Underground: Hacking, madness and obsession on the electronic frontier Part 69

He took up sky-diving. A single jump gives him a high which lasts for days, sometimes up to a week. Girls have captured his interest. He's had a few girlfriends and thinks he would like to settle into a serious relations.h.i.+p when he finds the right person.

Recently, Prime Suspect has been studying martial arts. He tries to attend at least four cla.s.ses a week, sometimes more, and says he has a special interest in the spiritual and philosophical sides of martial arts. Most days, he rises at 5 a.m., either to jog or to meditate.

MENDAX

In 1992 Mendax and Trax teamed up with a wealthy Italian real-estate investor, purchased La Trobe University's mainframe computer (ironically, a machine they had been accused of hacking) and started a computer security company. The company eventually dissolved when the investor disappeared following actions by his creditors.

After a public confrontation in 1993 with Victorian Premier Jeff Kennett, Mendax and two others formed a civil rights organisation to fight corruption and lack of accountability in a Victorian government department. As part of this ongoing effort, Mendax acted as a conduit for leaked doc.u.ments and became involved in a number of court cases against the department during 1993-94. Eventually, he gave evidence in camera to a state parliamentary committee examining the issues, and his organisation later facilitated the appearance of more than 40 witnesses at an investigation by the Auditor-General.

Mendax volunteers his time and computer expertise for several other non-profit community organisations. He believes strongly in the importance of the non-profit sector, and spends much of his free time as an activist on different community projects. Mendax has provided information or a.s.sistance to law-enforcement bodies, but not against hackers. He said, 'I couldn't ethically justify that. But as for others, such as people who prey on children or corporate spies, I am not concerned about using my skills there.'

Still pa.s.sionate about coding, Mendax donates his time to various international programming efforts and releases some of his programs for free on the Internet. His philosophy is that most of the lasting social advances in the history of man have been a direct result of new technology.

NorTel and a number of other organisations he was accused of hacking use his cryptography software--a fact he finds rather ironic.

ANTHRAX

Anthrax moved to Melbourne, where he is completing a university course and working on freelance a.s.signments in the computer networking area of a major corporation.

His father and mother are divorcing. Anthrax doesn't talk to his father at all these days.

Anthrax's mother's health has stabilised somewhat since the completion of the court case, though her condition still gives her chronic pain.

Despite some skin discolouration caused by the disease, she looks well. As a result of her years of work in the local community, she has a loyal group of friends who support her through bad bouts of the illness. She tries to live without bitterness and continues to have a good relations.h.i.+p with both her sons.

Anthrax is no longer involved in the Nation of Islam, but he is still a devout Muslim. An acquaintance of his, an Albanian who ran a local fish and chips shop, introduced him to a different kind of Islam. Not long after, Anthrax became a Sunni Muslim. He doesn't drink alcohol or gamble, and he attends a local mosque for Friday evening prayers. He tries to read from the Qu'raan every day and to practise the tenets of his religion faithfully.

With his computer and business skills now sought after by industry, he is exploring the possibility of moving to a Muslim country in Asia or the Middle East. He tries to promote the interests of Islam worldwide.

Most of his pranking needs are now met by commercial CDs--recordings of other people's pranking sold through underground magazines and American mail order catalogues. Once in a long while, he still rings Mr McKenny in search of the missing shovel.

Anthrax felt aggrieved at the outcome of his written complaint to the Office of the Ombudsman. In the complaint, Anthrax gave an account of how he believed the AFP had behaved inappropriately throughout his case. Specifically, he alleged that the AFP had pressured his mother with threats and had hara.s.sed him, taken photographs of him without his permission, given information to his university about his case prior to the issue of a summons and the resolution of his case, and made racist comments toward him during the raid.

In 1995-96, a total of 1157 complaints were filed against the AFP, 683 of which were investigated by the Commonwealth Ombudsman. Of the complaint investigations completed and reviewed, only 6 per cent were substantiated. Another 9 per cent were deemed to be 'incapable of determination', about 34 per cent were 'unsubstantiated', and in more than a quarter of all cases the Ombudsman either chose not to investigate or not to continue to investigate a complaint.

The Office of the Ombudsman referred Anthrax's matter to the AFP's Internal Investigations office. Although Anthrax and his mother both gave statements to the investigating officers, there was no other proof of Anthrax's allegations. In the end, it came down to Anthrax and his mother's words against those of the police.

The AFP's internal investigation concluded that Anthrax's complaints could either not be substantiated or not be determined, in part due to the fact that almost two years had pa.s.sed since the original raid. For the most part, the Ombudsman backed the AFP's finding. No recommendation was made for the disciplining of any officers.

Anthrax's only consolation was a concern voiced by the Ombudsman's Office. Although the investigating officer agreed with the AFP investigators that the complaint could not be substantiated, she wrote, 'I am concerned that your mother felt she was compelled to pressure you into attending an interview based on a fear that she would be charged because her phone was used to perpetrate the offences'.

Anthrax remains angry and sceptical about his experience with the police. He believes a lot of things need to be changed about the way the police operate. Most of all, he believes that justice will never be a.s.sured in a system where the police are allowed to investigate themselves.

PAD AND GANDALF

After Pad and Gandalf were released from prison, they started up a free security advisory service on the Internet. One reason they began releasing 8lgm advisories, as they were known, was to help admins secure their own systems. The other reason was to thumb their noses at the conservatives in the security industry.

