that has the public interest at heart. It is a surprise that the Zeta’s and other Narco-Cartels deal with drugs, kidnapping, murder and child trafficking, which are all illegal activities, is known, yet no one has taken the aggressive and courageous initiative to investigate it apart from the Anonymous hackers group who have confronted them. Those that have even openly voiced their disgust about the drug cartels have ended up dead, since death is their main motive for intimidation. However despite this noble approach, the FBI and other US government agencies consider Anonymous as an illegal and outlaw group. Everyone except the media and these government agencies see the value in Anonymous an it is long overdue that they opened their eyes and see the positive things this group has been doing.
Anonymous in another occasion, threatened to attack Facebook. Unless you’ve been living in a cave for the past few years, Facebook is a social networking site on the internet where people communicate, chat and make new friends. However Anonymous clearly stated that their main reason for wanting to attack Facebook was because it is well known that the executives sell users private information to government agencies and large corporations; hence there is no privacy or protection about the users profile. It is a fact that once you upload information into Facebook, it is impossible to delete it…they keep it there forever. People have a habit of posting almost anything on Facebook, regardless of whether it is morally acceptable or not. The step the anonymous group is planning to take is a relevant one because this would help people be cautious of the things they post on social networks, it will help boost morality. Aside from this, various government agencies are busy looking for reasons to bring Anonymous down. You would think that they should think twice since all this group seems to be doing is to fight for the rights of the civilians (Apro113).
In another incident that is very touching, Anonymous announced their plans to fight illegal sites that deal with child pornography. They revealed a web hosting company that is known as, “Freedom Hosting” for entertaining child pornography knowingly without any regard for the children that are victimized for this black market. It was stated that the Anonymous Hackers group ordered freedom hosting, and other web sites, which are involved in child pornography, to shut down their sites.
Anonymous made this public statement regarding Operation Darknet:
“The owners and operators at Freedom Hosting are openly supporting child pornography and enabling pedophiles to view innocent children, fueling their issues and putting children at risk of abduction, molestation, rape, and death. For this, Freedom Hosting has been declared #OpDarknet Enemy Number One. By taking down Freedom Hosting, we are eliminating 40+ child pornography websites, among these is Lolita City, one of the largest child pornography websites to date containing more than 100GB of child pornography.
We then issued a warning to remove the illegal content from their server, which they refused to do,” Anonymous said. We then issued multiple warnings to remove all child pornography from their servers, which Freedom Hosting refused to do.” After the server was put back online, Anonymous responded again with action. “We once again infiltrated the shared hosting server at Freedom Hosting and stopped service to all clients.”
“Our demands are simple,” Anonymous said. “Refuse to provide hosting services to any website dealing with child pornography. This statement is not just aimed at Freedom Hosting, but everyone on the internet. It does not matter who you are, if we find you to be hosting, promoting, or supporting child pornography, you will become a target.”
This is a very important and positive step taken by the Anonymous since child pornography is a despicable and deplorable activity. Through this, the Anonymous is doing not only the public a favor, but also the government by trying to bring an ending to these illegal activities through bringing down these illegal companies as well as those that participate in these horrible crimes. They are helping fight for the children’s rights in places where not even the authorities have been able to succeed.
Anonymous hacked into the Broadcast Music Inc website, claiming that they intended to make them payback for what they had taken from the public. The broadcast music Inc founded in 1939 is an organization that deals in the collection of license fees in the interest of the publishers of music, composers and writers of songs. They pointed out that they took the website down because they witnessed them enforce copyright instead of fighting it. They further said that they could not just sit back and watch companies take money from the government to use in making profits. Those acting within Anonymous are doing both the government and the public a favor by making sure no company misuses the public’s resources.
On a different occasion, Anonymous was up against the Church of Scientology. The Church of scientology website is a web site that claims to be involved in the truth. The Anonymous claimed that their intention was to change the illegal practices of the church of Scientology. According to Anonymous, the Church of Scientology has been exploiting its church members financially and denying its church members their freedom to speech. The church members keeping a certain video, featured by Tom Cruise, a secret, caused this.
