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77-610: Hack-Tic was a Dutch hacker magazine published between 1989 and 1994. It had a cult following and upset authorities beyond the Dutch borders. In 1988, a small delegation from the Chaos Computer Club in Hamburg visited Amsterdam after being invited by Caroline Nevejan, who organized political events at Paradiso in Amsterdam. Rop Gonggrijp , the magazine's later editor and publisher

154-539: A " black box " used to make free long-distance phone calls, and included a very short parts list that could be used to construct one. AT&T forced Ramparts to pull all copies from shelves, but not before numerous copies were sold and many regular subscribers received them. In the 1980s, the revolution of the personal computer and the popularity of computer bulletin board systems (BBSes) (accessed via modem ) created an influx of tech-savvy users. These BBSes became popular for computer hackers and others interested in

231-422: A 6-digit card and once every 1000 tries for a 7-digit card. While this is almost easy enough for people to do manually, computers made the task far easier. "Code hack" programs were developed for computers with modems. The modems would dial the long-distance access number, enter a random calling card number (of the proper number of digits), and attempt to complete a call to a computer bulletin board system (BBS). If

308-409: A call, the companies kept the calling card numbers short – usually 6 or 7 digits. This opened up a huge vulnerability to phone phreaks with a computer. 6-digit calling card numbers only offer 1 million combinations. 7-digit numbers offer just 10 million. If a company had 10,000 customers, a person attempting to "guess" a card number would have a good chance of doing so correctly once every 100 tries for

385-417: A client, or while working for a security company that makes security software. The term is generally synonymous with ethical hacker , and certifications, courseware, classes, and online training covering the diverse arena of ethical hacking have been developed. A black hat hacker is a hacker who "violates computer security for little reason beyond maliciousness or for personal gain" (Moore, 2005). The term

462-402: A form of in-band signaling , and included some tones which were for internal telephone company use. One internal-use tone is a tone of 2600 Hz which causes a telephone switch to think the call had ended, leaving an open carrier line, which can be exploited to provide free long-distance, and international calls. At that time, long-distance calls were more expensive than local calls. The tone

539-401: A group of phreaks, known as "Group Bell". Bernay initiated a similar group named the "Mark Bernay Society". Both Bernay and Evan received fame amongst today's phone phreakers for internet publications of their collection of telephone exploration recordings. These recordings, conducted in the 1960s, 1970s, and early 1980s are available at Mark's website Phone Trips . In October 1971, phreaking

616-423: A hacker is someone who focuses on the security mechanisms of computer and network systems. Hackers can include someone who endeavors to strengthen security mechanisms by exploring their weaknesses and also those who seek to access secure, unauthorized information despite security measures. Nevertheless, parts of the subculture see their aim in correcting security problems and use the word in a positive sense. White hat

693-430: A kind of credibility on their members. A script kiddie (also known as a skid or skiddie ) is an unskilled hacker who breaks into computer systems by using automated tools written by others (usually by other black hat hackers), hence the term script (i.e. a computer script that automates the hacking) kiddie (i.e. kid, child an individual lacking knowledge and experience, immature), usually with little understanding of

770-399: A long whistle to reset the line, followed by groups of whistles (a short tone for a "1", two for a "2", etc.) to dial numbers. While single-frequency worked on certain phone routes, the most common signaling on the then long-distance network was multi-frequency (MF) controls. The slang term for these tones and their use was "Marty Freeman". The specific frequencies required were unknown to

847-663: A professionally organized conference program. So far, all the events have been held in the Netherlands. These events have been a major source of inspiration for the Hackers On Planet Earth (HOPE) conferences organized by 2600: The Hacker Quarterly in New York City as well as for the Chaos Communication Camps held near Berlin . Hacker (computer security) A security hacker or security researcher

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924-571: A rudimentary understanding of how phone networks worked. Bill discovered that a recorder he owned could also play the tone at 2600 Hz with the same effect. John Draper discovered through his friendship with Engressia that the free whistles given out in Cap'n Crunch cereal boxes also produced a 2600 Hz tone when blown (providing his nickname, "Captain Crunch"). This allows control of phone systems that work on single frequency (SF) controls. One can sound

