In the last year or so there has been a virtual deluge of books on
hackers and hacking. Even movies were based on the subject. The
electronic hacker requires a greater knowledge base than a computer
hacker. It requires a working knowledge of computing and a good
knowledge of electronics. Indeed there has been an influx of
computer hackers to the ranks of electronic hackers. My comments in
the last volume are still applicable as they relate to the electronic
hacker rather than the computer hacker.
Many of the books on computer hacking seek to, and in some
cases actually do, identify the main traits of hackers. Indeed some of
them such as "The New Hacker's Dictionary" do an excellent job.
Electronic hackers are more difficult to quantify. I do not think that
anyone has actually tried to properly define what an electronic hacker
is.
As Electronic hackers are rarer than computer hackers, this is an
exceedingly difficult thing to do. As an electronic hacker, I am in a
better position to comment on the main traits required for this type of
hacking. Much of the comments that follow apply equally to computer
hackers. These comments may be offensive to some of the
pseudo-intellectual sociologists reading this.
There is no such thing as an average hacker. A hacker by nature
will be above average intelligence. Out-thinking is a pastime that
generally restricted to those with above average intelligence. Since
the level of electronic knowledge required for hacking is high this
would tend to restrict hacking as a hobby to technicians and
engineers or at the least a person with a good knowledge of
electronics.
Another interesting aspect in hacking is that all of the top electronic
hackers and most of the average electronic hackers in Europe are
male. This is not a surprising thing. Advanced hacking requires
phenomenal visio-spatial abilities and the ability to grasp complex and
extremely abstract Concepts. These are specifically male traits. Any
feminists reading this may be offended. Don't blame me, blame God.
He designed the Human race.
There appears to be one common factor in the background of
electronic hackers - an interest in electronics prior to third Level
education. Some hackers look down on engineers as blow-ins. The
majority of engineers only decided to do engineering on entering third
level education. Or in some cases their parents made the decision for
them. For some of them engineering is only a job. They probably did
well in exams all throughout their academic careers because they
could memorise some fact or text and regurgitate it on an exam
paper. An electronic hacker will have a fascination with electronics
and it is this fascination with electronics that these paper engineers
lack. Luckily these paper engineers do not last very long in electronics
and find other positions that suit them. In the early eighties, one paper
engineer told me that it was impossible for a mere mortal such as
myself to design a satellite receiver system. He also said that satellite
television was never going to be used on a widespread basis. The
chap now sells shirts for a living!
As the electronic hacker has had previous experience in electronics,
they will not do well in third level education. Most will drop out
of their course because they become bored with what they are being
taught. In this respect, the above average intelligence of the hacker is
a disadvantage. Most of the third level courses in electronics will be
like a mental straight jacket to the hacker. Most non-hacker readers
will automatically think that just because a hacker has above average
intelligence he will just get on with the course. Unfortunately it is
never as simple as this. The average academic year is thirty-six
weeks long. If you could complete this course in three weeks would
you hang around for the other thirty three weeks?
There are probably readers who think that hacking is a crime in the
sense that it is theft of service. The legislation varies from country to
country. Some countries in Europe, such as France and Ireland have
rather draconian laws against piracy.
As the moral kind of reader regards hacking as a crime, he or she
may not try to hack. The attitude of a hacker is totally different. A
hacker would generally know that hacking is a form of theft of service
but would not really be too concerned. The moral and ethical
conditioning that society imposes has a greater effect on those with
average intelligence, after all the morals and ethics are generally
created by those of average intelligence. When one is of above
average intelligence, there is often a feeling of not belonging. This
feeling of not belonging results in a sort of intellectual arrogance
where the individual concerned decides that the normal morals and
ethics do not apply to him as he is not normal. This is of course an
extreme example but a milder form of this decision would explain the
attitude of most hackers to the moral aspect of hacking. The vast
the moral and ethical aspects are suspended. All's fair in love, war
and business.
In my opinion, anyone involved in hacking for purely experimental
reasons should not be prosecuted. It is disgusting that people who
are often critical thinking addicts or at least are not involved anything
creative, should decide to hassle experimenters. (This of Course
excludes criminal lawyers who are among the most creative
experimenters known.) These people do not apparently recognise
that all of the major inventions were made by experimenters and if it
wasn't for experimenters Humanity would still be swamp slime.
On some of the computer bulletin boards, the good and evil of
experimental hacking has been debated. The most often proposed
argument on the evil of experimental hacking is that it is shop lifting in
a different guise. I do not agree with this. It is, to use another analogy
often quoted by anti-hackers, like saying that guns kill people. The logic
is flawed.
Incidentally guns do not kill people, bullets do. The whole objective
of hacking is to hack the system and not to get the programming for
free. That is piracy. The proponents of the argument do not
differentiate between hacking and piracy.
If there is one thing that really gets to me it is the high moral tone
adopted by the anti-hacker campaigners. They make it sound like
hackers are some kind of sub-human scum. It is almost as it these
anti-hacker campaigners are jealous of hackers. To them hackers
represent FUAD. This stands for Fear Uncertainty And Doubt. The
anti-hackers fear what the hacker can get up to. They are uncertain
just what the hacker can do and they are doubtful whether they can
match up to the hacker's abilities and talents.
