Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!rice!uupsi!rodan.acs.syr.edu!jstewart
From: jstewart@rodan.acs.syr.edu (Ace Stewart)
Newsgroups: comp.admin.policy
Subject: Re: Possibly nefarious users
Message-ID: <1991Jun13.162305.26549@rodan.acs.syr.edu>
Date: 13 Jun 91 16:23:05 GMT
References: <1991Jun7.184025.25010@eng.umd.edu> <1991Jun7.215349.11643@zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu> <1991Jun12.201850.2980@eng.umd.edu>
Organization: Syracuse Univ/Eastman Kodak Co.
Lines: 25

In article <1991Jun12.201850.2980@eng.umd.edu> russotto@eng.umd.edu (Matthew T. Russotto) writes:
>Robert Morris Jr. (the Jr. IS significant) did a hell of a lot more
>than access a dialup whose status (for restricted use or not) was
>unknown.  What he did was write a program which would exploit known
>BUGS in systems and access them--and tie them up, though I'm told that
>was a bug in his program.

I offer the following information and opinion tentatively, but feel it
worthwhile considering. Folx, _someone_ was bound to do this, be
thankful a bug in the program allowed thousands of systems admins to
fix their machines to correct the leaks. 

R. Morris, Jr. is being viewed as a bad guy, and depending on your
view of things, he is _all_ bad. Please remember that were he a
different person, a whole other load of things could've happened to
systems that didn't and quite frankly, I can imagine sites that would
still be recovering from the disaster even up to and including today.

And, for all of that, he'll probably get a very good job.  :}

--Ace
-- 
    Ace Stewart | Affiliation: Eastman Kodak Company, Rochester, New York
jstewart@rodan.acs.syr.edu jstewart@sunrise.bitnet jstewart@mothra.cns.syr.edu
   jstewart@sunspot.cns.syr.edu     ace@suvm.bitnet     rsjns@suvm.bitnet