1001-441: A safe phone number for phreaks to give out to one another as home phone numbers and personal cellular numbers would allow the phreak's identity (and home address) to be discovered. This is especially important given that phone phreaks are breaking the law. Phreakers also use "bridges" to communicate live with one another. The term "bridge" originally referred to a group of telephone company test lines that were bridged together giving

1078-414: A series of security briefing events. A hacktivist is a hacker who utilizes technology to publicize a social, ideological, religious or political message. Hacktivism can be divided into two main groups: Intelligence agencies and cyberwarfare operatives of nation states. Groups of hackers that carry out organized criminal activities for profit. Modern-day computer hackers have been compared to

1155-482: A subculture saw a brief dispersion in fear of criminal prosecution in the 1990s, before the popularity of the internet initiated a reemergence of phreaking as a subculture in the US and spread phreaking to international levels. The 1984 AT&T breakup gave rise to many small companies intent on competing in the long-distance market. These included the then-fledgling Sprint and MCI , both of whom had only recently entered

1232-523: A team to a prominent convention to compete in group pentesting, exploit and forensics on a larger scale. Hacker groups became popular in the early 1980s, providing access to hacking information and resources and a place to learn from other members. Computer bulletin board systems (BBSs), such as the Utopias, provided platforms for information-sharing via dial-up modem. Hackers could also gain credibility by being affiliated with elite groups. Maximum imprisonment

1309-553: Is a very short single click, possible but hard to simulate. Back in the day of rotary dial, technically identical phone sets were marketed in multiple areas of the world, only with plugs matched by country and the dials being bezeled with the local standard numbers. Such key-locked telephones, if wired to a modern DTMF capable exchange, can also be exploited by a tone dialer that generates the DTMF tones used by modern keypad units. These signals are now very uniformly standardized worldwide. It

1386-417: Is notable that the two methods can be combined: Even if the exchange does not support DTMF, the key lock can be circumvented by switch-hooking, and the tone dialer can be then used to operate automated DTMF controlled services that can not be used with rotary dial. The origins of phone phreaking trace back at least to AT&T 's implementation of fully automatic switches . These switches used tone dialing ,

1463-526: Is often referred to as the "computer underground". The subculture around such hackers is termed network hacker subculture, hacker scene, or computer underground. It initially developed in the context of phreaking during the 1960s and the microcomputer BBS scene of the 1980s. It is implicated with 2600: The Hacker Quarterly and the alt.2600 newsgroup. In 1980, an article in the August issue of Psychology Today (with commentary by Philip Zimbardo ) used

1540-461: Is one year or a fine of the fourth category. 18 U.S.C.   § 1030 , more commonly known as the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act , prohibits unauthorized access or damage of "protected computers". "Protected computers" are defined in 18 U.S.C.   § 1030(e)(2) as: The maximum imprisonment or fine for violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act depends on the severity of

1617-715: Is referred to as hacktivism . Some consider illegal cracking ethically justified for these goals; a common form is website defacement . The computer underground is frequently compared to the Wild West. It is common for hackers to use aliases to conceal their identities. The computer underground is supported by regular real-world gatherings called hacker conventions or "hacker cons". These events include SummerCon (Summer), DEF CON , HoHoCon (Christmas), ShmooCon (February), Black Hat Conference , Chaos Communication Congress , AthCon, Hacker Halted, and H.O.P.E. Local Hackfest groups organize and compete to develop their skills to send

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1694-468: Is someone who explores methods for breaching defenses and exploiting weaknesses in a computer system or network . Hackers may be motivated by a multitude of reasons, such as profit, protest, information gathering, challenge, recreation, or evaluation of a system weaknesses to assist in formulating defenses against potential hackers. Longstanding controversy surrounds the meaning of the term " hacker ". In this controversy, computer programmers reclaim