The group claimed that the church violated freedom of speech by tempering with what was initially written in a couple of web sites. This was against the scientology beliefs, and thus they changed the content with their own words. Every human being has the right to enjoy their freedom to speech, and thus, if anyone tries to take that right away then they are going against the law, and by the Anonymous Hackers fighting against groups that go against the human right, then they are for the people and the government and not against them (Ralph 57).
Another attack by Anonymous was on the Bay Area Rapid Transit. Anonymous attacked the Bay Area Rapid Transit Company on the basis that the company was involved in censorship and submission of people. Anonymous explained that no one has right to judge people wrongly for speaking out on things they perceive as wrong.
The Bay area Rapid Transit banned people from the downtown area from using their phones even in time of emergency. This is an act of stopping people from practicing their right to communicate and right to speak out one’s mind, thus; the action that Anonymous intends to take is justified, and it is not an illegal matter (Roberts 22). Reasons for the attacks on companies by Anonymous… There are a number of reasons as to why Anonymous do what they do. For example, they did it because it gives them the satisfaction of taking action that those of us wish that we could do. The attacks make them feel they have accomplished something great and thus gain the support of the community. This can be explained using the intrinsic motivation theory that states that there are some activities that one gets involved in for the enjoyment they get from it. Anonymous enjoy watching companies and agencies that deal in illegal or corrupt activities brought down.
Feeling of creativity is another reason why Anonymous involve themselves in the activities they do. Hacking is not an easy task that anyone can do since it requires expertise and creativity and is thus a form of an art. Thus, when Anonymous does such things they get the feeling of creativity thus feel good about their sense of accomplishment. The feeling of being obligated to the community also makes Anonymous do what they do. Through their action, we can see that they are involved in activities that deal with the public matters, and in this case, it can be concluded that, they do what they do because of the feeling that they are obligated to fighting for the rights of the public that no one else can. Though no common reason, Anonymous may involve themselves in these activities for the benefit of payment.
Solving of a problem could also be a reason for Anonymous doing what they do. For example, in the presence of a problem with software, they may decide to solve the problem for the benefit of others. Through solving of these problems, they improve their skills and reputation as well. Interest could also lead to one engaging in these activities. For example, a hacker may decide to hack into a company’s computer for the interest, even though they are not gaining anything, and even after getting the information they might end up not using it. Conclusion It can be concluded that, even though the activities that Anonymous are engaged in may appear to be illegal, since they go against people’s right to privacy, by hacking into their computers without their permission, it comes out that Anonymous are also helping the public as a whole.
They are fighting for the rights of the public. It can also be concluded that they do not just do the activities for fun but for a couple of tangible reasons that include challenge, interest and fighting for what most people cannot or dare not do. So even though Anonymous has been portrayed to be an illegal group, it does a lot of good than evil. It comes forward and deal with the staff that no one, including the government is willing to take responsibility and do.
With all of this being said, it is safe to say that the global internet community currently supports the actions of Anonymous. Exposing the rampant corruption of governments and companies, defacing and removing child porn sites as well as speaking up for the public – these are all the things that we the people want to occur. We are all well aware that the media is in the pockets of the wealthy, for example Fox News – the truth rarely comes out. This is where we need Anonymous.
Please watch these videos to learn more about Anonymous then YOU make the decision:
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Http://www.Anonanlytics.com
Works Cited:
Apro, Bill. Hackers: The hunt for Australious most infamous Computer Crackers. Australia: Five miles press, 2005. Print Douglas, Thomas. Hacker Culture. Minnesota: University of Minnesota Pres, 2002. Print
Douglas, Wilhem. Proffesional Penetration Testing. Syngress press, 2000. Jordan, Tim. Hacktivism and Cyber wars. New York: New York Times Press, 2004. Print
Mandy, Andrew. Hungry Minds. New York: New York Times Press, 2001. Print
Paul, Taylor. Hackers. Toronto: University of Canada Press, 1999. Print
Ralph, Cliffor.The investigation prosecution and defence of a computer related crime. Durma, North Carolina: Carolina Academic Press, 2006. Print
Roberts, Moore. Cybercrime. Ohio: Mathew Bender and company, 2005.
