Key hacker magazine faces closure
By Mark Ward
BBC News website technology correspondent
The in-house magazine of the digital underground, Phrack is closing after 20
years as its editorial team steps down.
As much manifesto as hacking handbook, the magazine was hugely influential
in the early days of hacker culture.
It was very closely associated with legendary hacking groups such as the
Legion of Doom that were the first serious explorers of cyberspace.
As hackers moved from dial-up bulletin boards on to the net, the magazine
kept its place as a knowledgeable, and often
scurrilous, source of security information.
For instance, issue 62 of Phrack contained articles about getting round
Windows buffer overflow protections, advances in Windows shellcode,
attacking Apache and hijacking wireless base stations.
History lessons
"Phrack is still really well known," said Ollie, current editor of the
magazine. "There are a lot of security magazines but no hacking magazines."
Stan, a regular Phrack contributor, said the fact that it had survived for
20 years gave it a great deal of influence.
"There are a lot of groups that put out their own magazines and they usually
last about three issues," he said.
We explore and you call us criminals. We seek after knowledge and you
call us criminals. Yes, I am a criminal. My crime is that of curiosity. I am
a hacker, and this is my manifesto
The Mentor, Phrack 7, phile 3
Ollie said that Phrack had evolved as hacking had changed and said that the
basic skill level hackers need to build up was rising all the time.
"It's much harder to get to a point where you can actually do stuff," he
said. "You have to learn much more and read many more books. The entry level
of skills has been raised."
The deadline for sending in articles for the last issue is 10 July.
To commemorate Phrack's final appearance, issue 63 will be a hardback
edition available at the Defcon and WhatTheHack2005 hacker conventions.
The first issue of Phrack was published on 11 November 1985 and much of the
information it detailed was about phreaking - essentially hacking the phone
system.
This was because in 1985 the only place hackers talked to each other was via
dial-up bulletin board systems. At that time the net was almost an entirely
academic, governmental and military network. Commercial use of it was
prohibited.
Legal challenge
Phrack originated on a bulletin board known as Metal Shop but its issues
were held by any board that wanted to consider itself part of the digital
underground.
Phrack's main contributors, Taran King and Knight Lightning, boosted its
popularity by writing profiles of well-known hackers, such as Erik Bloodaxe
and The Mentor, and searching out articles that expanded people's knowledge
of how telephone and computer networks worked.
Whether you know it or not, if you are a hacker, you are a
revolutionary. Don't worry, you're on the right side.
Dr Crash, Phrack 6, phile 3
The magazine got caught up in the series of raids on hackers and hacker
groups that took place in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
Phrack editor Knight Lightning, aka Craig Neidorf, was arrested, charged
with fraud and tried before a grand jury for reprinting most of a
confidential document, known as the E911 document, stolen from the Bell
South telephone company. Bell South claimed that the confidential E911
document contained sensitive information and put its value at $80,000.
The case became a cause celebre for the digital underground and Mr Neidorf's
defence was organised by the fledgling Electronic Frontier Foundation.
The case against Mr Neidorf collapsed when it was shown that the E911 paper
could be ordered by phone from Bell South for only $13.
Bruce Sterling, author and digital lifestyle guru who wrote about Phrack in
his 1992 book The Hacker Crackdown, thought it unlikely that the magazine
would disappear for ever.
"I'd be surprised to see the thing stay dead," he told the BBC News website,
"They've got no fixed address and anonymous contributors."
"Any set of unruly teenagers could start Phrack up because that's who
started it in the first place."
Ollie from Phrack said that the team would be happy to hand it over to a new
group that wanted to start it up again.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/technology/4657265.stm
Published: 2005/07/09 07:40:45 GMT
© BBC MMV
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