1771-459: Is still available, for example in Italy. Possibly one of the first phreaking methods was switch-hooking, which allows placing calls from a phone where the rotary dial or keypad has been disabled by a key lock or other means to prevent unauthorized calls from that phone. It is done by rapidly pressing and releasing the switch hook to open and close the subscriber circuit, simulating the pulses generated by

1848-429: Is the name given to ethical computer hackers, who utilize hacking in a helpful way. White hats are becoming a necessary part of the information security field. They operate under a code, which acknowledges that breaking into other people's computers is bad, but that discovering and exploiting security mechanisms and breaking into computers is still an interesting activity that can be done ethically and legally. Accordingly,

1925-414: Is very common. Phreaking The term first referred to groups who had reverse engineered the system of tones used to route long-distance calls . By re-creating the signaling tones, phreaks could switch calls from the phone handset while avoiding long-distance calling charges which were common then. These fees could be significant, depending on the time, duration and destination of the call. To ease

2002-516: The United States and Canada , including those of Los Alamos National Laboratory , Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and Security Pacific Bank . The case quickly grew media attention, and 17-year-old Neal Patrick emerged as the spokesman for the gang, including a cover story in Newsweek entitled "Beware: Hackers at play", with Patrick's photograph on the cover. The Newsweek article appears to be

2079-456: The privateers of by-gone days. These criminals hold computer systems hostage, demanding large payments from victims to restore access to their own computer systems and data. Furthermore, recent ransomware attacks on industries, including energy, food, and transportation, have been blamed on criminal organizations based in or near a state actor – possibly with the country's knowledge and approval. Cyber theft and ransomware attacks are now

2156-566: The "keys to the kingdom", and the intricacies of the phone system were at the disposal of people with a knowledge of electronics. The second generation of phreaks arose at this time, including New Yorkers "Evan Doorbell", "Ben Decibel" and Neil R. Bell and Californians Mark Bernay, Chris Bernay, and "Alan from Canada". Each conducted their own independent exploration and experimentation of the telephone network, initially on an individual basis, and later within groups as they discovered each other in their travels. "Evan Doorbell", "Ben" and "Neil" formed

2233-639: The 1960s when it was discovered that certain whistles could replicate the 2600 Hz pitch used in phone signalling systems in the United States. Phone phreaks experimented with dialing around the telephone network to understand how the phone system worked, engaging in activities such as listening to the pattern of tones to figure out how calls were routed, reading obscure telephone company technical journals (often obtained through dumpster diving ), social engineering , building electronic devices called blue boxes , black boxes , and red boxes to help them explore

2310-564: The House that year. As a result of these laws against computer criminality, white hat, grey hat and black hat hackers try to distinguish themselves from each other, depending on the legality of their activities. These moral conflicts are expressed in The Mentor 's " The Hacker Manifesto ", published 1986 in Phrack . Use of the term hacker meaning computer criminal was also advanced by the title "Stalking

2387-453: The US, as the monopoly of AT&T Corporation was forced into divestiture. During this time, exploration of telephone networks diminished, and phreaking focused more on toll fraud. Computer hackers began to use phreaking methods to find the telephone numbers for modems belonging to businesses, which they could exploit later. Groups then formed around the BBS hacker/phreaking (H/P) community such as

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2464-508: The United States as of 2020. It is rare to find a diverter solely used for Answering Service forwarding anymore, but the many other types such as phone-company test numbers and remote PBX DISAs are still used as diverters. Before the BBS era of the 1980s phone phreaking was more of a solitary venture as it was difficult for phreaks to connect with one another. In addition to communicating over BBSs phone phreaks discover voice mail boxes and party lines as ways to network and keep in touch over

2541-431: The United States, with strict regulations. In some locations, calling across the street counted as long distance. To report that a phone call was long-distance meant an elevated importance because the calling party is paying by the minute to speak to the called party. Some phreaking consists of techniques to evade long-distance charges, which is criminalized as " toll fraud". In 1990, the pager cloning technique arose and

