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From: folta@tove.umd.edu (Wayne Folta)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip,comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: a holiday gift from Robert "wormer" Morris
Summary: are you sure that this was a one time act?
Message-ID: <14434@mimsy.UUCP>
Date: 9 Nov 88 14:06:35 GMT
References: <1698@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU> <2060@spdcc.COM> <24@jove.dec.com> <1445@anasaz.UUCP> <389@ksr.UUCP>
Sender: nobody@mimsy.UUCP
Reply-To: folta@tove.umd.edu.UUCP (Wayne Folta)
Organization: U of Maryland, Dept. of Computer Science,
Lines: 25

In article <389@ksr.UUCP> dudek@ksr.com (Glen Dudek) writes:
>
>I was system administrator at Harvard's computer science computing
>facility while Robert Morris was an undergraduate there.  I found him
>to be an intelligent and responsible person.  He volunteered his
>assistance in solving difficult problems in network configuration and
>routing, and helped to make Harvard a major Northeast news and mail
>gateway.  He did not exploit his knowledge of UNIX security
>deficiencies to break into systems or install trojan horses, though he
>well could have.
>

Is anyone sure that Morris didn't plant any trojan horses at Harvard?
From the popular press accounts (admittedly the popular press is naive
and sensationalist) Morris had passwords recorded in his account for
machines at MIT and Harvard.  Is this so?  If so, why did he have them?
If so, did his buddies at Harvard give them to him, or did he steal them?

I am sure that Glen Dudek speaks with authority about Morris' helpfulness,
intelligence, and general good nature.  But how can he authoritatively
state that Morris did not compromise Harvard's systems?



Wayne Folta          (folta@tove.umd.edu  128.8.128.42)