MIT restrains Students from giving Hacking Talks

CNET News reports,

A federal judge on Saturday granted the Massachusetts transit authority’s request for an injunction preventing three MIT students from giving a presentation about hacking smartcards used in the Boston subway system.

It seems interesting that MIT is even taking legal steps to prevent its students from indulging in any activities, that might not be in the best interest of the government and the nation at large. While at the same time, “21″ is creating waves throughout the world.

(PS: For those who live in another world, “21″ is the fact-based story about six MIT students who were trained to become experts in card counting and subsequently took Vegas casinos for millions in winnings. It is inspired by the true story of five students who changed the game forever.)

Underground Societies Part III – Legion Of Doom (LOD)

The Legion of Doom (LOD) was an extremely influential hacker group that was active from the 1980s to the late 1990s. Their name appears to be a reference to the main antagonists of Challenge of the Superfriends.

LOD was founded by the hacker Lex Luthor, after a rift with his previous group the Knights of Shadow (much as the Masters of Deception would later be founded after Phiber Optik had a rift with Chris Goggans and LOD, eventually leading to the Great Hacker War and disbanding of both groups).

At different points in the group’s history, LOD was split into LOD and LOD/LOH (Legion of Doom/Legion of Hackers) for the members that were more skilled at hacking than pure phone phreaking.

Unlike Masters of Deception there were different opinions regarding what the Legion of Doom was. LOD published the Legion of Doom Technical Journals and regularly contributed to the overall pool of hacking knowledge and information, while causing no direct harm to the phone systems and computer networks they took over. On the other hand, many LOD members were raided, charged and in some cases successfully prosecuted for causing damage to systems and reprogramming phone company computers (Grant, Darden and Riggs, etc). While the “Bellsouth” case could be construed as exploration of the phone system, with claims that no real damage was done, there are other former LOD members such as Corey A. Lindsly (a.k.a. Mark Tabas) who were clearly interested in for-profit computer crime, with no goal except personal gain.[1][2]

Although the overall expressed beliefs and behavior of LOD and MOD were different, it can be difficult to untangle the individual actions of any given member. In many cases there seems to be cross-over between the two groups or collaboration between LOD and MOD members, even in the midst of The Great Hacker War.

As of 2006 what has happened to each individual member of the Legion of Doom is unknown. A small handful of the higher-profile LOD members who are accounted for includes: Chris Goggans “Erik Bloodaxe”, Dave Buchwald “Bill From RNOC”, Patrick K. Kroupa “Lord Digital”, Loyd Blankenship “The Mentor”, Bruce Fancher “Dead Lord” and Mark Abene “Phiber Optik”, who was a member of both LOD and Masters of Deception (MOD).

Other members included: Steven G. Steinberg “Frank Drake”, Corey A. Lindsly “Mark Tabas”, Peter Jay Salzman “Thomas Covenant”, Adam Grant “The Urvile”, Franklin Darden “The Leftist”, Robert Riggs “The Prophet”, Kenton Clark “Monster X”, Todd Lawrence “The Marauder”, Scott Chasin “Doc Holiday”, Dan Smith “Control C”, and Jake Kenyon Shulman “Malefactor”.

Former LoD people whose real names are unknown include: Agrajag The Prolonged, King Blotto, Blue Archer, The Dragyn, Unknown Soldier, Sharp Razor, Doctor Who, Paul Muad’Dib, Phucked Agent 04, X-man, Randy Smith, Steve Dahl, The Warlock, Terminal Man, Silver Spy, The Videosmith, Kerrang Khan, Gary Seven, Carrier Culprit, Master of Impact, Phantom Phreaker, Doom Prophet, Phase Jitter, Prime Suspect, The m0nit0r, Skinny Puppy, r00t, Professor Falken, Solomon Grundy (which was later shortened to “Sundry”) and LoD founder: Lex Luthor.

Underground Societies Part II – Masters Of Deception (MOD)

Masters of Deception (MOD) were a New York-based hacker group. MOD successfully controlled all the major telephone RBOC’s and X.25 networks as well as controlling large parts of the backbone of the rapidly emerging Internet. MOD’s initial membership grew from meetings on Loop-Around Test Lines that led to legendary collaborations to hack RBOC phone switches and the various minicomputers and mainframes used to administer the telephone network. They successfully remained underground using alternative handles to hide even their true hacker identities, which over time had become notorious. Bearing no resemblance to the stereotypical profile or media representation of how a traditional hacker looks or acts provided a perfect cover for instances of hacking in public places. Ironically, MOD’s unique sense of style would later make some of its members very popular with the mass-media.

Acid Phreak founded the Masters of Deception with Scorpion and HAC. The name itself was, among other things, a mockery of LOD, as ‘M’ is one letter up in the alphabet from ‘L’, although the name originally was a flexible acronym that could be used to identify membership in situations where anonymity would be the best course of action. It could stand for “Millions of Dollars” just as easily as “Masters of Deception.” The latter was perfectly suited to the ideology of MOD, who, through artful deception, attained new heights in exploration and understanding of “The System”. Alternate handles, social engineering, misdirection, discovery of and the masterful application of system exploits, backdoors and trojan horses, these were the ways of Masters of Deception.

It is worth mentioning that the intended mockery of the LOD name was a sort of statement to the underground that LOD had lost its direction. Several LOD members were close friends who had been raided and indicted by the government, causing the majority of those who remained to drop out of the underground for safety reasons. In their absence, LOD largely fell into disarray causing the disagreement and disillusionment that led Phiber Optik to align himself with MOD in an effort to restore the direction of the true spirit of underground hacking.

The original Masters of Deception included: Mark Abene (“Phiber Optik”), Paul Stira (“Scorpion”), Eli Ladopoulos (“Acid Phreak”), HAC, John Lee (“Corrupt,” a.k.a. “Netw1z”), and Julio Fernandez (“Outlaw”). Additional members whose real names are unknown include: Supernigger (also of DPAK), Wing, Nynex Phreak, Billy_The_Kid, Crazy Eddie, The Plague, ZOD, Neutrino, Seeker (CKER), and Red Knight (who was also a member of Cult of the Dead Cow).

Masters of Deception operated differently in many respects to previous hacking groups. Although they openly shared information with each other, they took a controversial view on sharing information outside the group. It was believed that access to MOD’s knowledge should be earned via degrees of initiation and a proven respect for the craft, rather than releasing powerful information into the wild where it could be used for nefarious purposes. A demonstration of responsibility on the part of the initiate was required. This informal compartmentalized protection of more sensitive knowledge was a structure originally employed by LOD in the 1980s, rather successfully.

As a result of their involvement in the so-called Great Hacker War, five of MOD’s members were indicted in 1992 in federal court. Within the next six months (in 1993), all five plead guilty and were sentenced to either probation or prison.