Format
The 1995 cover format continued the previous year's style - for the most part.
The price ($4) remained printed on the cover as well as the Canadian price ($5.50) in parentheses next to it.
The page length quietly increased to 56 pages with the page numbering scheme mostly remaining as it was in previous years (page 54 was numbered for Spring and Summer but not thereafter).
The contents had the following unique titles:
- Spring: READ
- Summer: GUTS
- Autumn: WHAT?
- Winter: CONSUME
Little messages continued to be found on Page 3 masked into the dotted line that separated the contents from the mailing info.
These messages read as follows:
- Spring: "you have always been here" A line from Babylon 5 that seemed somehow apropos.
- Summer: "scooby snacks" The name of a popular song from Fun Lovin' Criminals.
- Autumn: "we will survive" A line from a Grateful Dead hit on the occasion of Jerry Garcia's death and applicable to the turbulent state of the hacker world.
- Winter: "beyond hope" A hint at a sequel to last year's HOPE conference, albeit one that wouldn't take place for another year and a half.
In the middle of each issue, our first two letters pages now took the form of one giant double page with an envelope icon spanning the whole thing.
Letters titles continued to be unique:
- Spring: "The Better Letters"
- Summer: "Letters are the cornerstone of any civilized society."
- Autumn: "Language is a Virus from Outer Space"
- Winter: Thoughts of the Reader
Covers
The first three covers of the year were drawn by Holly Kaufman Spruch and the last one wasn't drawn at all, but was a photograph credited to Phriend1, Shawn West, and Walter (in order, the photo contributor, our webmaster, and our dog).
The mini-covers in the upper-right continued to appear on each cover until Winter.
Inside
The staff section now had credits for Editor-In-Chief, Layout, Cover Design, Office Manager, Writers, Network Operations, Voice Mail, Technical Expertise, and Shout Outs. It remained on Page 2 and shared space with the postal Statement of Ownership in Winter.
For the first time, there was a unique quote for each issue:
Spring: "There are an estimated 35,000 hackers in the U.S. and their community is growing by an estimated 10 percent annually. They are not isolated individuals, slaving away in a vacuum; hackers have established formal operations within every metropolitan city in North America. Hackers communicate via compromised Internet gateways, long distance calls stolen from corporate victims and through about 1,300 underground bulletin boards across the U.S. This infrastructure collects and disburses a constant flow of stolen calling-card information, corporate voice-mail-access data, compromised PBX DISA-port numbers, hackable modems, cloned cellular telephones, and stolen cellular phone IDs... The threat to U.S. businesses also has recently taken a new direction, due to hackers' growing numbers and maturity. Security investigations have confirmed that known hackers are employed within Fortune 500 firms, which know nothing about the individuals' prior activities. The risk to U.S. businesses is clear. What will happen when one of these hacker's employment is terminated? Will the individual destroy or damage the company's voice/data networks, release vital information about these networks to other hackers, or plant the seeds of future destruction in company systems? Time will tell." - Unbridled paranoia from The Organized Hackerhood, part of McDonnell Douglas' internal security newsletter leaked to us by an inside hacker.
Summer: "In a dramatic confirmation of how vulnerable Defense Department computers connected to the Internet actually are, the Defense Information Systems Agency revealed that it has conducted mock attacks on more than 8,000 DOD computers over the last two years. The DISA team successfully broke into more than 88 percent of the computers. Less than 5 percent even realized they had been attacked." - Federal Computer Week, February 6, 1995.
Autumn: "The threat that contemporary electronic intruders pose to the PSN [Public Switched Network] is rapidly changing and is significant. As a result of their increasing knowledge and sophistication, electronic intruders may have a significant impact upon national security and emergency preparedness (NS/EP) telecommunications because more than 90 percent of U.S. Government telecommunications services are provided by commercial carriers. ... technological changes and market forces in the domestic telecommunications industry are fueling a trend toward increasing automation and downsizing of staff. Consequently, there are now greater numbers of current and former telecommunications employees who may be disgruntled than at any time in recent years. These individuals should be viewed as a potential threat to NS/EP telecommunications." - The Electronic Intrusion Threat to National Security and Emergency Preparedness Telecommunications, published by National Communications System of Arlington, VA and leaked to us by a disgruntled employee.
Winter: "All speech is not protected by the First Amendment." - Senator (((Arlen Specter))) (R-Pa.)
Mailing info continued to be printed on Page 3 as required by the post office.
Starting in Summer, we began listing 2600.com email addresses next to appropriate categories (subscriptions, letters, articles) and dispensed with our generic Internet address that had been located at The WELL (2600@well.sf.ca.us).