2618-611: The Wily Hacker", an article by Clifford Stoll in the May 1988 issue of the Communications of the ACM . Later that year, the release by Robert Tappan Morris, Jr. of the so-called Morris worm provoked the popular media to spread this usage. The popularity of Stoll's book The Cuckoo's Egg , published one year later, further entrenched the term in the public's consciousness. In computer security,

2695-512: The advent of VoIP, the use of telephone company-owned bridges has decreased slightly in favor of phreaker-owned conferences. The end of multi-frequency (MF) phreaking in the lower 48 United States occurred on June 15, 2006, when the last exchange in the contiguous United States to use a "phreakable" MF-signalled trunk replaced the aging (yet still well kept) N2 carrier with a T1 carrier . This exchange, located in Wawina Township, Minnesota ,

2772-949: The attacks. A typical approach in an attack on Internet-connected system is: In order to do so, there are several recurring tools of the trade and techniques used by computer criminals and security experts. A security exploit is a prepared application that takes advantage of a known weakness. Common examples of security exploits are SQL injection , cross-site scripting and cross-site request forgery which abuse security holes that may result from substandard programming practice. Other exploits would be able to be used through File Transfer Protocol (FTP), Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), PHP , SSH , Telnet and some Web pages. These are very common in Web site and Web domain hacking. Tools and Procedures The computer underground has produced its own specialized slang, such as 1337speak . Writing software and performing other activities to support these views

2849-424: The beginnings of YIPL ( Youth International Party Line ), a publication started by Abbie Hoffman and Al Bell to provide information to Yippies on how to "beat the man ", mostly involving telephones. In the first issue of YIPL , writers included a "shout-out" to all of the phreakers who provided technological information for the newsletter: "We at YIPL would like to offer thanks to all you phreaks out there." In

2926-437: The bill for the long-distance calls, as it was their own private equipment (not phone company security flaws) that allowed such fraud to occur. By 1993, call forwarding was offered to nearly every business line subscriber, making these diverters obsolete. As a result, hackers stopped searching for the few remaining ones, and this method of toll fraud died. Many (different type) of diverters still exist and are actively "phreaked" in

3003-469: The computer connected successfully to the BBS, it proved that it had found a working card number, and it saved that number to disk. If it did not connect to the BBS in a specified amount of time (usually 30 or 60 seconds), it would hang up and try a different code. Using this method, code hacking programs would turn up hundreds (or in some cases thousands) of working calling card numbers per day. These would subsequently be shared amongst fellow phreakers. There

3080-427: The computer underground should be called crackers. Yet, those people see themselves as hackers and even try to include the views of Raymond in what they see as a wider hacker culture, a view that Raymond has harshly rejected. Instead of a hacker/cracker dichotomy, they emphasize a spectrum of different categories, such as white hat , grey hat , black hat and script kiddie . In contrast to Raymond, they usually reserve

3157-535: The creation of the routing tones, electronic tone generators known as blue boxes became a staple of the phreaker community. This community included future Apple Inc. co-founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak . The blue box era came to an end with the ever-increasing use of digital telephone networks which allowed telecommunication companies to discontinue the use of in-band signaling for call routing purposes. Instead, telecom companies began employing common-channel signaling (CCS), through which dialing information

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3234-469: The data on the magnetic stripe of your bank card?", "How to build your own pay-TV descrambler" and at least twenty different variations of "How does one make free phone calls?" (much to the dismay of Dutch telecommunication monopoly KPN , then still called PTT Telecommunicatie ). But Hack-Tic was not just about hi-tech mischief: its makers sensed the upcoming importance of communications and technology and were actively involved in making sure new technology

3311-446: The defect in a system and publish the facts to the world instead of a group of people. Even though grey hat hackers may not necessarily perform hacking for their personal gain, unauthorized access to a system can be considered illegal and unethical. A social status among hackers, elite is used to describe the most skilled. Newly discovered exploits circulate among these hackers. Elite groups such as Masters of Deception conferred