The life of a hacker is somewhat mysterious and lonely – most of the time. When the DEFCON convention rolls around, being a hacker becomes a social event. Once a year, talented hackers are honored at DEFCON which is the largestannual convention for computer experts with an affinity for hacking.
Despite the fact that hacking is illegal, a great many federal agencies such as DOD, NSA, DHS, NASA, and CID among others have been using the event as a means of recruiting those with hacking talent. Federal agencies have also been hosting panels on various hacking related subjects.
Actually, not all the people that have knowledge in hacking are “bad guys.” Many are involved with computer security and a large focus of the convention is exactly on that. The more advanced and effective computer security is, the better a computer system will be protected against unlawful intrusions.
And this is a huge convention which draws in a great many tremendous names in the industry.
A great many popular and legendary names in hacking circles will appear hear and share advice, tips, and conduct training sessions.
DEFCON is not a convention that is a new event. It was first held in 1993 in Las Vegas and it has taken place in the city every year since. The original organizer of the event was Jeff Moss and the first convention was little more than a farewell party for a friend who was a fellow hacker. Unfortunately, his friend could not attend the farewell party and Moss opted to invite all his other hacker friends to take a trip to Las Vegas where they could bid a fond farewell to their friend in abstensia.
Over 100 hackers attended the party which would be dubbed DEFCON. This came from the film WARGAMES in which Las Vegas was targeted for a nuclear attack. Despite the flippant nature of the name, it stuck when Moss opted to continue hosting annual conventions.
DEFCON was only supposed to be a one-time event but his friends cajoled him into turning it into an annual one since the original event was so much fun. Of course, there was also a need for a hacker and phone phreak convention since none had previously existed. With DEFCON, there was a place where such skilled operators could meet. With each subsequent event, the convention drew larger and larger crowds.
In time, the event began to take on a more serious tone and started to cover security related topics which would be a help to the computer industry. This gave the outlaw event a sense of legitimacy.
DEFCON 11 saw a great many different speakers attend the event. Notable speakers included Michael Scarito, Justin Searle, Mahmud Ab Rahman, Semon Rezchikov, Morgan Wang, Nicholas J. Percoco, and many other notables in the world of hacking, phreaking, and computer security. Speakers cover a vast range of different topics really leaving no subject related to hacking untouched. Even a cursory glance of the speaking topics reveals there is an enormous amount of information covered at the convention.
Of course, a great many hacker groups attend the event as well. This further adds to the social and informational environment of the event. If you truly want to be in the know about hacking, this convention is a must to attend.
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Hacking is something that has spent a lot of time in the news lately. Hackers are people who break into computer systems. Anonymous is one loose group of hackers, that have been in the news a lot lately. They have broken into computer networks, and arranged for attacks on websites. The actions that hackers take are always illegal, and they are arrested and prosecuted by countries all around the world. Even though they are illegal there is still a hacker community. In the past they have been more underground, but they are becoming more public. That community has existed for decades. Even though they are a diverse group and have a great many interests, there are many issues that interest all hackers, particularly information about laws surrounding what they do including the release of the infamous hacker Kevin Mitnick
In 1984, a magazine called 2600: The Hacker Quarterly was first published. It was founded by Emmanuel Goldstein. That name is a pen name of Eric Corley. It is also a direct allusion to Big Brother and Nineteen Eighty-four. 1984 also saw the break-up of the huge telecommunication company AT&T’s monopoly, which influenced hackers and phreakers. Phreakers is slang for phone breakers. This includes another illegal set of activities. They are people used the public telephone networks to exploit the telecommunication networks. With modern digital technology phreakers more closely resemble hackers.
They are now more likely to be the same person. The magazine took its name from a discovery of a phone breaker during the 1960s. A phreaker discovered that if you produced a tone at 2600 hertz you could access something called the operator mode on the telephone trunk. That allowed the phreakers to use features of the phone service that the average user wasn’t allowed to access.