1995 really began with a bang as fugitive hacker Kevin Mitnick was captured in Raleigh, North Carolina on February 15th. At the time, we were the only media outlet questioning the facts as they had been presented. We focused on the inaccuracies in the story. We pointed out that one of the biggest pieces of evidence against Kevin (a file in his possession that had thousands of credit card numbers from Internet provider Netcom) was something that had been in the possession of many people. In fact, we had even reported on it the previous year! We also were the first to criticize the involvement of New York Times reporter John Markoff in Kevin's capture. "One week before his capture, Mitnick contacted us to express concern over information he had received indicating that Markoff was actively aiding law enforcement to help track him down. It seemed bizarre at the time but as events unfolded, it appeared that this is exactly what was going on." And at the same time, we started to ask some questions about just what was actually on some of those systems that Kevin had been accused of accessing: "... who could keep quiet about a password sniffer designed for the NSA that could run on virtually any machine? So far, the press has."
Kevin's trial was set for July 10th in North Carolina. He pleaded guilty to one charge out of 23 which translated to eight months in prison. (We had no idea of how much more was to come.) By the end of the year, we had printed a technical explanation of the methods used to infiltrate security expert Tsutomu Shimomura's system, allegedly by Kevin Mitnick. From the beginning, we wanted the actual facts to be revealed, something the rest of the media seemed content to overlook in place of standard anti-hacker hysteria.
Almost immediately after the Kevin Mitnick arrest, 2600 writer and HOPE conference coordinator Bernie S. also found himself being targeted by the authorities. While Kevin's story dominated the Spring issue, Bernie S. was featured in the opening pages of the Summer edition. "It's almost a given that the first few pages of 2600 will be devoted to the latest travesty of justice." We certainly had no shortage of material this year.
Bernie S.' story was Kafkaesque in its absurdity. Local police had spotted him selling crystals for a RadioShack tone dialer to someone in a parking lot and had at first thought it was some kind of drug deal. When they eventually figured out that these crystals could be used to make free phone calls if used in a particular way, they came after him like he was Al Capone. The local Haverford Police teamed up with the United States Secret Service and threw everything they could at Bernie S.. And they had a lot to throw. But what was particularly bizarre here was that nothing he possessed and nothing he was doing constituted a crime - except if twisted and distorted to give the impression of some kind of conspiracy. "Imagine a world where reading, experimentation, and software are the only ingredients needed to put a person in prison indefinitely." We didn't have to imagine for very long; this was precisely what was going on right in front of our eyes.
Those who questioned these tactics soon found themselves targeted as well. One local college student was threatened with a lawsuit by the Haverford Police for criticizing them. While laughable, that kind of a threat to an individual coming from law enforcement can be extremely intimidating. And it was.
a demonstration of just how corrupt and in league these agencies were, the Haverford Police dropped all charges against Bernie S. at the same instant that the Secret Service had him charged federally. We all learned how easy it was for them to lock someone up with virtually no evidence. "It is becoming clear that this is an agency out of control which threatens to hurt not only hackers but anyone who values free speech in this country." It seemed that Bernie S. had angered the agency by sharing pictures of Secret Service agents visiting the office of a friend with fellow hackers at the Philadelphia 2600 meeting and attending members of the media. Again, nothing illegal had been done. He just pissed off the wrong people.
Later in the year, Bernie S. was forced to plead guilty to "possession of technology which could be used in a fraudulent manner" in order to be released soon. The alternative was to face years in prison if convicted by a jury, something which seemed certain given the powers the Secret Service possessed.
We had very strong criticism against various civil liberties groups that remained silent while all of this was going on. At the time, defending hackers seemed to be quite low on their priority list.
And we were quite vocal in our criticism of the agencies responsible. "It is becoming clear that if we are to survive as a democratic society, we must make it a priority to eliminate the Secret Service as a watchdog over American citizens."
Our brand new 2600.com server had gone into service and email addresses were set up for both Kevin and Bernie S.. Readers could send them email, and we would print it out and mail it to them in prison.
Our site hit the ground running with all kinds of new email addresses announced for everything from articles to meetings. For the first time, our meeting guidelines were announced in our pages so that everyone knew where we stood and what it was that linked us all together. A sample flyer for the Boston 2600 meeting was printed, capturing the spirit of what the meetings were all about. A reader shared their experiences of the reactions they got while wearing one of our shirts. And the payphones at the New York 2600 meeting stop taking incoming calls, cutting us off from calls that other meetings used to make to us.
We continued to offer free subscriptions to readers in Eastern Europe as changes in that part of the world proved historical and inspirational. We learned that the Internet link between Hungary and the outside world was a single 64 kbps line.
The Church of Scientology tried unsuccessfully to shut down critical discussion of its operations on USENET newsgroups. They were successful, however, in permanently shutting down a famous anonymous remailer in Finland (anon.penet.fi) and getting the email address of someone who posted something they considered to be proprietary. It was a chilling moment for hackers everywhere.
It was the year that the Oklahoma City bombing took place and, somehow, hackers felt the backlash from the authorities, even though there was no high-tech or encryption of any sort used in the terrorist operation. The authorities used the "what if" argument to win support for more controls. Both government and mass media called for restrictions on encryption and the Internet, despite the fact that those involved used neither. Those in the hacker world saw the threat: "...curtailing speech and liberty never advances the cause of freedom and once begun is very difficult to reverse." Meanwhile, encryption was effectively outlawed in Russia, surprisingly (or not) with the influence of our own FBI.
