Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!ut-sally!husc6!cmcl2!beta!unm-la!unmvax!hi!hc!ames!ptsfa!hoptoad!academ!killer!robertl From: robertl@killer.UUCP (Robert Lord) Newsgroups: comp.misc,misc.headlines Subject: Re: Hacker Scholarship Message-ID: <1063@killer.UUCP> Date: Sun, 28-Jun-87 14:46:38 EDT Article-I.D.: killer.1063 Posted: Sun Jun 28 14:46:38 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 4-Jul-87 04:07:07 EDT References: <2757@mtgzz.UUCP> <345@genesis.UUCP> <2318@hoptoad.uucp> <506@cblpe.ATT.COM> Organization: The Unix(tm) Connection, Dallas, Texas Lines: 62 Summary: more about hackers... Xref: mnetor comp.misc:773 misc.headlines:812 Look..There has ben alot of talk floating around about hackers and such beeing 'scum' and other derogatory types of life. 90% of hackers are just computer buffs who have no other way of getting computer time. They have there Apple //e's with thier modems, and they want to expand and learn more. How do you expect them to do this? Go to there scholl where they can teach the teacher, and have the same computers as thsi little hacker does at home? Naturally, the hacker goes looking for bigger and better systems to play with, and along the line learns about security flaws to get accses. Also, occasionally, he will make a mistake and wipe out some data..I agree this is unexcusible, but there should have been more security on the system. I speak from experiance when I say that there are less that 1,000 real 'hackers' out there, that only hack to learn, and know how to take down a system but never do. The rest of the so called hackers are just rodents who think there cool by hacking, and at the first chance they have will nuke a system. There are bulletin boards all over the country catering to these people, and there is a close nit community for the real hackers. I should know, I've been there. I was once in the not too distant past a 'real hacker'. How do you think I learned all that I know? (well, you don't know how much I know...oh well). My speciallty was unix systems, ans I can tell you right now a few easy steps to make your system less vunerable. 1) PUT PASSWORDS on you system!!!! Noone does this, and it makes it easy. I have gotten into systems that were connected up to a modem, and no password on the root account! 2) Protect your uucp network. Most system administrators think the uucp account is not important, so they don't protect it. Well, I have news for you, it is very important if you belong to a network. Once I broke into one system, that lead to a whole slew of unix computers around the country. A friend of mine and I broke into every one of them! 3) Protect your information! Many systems have mail that is readable by everyone. Most of the audit files (such as the modem logs) are writeable by everyone, so if I used the 'cu' command to call a few other comuters I could just edit the audit files...Not smart! These are a few of the major points of security, and they run rampent on almost all systems around the world. Your first line of defense are the passwords. Make sure every one on your system has a password, otherwise it is fairly simple to get accses to the system. If the hacker only has one account, all he has to do is to look at the /etc/passwd file and get at least 3-4 more accounts without a pass. Also, make sure you backup your system reguarly (like a full backup once a week...archive it every day). This will prevent major damage in case a rodent decidedes to try and take out your system. If you are setting up a new system, then give one of your friendly unix gurus a call, and he will be happy to help you with the security of your system. In summary....Really, the real hackers are nice people (take me for an example). They don't try to hurt systems, but infact are just trying to learn everything they can about something they love - Computers. Robert Lord, Hacker Extrodinare (retired) ihnp4!killer!robertl P.S. I retired for a few reasons...Namely it got boring. I decided to go into comercial programing...and am dooing pretty well considering I'm still in high school.