3388-471: The effect of a party-line. Eventually, all party-lines, whether bridges or not, came to be known as bridges if primarily populated by hackers and/or phreakers. The popularity of the Internet in the mid-1990s, along with the better awareness of voice mail by business and cell phone owners, made the practice of stealing voice mailboxes less popular. To this day bridges are still very popular with phreakers yet, with

3465-512: The famous Masters of Deception ( Phiber Optik ) and Legion of Doom ( Erik Bloodaxe ) groups. In 1985, an underground e-zine called Phrack (a combination of the words phreak and hack) began circulation among BBSes, and focused on hacking, phreaking, and other related technological subjects. In the early 1990s, groups like Masters of Deception and Legion of Doom were shut down by the US Secret Service 's Operation Sundevil . Phreaking as

3542-416: The fastest-growing crimes in the United States. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies facilitate the extortion of huge ransoms from large companies, hospitals and city governments with little or no chance of being caught. Hackers can usually be sorted into two types of attacks: mass attacks and targeted attacks. They are sorted into the groups in terms of how they choose their victims and how they act on

3619-411: The first use of the word hacker by the mainstream media in the pejorative sense. Pressured by media coverage, congressman Dan Glickman called for an investigation and began work on new laws against computer hacking. Neal Patrick testified before the U.S. House of Representatives on September 26, 1983, about the dangers of computer hacking, and six bills concerning computer crime were introduced in

3696-580: The general public until 1954, when the Bell System published the information in the Bell System Technical Journal in an article describing the methods and frequencies used for inter-office signalling. The journal was intended for the company's engineers; however, it found its way to various college campuses across the United States. With this one article, the Bell System accidentally gave away

3773-505: The last issue, YIPL stated: YIPL believes that education alone cannot affect the System, but education can be an invaluable tool for those willing to use it. Specifically, YIPL will show you why something must be done immediately in regard, of course, to the improper control of the communication in this country by none other than bell telephone company. In 1973, Al Bell would move YIPL over and start TAP (Technological American Party). Al Bell

3850-518: The late 1970s. TAP ended publication in 1984 due mostly to a break-in and arson at Tom Edison's residence in 1983. Cheshire Catalyst then took over running the magazine for its final (1984) year. A controversially suppressed article "Regulating the Phone Company In Your Home" in Ramparts magazine (June 1972) increased interest in phreaking. This article published simple schematic plans of

3927-476: The magazine has not been printed since 1993, the community that formed around it continues to organize large hacker culture events every four years, with visitors from a large number of countries. The last editions have been complete outdoor cities with thousands of visitors staying in tents. Visitor participation at these events has been high, leading to events which some describe as "all crew, no visitors". Recent events have had many visitor-organized "villages" and

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4004-400: The marketplace. At the time, there was no way to switch a phone line to have calls automatically carried by non-AT&T companies. Customers of these small long-distance operations would be required to dial a local access number, enter their calling card number, and finally enter the area code and phone number they wish to call. Because of the relatively lengthy process for customers to complete

4081-399: The network and make free phone calls, hanging out on early conference call circuits and "loop arounds" to communicate with one another and writing their own newsletters to spread information. Phreaking was especially prevalent in universities, where it began spreading much like computer hacking would in the following decades. Before 1984, long-distance telephone calls were a premium item in

4158-519: The opportunity this provided, and they would spend hours manually dialing businesses after hours, attempting to identify faulty diverters. Once a phreaker had access to one of these lines, they could use it for one of many purposes. In addition to completing phone calls anywhere in the world at the businesses' expense, they could also dial 1-900 phone sex/entertainment numbers, as well as use the line to harass their enemies without fear of being traced. Victimized small businesses were usually required to foot

4235-409: The public fears in a computer criminal". A grey hat hacker lies between a black hat and a white hat hacker, hacking for ideological reasons. A grey hat hacker may surf the Internet and hack into a computer system for the sole purpose of notifying the administrator that their system has a security defect, for example. They may then offer to correct the defect for a fee. Grey hat hackers sometimes find