Corley is still involved in the magazine. He edits it and publishes it with his non-profit company, called 2600 Enterprises, Inc. The magazine comes out 4 times a year. It gets published on the first Friday of months that follow seasonal changes. In keeping with the current digital age, and the fact that hackers are concerned about computer issues, the magazine comes in paper versions as well as digital versions, including versions for popular ereaders. If a person subscribes they can also get free advertising, and many of the subscribers who have been imprisoned for their illegal hacking activities use the magazine to communicate with others.
The magazine primarily concerns itself with information about new technology and current events in the world of technology. It also contains some information which may skirt the laws in various countries. It is important for people to remember that no matter how exciting or interesting they think that the hacker community is, or what information that 2600: The Hackers Quarterly puts out, hacking is an illegal activity. Hackers can, and do, get arrested and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, occasionally on federal levels.
Wardriving is derived from the term wardialing, which comes from the movie, War Games. Mathew Broderick plays a hacker in the movie who “wardials” many phone numbers to trace out a modem. In today’s context, wardriving refers to the practice of automatically scanning Wi-Fi wireless networks by a person, who is travelling in a vehicle, by using a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) or any other portable computer like a laptop, notebook, or tablet hooked to an antenna. The vehicle can be a car or bike or aircraft or when the person is on foot.
The idea behind wardriving is to search for wireless networks and use the service. It started off harmlessly enough with wardrivers using the Internet service for free and driving away. but later assumed menacing proportions when hackers started sniffing around unsecured computers that used the same wireless system. There have been many data theft cases by using the wardriving technique.
How is wardriving conducted?
Wardrivers move around in vehicles and try not to attract too much attention… Inside the vehicle are Laptops fitted to long-range antennas. The vehicle moves around and the antennas pick up wireless networks locations. The software used by the wardrivers figures out if a wireless network is protected or not. If the wardrivers come across an unprotected network, they can get into the network and steal valuable data like passwords, credit card numbers, confidential business data, and other personal information. Even if the data is encrypted, the wardrivers can easily crack it by enlisting an eager hacker. With that said, in theory, wardriving is not illegal because it involves logging of access points per its definition. Piggybacking is another practice that involves logging and use of access points without the user’s permission. So, as per theory, wardriving is not illegal while piggybacking is outlawed in many places. However, there’s a very thin line between wardriving and piggybacking, and wardriving is often used to describe piggybacking activity.
Tools that are used in wardriving…
Many free wardriving tools are available. NetStumbler (which is very popular), NetBSD, OpenBSD, DragonFly, and many others are available as downloads. Wardriving applications are also developed for hand-held gaming devices. Antennas like Cantennas are used by wardrivers – these antennas are specially constructed to detect wireless networks.
My personal preference for this is to use Backtrack 5 which on my laptop boots from a ISO. Backtrack 5 has all of the software based tools that you would need to find WiFi hot spots and then initiate the WEP key hack. However when you do this you will need to familiarize yourself with the proper commands to initiate the hack utilizing Aircrack-NG within the Backtrack suite. In order to do this thought you will need to have a wireless NIC that will allow for packet injection. For this, I recommend a Alfa Networks AWUS036NH which connects to my laptop where ever I go.
The controversy surrounding wardriving…
Though wardriving has been going around since 2002, it came into the spotlight in 2010 when it was reported that Google’s Street View cars doubled up as wardriving vehicles that went around recording all WLAN networks. This raised huge privacy concerns and data protection chiefs in all developed nations were horrified by the expose. As mentioned earlier, theory states that wardriving merely logs in access points, and so, there are no wardriving-related laws in USA. There are local laws though. In some USA cities, if it is proven that wireless networks were accessed then the person who performed wardriving can face criminal charges that range from service theft to data theft to misusing of computer-related resources. The only protection against wardriving is to install powerful security software (firewall) on a computer and to use the most advanced encryption ( do not use the most basic WEP key protection – it cracks pretty fast) that your firewall has to offer.