Almost every hacker regards hacking as a game in which their
mindpower is pitted against that of the system designers. It is a battle
of intellects. That is the attraction. Some of the paper engineers
mentioned earlier would like to think of themselves as hackers but
they are not. It is often a paper engineer that claims that a system is
invincible. There is nothing more satisfying to a hacker than smashing
an "invincible" system that was designed by one of these paper
engineers.
The Hacking Hall Of Infamy
==========================
The following is an examination of some of the mistakes and @
general screwups that have led to serious hacks. Many of them are
due to non-technical people underestimating the risks that their
systems faced. In some of the cases, it was not fault of the people
involved. They either had not been properly briefed or had been
briefed by JAFAs. Ignorance may not be a crime but it can be fatal.
VideoCipher is Tamperproof And Undefeatable (sic)
=================================================
Perhaps the stupidest and most ignorant statement ever made
about a scrambling system was made in 1986 about VideoCipher.
Specifically VideoCipher 11, the planet's most hacked system.
The VideoCipher system is a very sophisticated system, tamper-
proof and undefeatable." Naturally this quotation came from a
marketing person. Now what was unbelievable about this quotation
was that there was a confirmed hack on the system in June 1986.
Apparently the news had not reached VideoCipher.
BBC Vs Hi-Tech
==============
In the UK, piracy has been highlighted by a number of cases, the
most notable being the Hi-Tech XtraVision case. The BBC attempted
to stop the UK descrambler manufacturer, Hi-Tech XtraVision
manufacturing and selling descramblers for the BBC Europe service
via Intelsat VA-F71 at 27.5 West. The original ruling an the case
stated that the UK Copyright Patents And Designs Act 7988 was not
usable in the case as it was badly framed. The end user of the
descrambler was outside UK jurisdiction and so UK law was not
applicable. It was overturned on appeal and Hi-Tech XtraVision
decided not to defend.
BBC Pressures Elektor Electronics
=================================
A stupid event accrued earlier in 1990 involving the "Elektor
Electronics" Magazine. In the February 1990 issue. this magazine
published the first of a two part constructional article for a SAVE
descrambler that did not use crystals. The decision to print was taken
when the first ruling in the Hi-Tech XtraVision case was in force. The
BBC lawyers then saw the magazine and got upset and threatened
Elektor. Elektor pulled the March 1990 edition of the magazine. The
full circuit diagram and theoretical description was already in the
hands of those who wanted it. Any hacker worth his salt can design a
printed circuit board. It makes the lawyers and the BBC look like utter
idiots. They took action after the event occurred and thus drew the
matter to the attention Of the media. It is not surprising that hackers
consider some lawyers as being between rocks and bacteria on the
evolutionary scale.
FilmNet Bares All
=================
The system owners almost always hold back at least two further
scrambling levels until the system has been in use for at least six
months. This is a good tactic as a lot of the inexperienced hackers will
be caught out when the further level of scrambling is introduced. It is
also an unwritten rule that the level will be introduced at a time that
will cause maximum damage to the professional hackers.
The best example of this tactic was Filmnet's introduction of a
further level of scrambling three days before the 1987 Cable And
Satellite Show. This left a lot of dealers with egg an their faces as
they were selling pirate descramblers that did not work. Fortunately
for some dealers, the three days were enough to update their
demonstration decoders. FilmNet should have introduced the further
level during the show for maximum effect.
The show was, in counter-piracy terms, FilmNet's biggest disaster
A business person representing FilmNet was boasting about how they
had faked out the hackers. The fact that FilmNet had thirty one
possible variations to play with was mentioned. Unfortunately one of
the people who overheard was a hacker.
The FilmNet. representative was unfamiliar with binary. In binary, 0
is also considered as it is a logical state whereas to the businessman
it means nothing. In technical terms, FilmNet has five possible levels
of encryption and thirty two combinations. Since level zero is clear this
leaves thirty one possible variations. This effectively condemned
FilmNet to four years of being totally hacked.
All of the subsequent upgrades on the FilmNet system were
limited. The SATPAC system was so crude that the upgrades were
often more risky for the official descrambler.
In late 1990, strange adverts started to appear in the UK satellite.
television press about the fact that FilmNet decoders were illegal.
Other scare tactics claimed that the decoders would soon be
obsolete. There were rumours that Sky were tied in to this advertising
campaign. On the Dealer Text teletext service on Sky News, (teletext
page 830), the evils of pirate FilmNet decoder were proclaimed.
On teletext page 441 on Eurosport, there was an actual advert for
pirate FilmNet decoders. This was rather embarrassing far Sky. Once
they found out about the advert, they quickly removed the FilmNet
reference.
Sky, at that time had control over Eurosport. The teletext magazine
was not assembled by Sky. All Sky did was to transmit a prepared
teletext magazine. Unfortunately they did not adequately screen the
advertisements.