1995 wasn't without its lighter moments, though. We published an intercepted memo advising system admins to take the White Sands Missile Range off the Internet during the weekend of 1994's HOPE conference. We found humorous excerpts from a NYNEX security publication outlining all kinds of misdeeds by employees. We had fun with AOL's internal rules on the use of certain words. ("If you would not hear it on Saturday morning network cartoons, don't use it here on AOL.") And we held a contest to find the oldest computer on the Internet. Our spirit was anything but squashed.
Technologically, all sorts of changes were in the air. There were rumors of a merger between NYNEX and Bell Atlantic. A new media called DVDs would be around in less than a year, storing many times what a CD could hold. Readers reported their first use of digital cellular modems. Nationwide Caller ID would be in place by the end of the year. Cable companies were beginning to offer dial tones.
We published articles on pager hacking, packet sniffing, military hacking, chipcards (old in Europe, new for us), hacking Disney, the legality and safety of war dialing, and COCOTs, along with the usual healthy dose of NYNEX horror stories. We designed a new 2600 t-shirt with the code of the Michelangelo virus on the front. We paid tribute to Jerry Garcia after his untimely passing. We uncovered a mystery mode on Citibank ATMs which provoked a good amount of discussion. And we continued to monitor problems at certain Barnes & Noble outlets, where readers reported vanishing copies of our magazine.
"The summer of 1995 will be remembered as the year (((Hollywood))) discovered the Internet." Whether or not it was, it certainly seemed to be the case then as both The Net and Hackers were released within weeks of each other. In addition to hackers being in the news, hackers were in the theaters and it seemed the spotlight of attention was never far off.
As always, we spent a good amount of time warning readers about corporate abuses. We advised strongly against giving one's name and address to RadioShack, particularly after privacy abuses were uncovered. Readers also reported on a disturbing practice by some chain stores that insisted on searching customers' bags upon leaving. We discovered yet another dimwitted NYNEX service that allowed anyone to find out how much money was owed on a particular phone number - and how overdue it was. After we played the amounts of phone bills for various corporate media giants over the airwaves of WBAI, the service was quickly discontinued. "Apparently, invading corporate privacy is the quickest way to get large corporations to notice privacy issues."
We also got into a big fight with an Internet service provider named PSI. We signed up for ISDN service with them on the condition that they support "data over voice," which allowed us to send data over the voice path at 56k, rather than the 64k of the data path. If we did the latter, NYNEX would charge us a penny a minute, which would have made it financially impossible to operate our new server around the clock. PSI revealed that they actually didn't support this service after we signed up with them, putting us in an impossible situation. Rather than cave in, we went public and even recorded a phone call of their representatives agreeing to offer the service they were now telling us they didn't. We stuck the recording up on our website and waited for the reaction, which wouldn't come until 1996.
Throughout it all, we always looked forward to the promise of the future. We knew the authorities acted against us because they were afraid. They feared what the net could become and so we faced "the beginning of a long war involving individuals, big business, and governments." Above all else, they didn't want to lose control. But it was already too late. "For the first time in the history of humanity, sheer, uncontrolled communication and exchange of information without regard to national borders or class distinction is a distinct possibility in the very near future. What we've seen so far is only a taste."
Still, we advised against blind allegiance to anything, including new technology. "Just because technology makes something a hundred times easier to accomplish is no reason to not look upon it with a healthy dose of skepticism." Being perpetual skeptics helped to keep us sane.
Spring: Spring 1995 had a lot going on.
Kevin Mitnick had just been captured in North Carolina and that was expressed pictorially.
A car is seen pulled over with Kevin's initials (KDM) on the license plate. The slogan on a North Carolina license plate was "First in Flight," a reference to the Wright brothers' successful flight at Kitty Hawk. This plate, however, reads "First to Fall," a warning to the rest of the hacker community that this was only the beginning.
The car also has a yellow HOPE bumper sticker like the ones given to all of our subscribers the previous year, as well as a PANTHERS sticker (the Carolina Panthers would begin their first season in the NFL later in the year).
Lined up along the street are several buildings. The first, attached to a gas station, reads EXON, but it's not related to oil giant EXXON. It's a reference to Senator Jim Exon, who spearheaded the Communications Decency Act, an attempt to enforce decency on the Internet which would become law in 1996 before being struck down by the Supreme Court in 1997.
C.O.S. refers to the Church of Scientology and their continuing attempts to shut down USENET discussion that was critical of them.
Netcom played heavily into the capture of Kevin Mitnick, even though information we had already published showed that their system wasn't exactly secure against anybody.
The building with "23" on it is a reference to the 23-count indictment that had been handed down against Kevin.
The mini-cover contained the source code for one of the files found in a directory of Kevin's, further proof of how so many people had access to this kind of thing.