Wargames has become a cult science-fiction classic. The feature starred Matthew Brockerick as a computer hacker named David who puts his computer skills to mischievous tasks…such as potentially launching nuclear missiles strikes. Wargames was one of the biggest sleeper hits of 1983 and for good reason. It truly did capture on the fears that many people did possess at the time about a nuclear war. Such fears were not unfounded. Both the USA and the USSR both had huge nuclear arsenals pointed at each other. The Cold War did not seem anywhere near close to ending in 1983. (Ironically, the Cold War would come to a close less than a decade later) The threat of a nuclear war loomed overhead and many films played on this fear. There was a new element to this particular film: the home computer. By today’s standards, this is where the film gains a reputation for being both hokey and dated. Using what was roughly as powerful as a Commodore 64, a high school student taps into a military computer assuming he is hacking into a video game site to steal military gaming software. He wishes to play global thermonuclear war not realizing he is monkeying with a supercomputer that can actually launch real missiles.
This leads the Superpowers on a course for World War III.
One thing that needs to be understood here, when Apple and Atari were releasing home computers to the consumer electronics market, very few people owned them. A man once appeared on a San Francisco news program in 1979 because for the very newsworthy fact that…he owned a computer. The reason this was big news was due to the fact most people believed that computes could do anything. In the hands of a super-genius a computer could possess near unlimited power. Of course, such sentiments were promoted more by fantasy fiction as opposed to legitimate sources of information. Either way, the populace was still a little leery about what computers could do and how much of a potentially dangerous threat they could present. While quite fantastical on the surface, the notion that a computer could nearly trigger a nuclear war was plausible at the
time. This is why the film was such a huge hit and grossed $79+ million.
One of the great misconceptions about this film is that it was rooted in a fear of nuclear war. That really is not the case. The true creature to fear in the film is the computer. The classic Cold War notion of nuclear brinksmanship was not a newcinematic or even television plot device. It had been done many times before. The true focus on this film is the aforementioned concept of the unknown limits of the powers of a computer. And what happens when a computer ceases to listen to its human programmers? Will it wreak havoc on the world? Per Wargames, the answer is it may very well. Even though it is dated, Wargames remains an exciting and fast paced thriller. While a 1980′s time capsule in some ways, Wargames will forever be a sci-fi/Cold War classic.
The Golden Shield aka China’s Green Dam is the name of the project and firewall of the People’s Republic of China, better known as the “Great Firewall of China.” The project is a censorship and surveillance operation created by the MPS, or Ministry or Public Security, a government division of China. This project was developed in 1998, however, operations of the project did not occur until November 2003.
Why was the Golden Shield Developed?
The background of the Golden Shield is closely related to the economic reform known to the world as socialist market economy. The political policies of the economic reform led the People’s Republic of China to create a market economy and to open their market to foreign investors. In 1994, the Internet becomes accessible in China. The Internet in China began to increase as a common platform for communication and for trading sensitive information. In 1997, the Ministry of Public Ministry began to take initiative to control the Internet and its usage. The Ministry of Public Security issued regulations to govern usage of the Internet in China.
A year later in 1998, political cohorts began to question the usage of the Internet. The CPC, or Communist Party of China began to fear the CDP, or China Democracy Party would create a network that they could not control. As a result, the CDP were banned immediately and many members of the party were arrested and imprisoned. Later in the year, the Golden Shield was created. Two parts of the Golden Shield took place. The first part started from 1998 to 2006. The last part was from 2006 to 2008. December 6th, 2002, a four-day inauguration took back, and 300 members involved in the Golden Shield attended. During the four-day exhibition, products were purchased, such as video monitoring, Internet security and human face recognition software.
Many detractors of the Golden Shield and the firewall nicknamed it the “Great Firewall of China” to poke fun at the firewall capabilities and the Great Wall of China. One of the most significant parts of the project includes blocking content. This prevents IP addresses routing to proxy servers and standard firewalls.
Why the Chinese Government Developed the Firewall?