4312-461: The pulses or clicks and interprets them in two possible ways. Depending on continent and country, one click with a following interval can be either "one" or "zero" and subsequent clicks before the interval are additively counted. This renders ten consecutive clicks being either "zero" or "nine", respectively. Some exchanges allow using additional clicks for special controls, but numbers 0-9 now fall in one of these two standards. One special code, "flash",

4389-401: The rotary dial. Even most current telephone exchanges support this method, as they need to be backward compatible with old subscriber hardware. By rapidly clicking the hook for a variable number of times at roughly 5 to 10 clicks per second, separated by intervals of roughly one second, the caller can dial numbers as if they were using the rotary dial. The pulse counter in the exchange counts

4466-433: The technology, and served as a medium for previously scattered independent phone phreaks to share their discoveries and experiments. This not only led to unprecedented collaboration between phone phreaks, but also spread the notion of phreaking to others who took it upon themselves to study, experiment with, or exploit the telephone system. This was also at a time when the telephone company was a popular subject of discussion in

4543-429: The telephone. They usually appropriate unused boxes that are part of business or cellular phone systems. Once a vulnerable mailbox system is discovered, word would spread around the phreak community, and scores of them would take residence on the system. They use these systems as a "home base" for communication with one another until the rightful owners discover the intrusion and wipe them off. Voice mailboxes also provide

4620-494: The term cracker for more malicious activity. According to Ralph D. Clifford, a cracker or cracking is to "gain unauthorized access to a computer in order to commit another crime such as destroying information contained in that system." These subgroups may also be defined by the legal status of their activities. A white hat hacker breaks security for non-malicious reasons, either to test their own security system, perform penetration tests or vulnerability assessments for

4697-441: The term hacker , arguing that it refers simply to someone with an advanced understanding of computers and computer networks, and that cracker is the more appropriate term for those who break into computers, whether computer criminals ( black hats ) or computer security experts ( white hats ). A 2014 article noted that "the black-hat meaning still prevails among the general public". The subculture that has evolved around hackers

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4774-572: The term "hacker" in its title: "The Hacker Papers." It was an excerpt from a Stanford Bulletin Board discussion on the addictive nature of computer use. In the 1982 film Tron , Kevin Flynn ( Jeff Bridges ) describes his intentions to break into ENCOM's computer system, saying "I've been doing a little hacking here." CLU is the software he uses for this. By 1983, hacking in the sense of breaking computer security had already been in use as computer jargon, but there

4851-414: The term bears strong connotations that are favorable or pejorative, depending on the context. Subgroups of the computer underground with different attitudes and motives use different terms to demarcate themselves from each other. These classifications are also used to exclude specific groups with whom they do not agree. Eric S. Raymond , author of The New Hacker's Dictionary , advocates that members of

4928-413: The two lines together. This gave the appearance to the caller that they were directly forwarded to the company's answering service. The switching equipment would typically reset the line after the call had hung up and timed out back to dial tone, so the caller could simply wait after the answering service had disconnected, and would eventually get a usable dial tone from the second line. Phreakers recognized

5005-420: The underlying concept. A neophyte (" newbie ", or "noob") is someone who is new to hacking or phreaking and has almost no knowledge or experience of the workings of technology and hacking. A blue hat hacker is someone outside computer security consulting firms who is used to bug-test a system prior to its launch, looking for exploits so they can be closed. Microsoft also uses the term BlueHat to represent

5082-480: The use of an access number. Another method of obtaining free phone calls involves the use of "diverters". Call forwarding was not an available feature for many business phone lines in the late 1980s and early 1990s, so they were forced to buy equipment that could do the job manually between two phone lines. When the business would close, they would program the call diverting equipment to answer all calls, pick up another phone line, call their answering service, and bridge