Sky Markets Do It Yourself Piracy Kit
=====================================
Perhaps the stupidest event in counter-piracy history was perpetra-
ted by Sky's marketing people. Evidently Sky's counter-piracy people
were not consulted on this. If they had been they would have stopped
the system dead in its tracks.
In 1990, Sky was locked in battle with BSB. Sky was trying to hook
as many viewers as possible for the fledgling Sky Movies. Then some
utter nutter of a marketing genius struck. The scheme was that Sky
would give three months free viewing of Sky Movies to purchasers of
IRDs.
The fully active smart cards were bundled with the IRDs. Included
in the packet was a subscription form for Sky Movies. The logic was
that typical of business school text books. It totally ignored the real
world.
The smart cards never reached the purchasers of the IRDs.
Instead, they were shipped to mainland Europe where they were sold
for high profits. Often dealers would forget to mention the free viewing
cards to purchasers of IRDs in the UK and Ireland. Many of the
purchasers were ignorant of the scheme anyway.
In European magazines, adverts appeared for decoders and smart
cards. Sky had people trying to track down the sources of the
companies advertising. This was an essentially futile operation. Sky
had actually caused the piracy problem. What was unnerving was the
sheer naivete of those Sky people involved. They actually believed
that pirates and hackers would play by their rules. Of course Sky
learnt a valuable lesson from this fiasco and now they try to control
the distribution of their smart cards.
Hacking And The Law
===================
It should be made clear that hacking or intercepting services in
Ireland is illegal. This info may also be illegal as it examines the
security of scrambling systems. The Irish Broadcasting Act 1990 is
intended to limit if not eliminate cable and MMDS piracy. It can be
applied to satellite piracy but requires a ministerial order.
To date there appears to have been no prosecutions for cable
piracy as in actually hacking the scrambling system. The prosecutions
that have occurred have been for patching into the cablenet without
paying. The term used is "Self Connectors". You have got to wonder
at the Freudian undertones in the mind that dreamt that one up. On
my local cablenet it has the word "Pirates" in brackets. Apparently the
term "Self Connectors" originated in Dublin and since there are two
countries in Ireland, Dublin and the rest of Ireland, it was obviously
felt that a translation was necessary.
When a new descrambler, official or pirate, comes on the market
the first thing that happens is that it is "examined". The case is
opened, the board is extracted and the oscilloscopes, logic analysers
and multimeters are attached. The first service diagrams for
descramblers are not issued by the manufacturers. They are issued
or rather sold by hackers.
It is essential that those who design systems hack the systems
designed by their competitors. This is the best and only way to learn
how to make your system secure. The best system designers are also
good hackers. .
There are some people trying to bring in laws in Europe about
computer program reverse engineering. The aim is to stop the
reversing and analysis of computer programs. This has parallels with
the Blackbox industry. It is unfortunate that those who try to make the
laws that govern technology are those who are generally least suited
to the task.
The law is often a few hundred years out of date. Judges are, in
some European countries, allowed to serve beyond their sell by date.
To expect them to cope with extremely complex technological
nuances is a bit much. However there are a few lawyers who
originally started out as engineers. These people have a good
understanding of the technology. It is generally their task to crush
complex technological thoughts into mental baby food in the rare
cases that actually come to trial.
Where legislation exists to cover hacking, it is usually of the
blunderbuss variety. It can be used to cover every eventuality. Often
this legislation is introduced at the behest of interested parties.
For example in Ireland, the Broadcasting Act of 1990 was intended
to protect cable companies and MMDS operators. Now just who was
the biggest cable company at that time? Cablelink of course.
Cablelink was owned primarily by the state via a semi state operator
or two. The state emphasis on the legislation can be seen in the
structure of the act. The act does not cover satellite borne
transmissions without a statutory instrument signed by the minister for
communications.
There is a trend nowadays to rely less on the law and more on
secrecy. A company will not patent a new system because it supplies
a ready source of information for hackers. This is perhaps a more
sensible approach. There is an aspect of law where a system could
be declared a trade secret. Some would argue that this offers enough
protection. To someone abiding by ordinary rules it would. Hackers
do not abide by such rules and the concept breaches one of the
prime rules of secrecy - the fewer who know the better the secrecy.
The use of the law in counter-piracy is like a loaded musket. It is
useful against a single opponent, which by some accident could be
you. In piracy, a system will be attacked from hundreds of directions.
In some countries, the UK for instance, the relevant law provides for
statutory conviction. It would not be feasible to prosecute all the
attackers. Some may not have the' money to pay the fines. An
indiscriminate approach would lose the battle for the hearts and
minds of the users.
Despite all of this there are still some channel executives who think
that legal methods can be used to stop piracy and or hacking. These
executives are not technical. Commonly they are products of a
business or legalistic education. Generally they lose this attitude after
actually having some hands-on real time experience.
Hacking is an essential item in the evolution of technology. It
stretches the technology to the limits and then goes one step beyond.
Many of the advances have been made by hackers. Some top
professional hackers were among those who were experimenting with
satellite in its early days.
It is stupid to claim that piracy will be eliminated, for if there was no
crime then there would be no need for a police force and we'd all be
vegetarian troglodytes. This is the real world - wake up and smell the
coffee!