In September of 2002, the technology director at Ministry of Public Security, Li Runsen, who also is a member of the Golden Shield leadership, explained the broad definition even further to thousands of police from all over the nation at a special meeting that was known as the “Information Technology for China’s Public Security”.
Li Runsen, a member of Golden Shield and director at MPS, explained in September of 2002 to Chinese police the definition of China’s National Firewall. Runsen said that the People’s Republic of China’s public security was in constant danger. Many research studies on China’s National Firewall have been conducted by Harvard Law School, Cambridge and the Toronto Citizen Lab. Their results concluded that the People’s Republic of China has the most comprehensive and most sophisticated Internet filtering system on the globe. Some of the Internet filtering techniques used for censorship is URL filtering, connection reset, IP blocking, packeting filtering and DNS filtering.
How the Golden Shield, China’s National Firewall is used?
Chinese Internet filters censor websites that contain the following:
Websites supported by Falun Gong and groups that are suppressed or outlawed.
News sources covering topics of police brutality, e.g. the protests of Tiananmen Square in 1989. In addition, sites that promotes freedom of speech, democracy and Marxism/Communism. Sites that fall in this category include the Chinese BBC and “Voice of America.”
Websites tied to the Taiwanese media, Taiwanese government, Taiwanese organizations, Taiwanese blogs, Taiwanese communities and websites with religious-oriented content.
Websites related to criminal activity or criminal intent.
Websites that paint Chinese authorities in a bad light that are pornographic or obscene.
Subversive websites.
Websites related or linked to the Dalai Lama and his teaching.
I remember the good old days. Back then I was 14, I would come home from school, put my books down, sit in front of my Radio Shack TRS-80 IV and immediately dial into one of several BBS’s around the Inland Empire. One of the ones that I loved the most was called Comnet-80 located in Riverside California. Steve King who was the owner and SysOp had a corney text based game called something like, “Thermonuclear war” ( nothing like in the movies Wargames) which would place you in a post war setting. It would ask you survival questions to see if you could make it. To this day I still remember the phone number by heart… 714-359-3189. Almost everyone has never heard about a BBS. Everyone only knows about the internet. Well, I will clue you into what this was all about. A Bulletin Board System, is a system that runs software allowing users to login and to connect to a system whilst using a terminal. Once a user logged in the BBS, the user performs various functions, such as downloading data and software, uploading software and data, sending and receiving messages from other uses, reading bulletins and news via e-mail or on the message boards. In addition, BBS’s offered chat rooms and online games, so other users could interact with one another.
The original usage of the Bulletin Board System was to access the BBS with a modem with a phone line, however, in the early part of the 90s, many Bulletin Board Systems enabled accessibility via Telnet, a radio connection or a packet network. The term “Bulletin Board System” was coined by Ward Christensen. The term refers to bulletin boards found in schools, public libraries, supermarkets, and other public places where people would post advertisements, newsfeeds and messages. When the Bulletin Board System was computerized, it was named “Computerized Bulletin Board System.”
From its early incarnation, BBS’s were operated by computer enthusiasts and the system was highly technical. The users would discuss mainly software and hardware. Since many of the BBS’s could be connection to a radio, many users in the radio community could discuss packet radio. As time went on, BBS’s grew in popularity, and many specialized interests and hobbies boards were created. Many BBS’s had various boards with every interest and hobby imaginable. The BBS’s in the 80’s helped to evolve the Hacker, Cracker and Phreaking community. Interests include music, politics, alternative lifestyles, religion and other interests. Bulletin Board Systems then incorporated customizable themes related to that particular board, such as if the BBS was basketball-related, the theme would be themed on the NBA.During its peak in the 1980s and the early 1990s, BBS’s were free and run by the SysOp, or system operator. Many BBS’s did have paid subscriptions in order to access the boards, such as customer service or for customer support. BBS’s were the precursor to social networking services, message forums, and the Internet. Earlier carnations of BBS’s were used locally since a user had to access the BBS by dialing a phone line and if you were using an out of state BBS, you had to pay long distance fees. This meant that BBS’s were locally used and many members lived in the same area. Many users would meet and greet other users at public places. Once the Internet became a phenomenon in the late 90′s and early 2000s, the BBS’s began to wane in popularity. Many BBS’s are archived on Google and users can read archives of older Bulletin Board Systems. Most of the speaking on the BBS’s such as “LOL” and “BRB” are still used today in text messaging, instant messaging and on social networking sites. Many things used on BBS’s are still used on the Internet today.