5159-731: The violation and the offender's history of violations under the Act . The FBI has demonstrated its ability to recover ransoms paid in cryptocurrency by victims of cybertheft. The most notable hacker-oriented print publications are Phrack , Hakin9 and 2600: The Hacker Quarterly . While the information contained in hacker magazines and ezines was often outdated by the time they were published, they enhanced their contributors' reputations by documenting their successes. Hackers often show an interest in fictional cyberpunk and cyberculture literature and movies. The adoption of fictional pseudonyms , symbols, values and metaphors from these works

5236-597: Was accessible to everyone. In 1991, the foundations were laid for Hacktic Netwerk , the organization which later became the ISP XS4ALL . Also in 1993, Hack-Tic organized Hacking at the End of the Universe (HEU), the first outdoor hacker festival event. In 1993 the last issue of Hack-Tic appeared. The issues are now online at XS4ALL, the ISP that grew out of Hacktic Network. Even though

5313-735: Was at that point already rather well known as a hacker who sometimes appeared in the newspapers. Being inspired by Datenschleuder (the CCC magazine) and 2600 The Hacker Quarterly , Gonggrijp decided to start his own magazine. In January 1989, the first issue was published. That summer, Nevejan, Gonggrijp and Patrice Riemens organized the Galactic Hacker Party in Paradiso, Amsterdam. The magazine grew from its original circulation of 50 photocopies to several thousand printed issues. A group of authors published wide-ranging articles including "How to copy

5390-425: Was coined by Richard Stallman , to contrast the maliciousness of a criminal hacker versus the spirit of playfulness and exploration in hacker culture , or the ethos of the white hat hacker who performs hacking duties to identify places to repair or as a means of legitimate employment. Black hat hackers form the stereotypical, illegal hacking groups often portrayed in popular culture, and are "the epitome of all that

5467-411: Was denied opening a bank account under the name of Technological American Party , since he was not a political party , so he changed the name to Technological Assistance Program to get a bank account. TAP developed into a major source for subversive technical information among phreaks and hackers all over the world. TAP ran from 1973 to 1984, with Al Bell handing over the magazine to "Tom Edison" in

5544-516: Was discovered in approximately 1957, by Joe Engressia , a blind seven-year-old boy. Engressia had perfect pitch , and discovered that whistling the fourth E above middle C (a frequency of 2637.02 Hz) would stop a dialed phone recording. Unaware of what he had done, Engressia called the phone company and asked why the recordings had stopped. Joe Engressia is considered to be the father of phreaking. Other early phreaks, such as "Bill from New York" (William "Bill" Acker 1953-2015), began to develop

5621-464: Was introduced to the masses when Esquire magazine published a story called "Secrets of the Little Blue Box" by Ron Rosenbaum . This article featured Engressia and John Draper prominently, synonymising their names with phreaking. The article also attracted the interest of other soon-to-be phreaks, such as Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs , who went on to found Apple Computer . 1971 also saw

5698-481: Was no public awareness about such activities. However, the release of the film WarGames that year, featuring a computer intrusion into NORAD , raised the public belief that computer security hackers (especially teenagers) could be a threat to national security. This concern became real when, in the same year, a gang of teenage hackers in Milwaukee, Wisconsin , known as The 414s , broke into computer systems throughout

5775-486: Was no way for these small phone companies to identify the culprits of these hacks. They had no access to local phone company records of calls into their access numbers, and even if they had access, obtaining such records would be prohibitively expensive and time-consuming. While there was some advancement in tracking down these code hackers in the early 1990s, the problem did not completely disappear until most long-distance companies were able to offer standard 1+ dialing without

5852-470: Was sent on a separate channel that was inaccessible to the telecom customer. By the 1980s, most of the public switched telephone network (PSTN) in the US and Western Europe had adopted the SS7 system which uses out-of-band signaling for call control (and which is still in use to this day), therefore rendering blue boxes obsolete. Phreaking has since become closely linked with computer hacking . Phreaking began in

5929-501: Was used by law enforcement . In the UK the situation was rather different due to the difference in technology between the American and British systems, the main difference being the absence of tone dialing and signaling , particularly in the 1950s and 1960s. The tone system in the United States has been almost entirely replaced, but in some countries, in addition to new systems, the tone system

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