There have been many hacker organizations that popped up over the years since the internet has become such a large part of our lives. For the most part, most of these groups such as Anonymous or Lulzec which have gotten some media attention, are mostly small groups of individuals. The Cult of the Dead Cow, on the other hand, is one of the larger and longest running collaborations of expert hackers. They have stated that their goal is to achieve “global domination through media saturation” and have been featured in numerous newspapers, programs and websites where they discuss their goals, and outlook on the media literate world. The group also runs a blog where they share the thoughts of the members and updates on the group and what they’ve been doing.
Cult of the Dead Cow started in 1984 in Lubbock, Texas at the Farm Pac slaughter house which was a popular hangout spot for youth in Lubbock. The group started with three system ops BBS members named Grandmaster Ratte (or Swamp Ratte), Franken Gibe, and Sid Vicious. This slaughterhouse was later burned in 1996 and rebuilt as the West Texas Amphitheater. The group stayed in the area for several years and started to grow. In 1990 one member called Drunkfux, started what is called HoHoCon, which was the modern hacker convention. It was usually held in Houston, Texas and invited hackers, news affiliates, journalists and law enforcement to come and discuss hacking and the state of the media. Drunkfux hosted five of these conventions annually and then eventually stopped. Today, there are a variety of hacker conventions hosted by other individuals around the area.
In 1991 cDc was called the “sassiest underground computer group” by Sassy magazine. In 1991 they started making music as well and distributing these albums on tapes via the post office. Now you can get all of their albums from their website for free. When 1994 arrived the group had become well established and renowned, leading them to launch their news group. They were the first hacking organization to have its own news group and they kicked off their news feed in a big way. They claimed responsibility for Ronald Reagan’s Alzheimer’s disease, claiming to have caused it by shooting him with a blow dart.
Later in 1995 the cDc made news once again by declaring war on the Church of Scientology. They went so far as to say they believed El Ron Hubbard was actually Heinrich Himmler of the S.S. and was stealing babies and raising them as super soldiers. They never really did anything about the religion other than taking this strong stance, but they still received a lot of media attention for making such intense statements denouncing scientology. In 1997 they began to use Mp3 format for the mass distribution of audio files on their website. They were one of the first groups to do so without charging and before online distribution of Mp3 files became popular. Their website was littered with files that could be downloaded for free, ranging from interviews, news clippings and music they had made or enjoyed.
In 2000 there was an 11 minute documentary called Disinformation that was made about the cDc, and how they function today. Also in 2000, one of the more renowned and talented hackers in the group named Mudge was asked to brief President Bill Clinton on how internet security functions and how to keep it secure, which he did.
cDc’s Disinformation Documentary
The cult of the Dead Cow still functions today and their blog is regularly updated all the time. Grandmaster Ratte is still a frequent poster and the group is still active, and is larger than ever before. Discussions are held all the time on the forums and fan boards where people come and often enter into a heated debate. The website states that it may advocate murder, adultery and a number of other lewd acts that you might be offended by, but no matter how you spin it, Cult of the Dead Cow has changed the way we look at internet security. They have made a name for themselves, and only time will tell what is in the cards for them next. They are now over a decade old and still going strong.
Bad Behavior has blocked 5 access attempts in the last 7 days.
Are you stunned as you hear stories such as officers with automatic weapons responding to your friend’s house expecting a drug-fueled mad-man who is demanding money in exchange for detainees? CCTV Don’t get flabbergasted -this is due to “Swatting” or the so called Caller ID Spoofing, which has become a high-tech trend in the 9-1-1 hoaxes.