Many on the Internet considered the 8lgm advisories to be the best available at the time--far better than anything CERT had ever produced. Pad and Gandalf were sending their own message back to the establishment. The message, though never openly stated, was something like this: 'You busted us. You sent us to prison. But it didn't matter. You can't keep information like this secret. Further, we are still better than you ever were and, to prove it, we are going to beat you at your own game.'

Believing that the best way to keep a hacker out of your system is to secure it properly in the first place, the two British hackers rejected security gurus who refused to tell the world about new security holes. Their 8lgm advisories began marginalising the traditional industry security reports, and helped to push the industry toward its current, more open att.i.tude.

Pad and Gandalf now both work, doing computer programming jobs on contract, sometimes for financial inst.i.tutions. Their clients like them and value their work. Both have steady girlfriends.

Pad doesn't hack any more. The reason isn't the risk of getting caught or the threat of prison. He has stopped hacking because he has realised what a headache it is for a system administrator to clean up his or her computer after an attack. Searching through logs. Looking for backdoors the hacker might have left behind. The hours, the ha.s.sle, the pressure--he thinks it is wrong to put anyone through that. Pad understands far better now how much strain a hacker intrusion can cause another human being.

There is another reason Pad has given up hacking: he has simply outgrown the desire. He says that he has better things to do with his time. Computers are a way for him to earn a living, not a way to spend his leisure time. After a trip overseas he decided that real travel--not its electronic cousin--was more interesting than hacking.

He has also learned to play the guitar, something he believes he would have done years ago if he hadn't spent so much time hacking.

Gandalf shares Pad's interest in travelling. One reason they like contract work is because it lets them work hard for six months, save some money, and then take a few months off. The aim of both ex-hackers for now is simply to sling backpacks over their shoulders and bounce around the globe.

Pad still thinks that Britain takes hacking far too seriously and he is considering moving overseas permanently. The 8lgm court case made him wonder about the people in power in Britain--the politicians, the judges, the law enforcement officers. He often thinks: what kind of people are running this show?

STUART GILL

In 1993, the Victorian Ombudsman1 and the Victoria Police2 both investigated the leaking of confidential police information in a.s.sociation with Operation Iceberg--a police investigation into allegations of corruption against a.s.sistant Commissioner of Police Frank Green. Stuart Gill figured prominently in both reports.

The Victoria Police report concluded that 'Gill was able to infiltrate the policing environment by skilfully manipulating himself and information to the unsuspecting'. The Ombudsman concluded that a 'large quant.i.ty of confidential police information, mainly from the ISU database, was given to ... Gill by [Victoria Police officer]

Cosgriff'.

The police report stated that Inspector Chris Cosgriff had deliberately leaked confidential police information to Gill, and reported that he was 'besotted with Gill'. Superintendent Tony Warren, ex-Deputy Commissioner John Frame and ex-a.s.sistant Commissioner Bernice Masterston were also criticised in the report.

The Ombudsman concluded that Warren and Cosgriff's relations.h.i.+p with Gill was 'primarily responsible for the release of confidential information'. Interestingly, however, the Ombudsman also stated, 'Whilst Mr Gill may have had his own agenda and taken advantage of his relations.h.i.+p with police, [the] police have equally used and in some cases misused Mr Gill for their own purposes'.

The Ombudsman's report further concluded that there was no evidence of criminal conduct by Frank Green, and that the 'allegations made over the years against Mr Green should have been properly and fully investigated at the time they were made'.

PHOENIX

As his court case played in the media, Phoenix was speeding on his motorcycle through an inner-city Melbourne street one rainy night when he hit a car. The car's driver leapt from the front seat and found a disturbing scene. Phoenix was sprawled across the road. His helmet had a huge crack on the side, where his head had hit the car's petrol tank, and petrol had spilled over the motorcycle and its rider.

Miraculously, Phoenix was unhurt, though very dazed. Some bystanders helped him and the distraught driver to a nearby halfway house. They called an ambulance, and then made the two traumatised young men some tea in the kitchen. Phoenix's mother arrived, called by a bystander at Phoenix's request. The ambulance workers confirmed that Phoenix had not broken any bones but they recommended he go to hospital to check for possible concussion.

Still both badly shaken, Phoenix and the driver exchanged names and phone numbers. Phoenix told the driver he did technical work for a 0055 telephone service, then said, 'You might recognise me. I'm Phoenix. There's this big computer hacking case going on in court--that's my case'.

The driver looked at him blankly.

Phoenix said, 'You might have seen me on the TV news.'

No, the driver said, somewhat amazed at the strange things which go through the dazed mind of a young man who has so narrowly escaped death.

Some time after Phoenix's close brush with death, the former hacker left his info-line technician's job and began working in the information technology division of a large Melbourne-based corporation. Well paid in his new job, Phoenix is seen, once again, as the golden-haired boy. He helped to write a software program which reduces waste in one of the production lines and reportedly saved the company thousands of dollars. Now he travels abroad regularly, to j.a.pan and elsewhere.

He had a steady girlfriend for a time, but eventually she broke the relations.h.i.+p off to see other people. Heartbroken, he avoided dating for months. Instead, he filled his time with his ever-increasing corporate responsibilities.

His new interest is music. He plays electric guitar in an amateur band.

ELECTRON

A few weeks after his sentencing, Electron had another psychotic episode, triggered by a dose of speed. He was admitted to hospital again, this time at Larundel. After a short stay, he was released and underwent further psychiatric care.

Some months later, he did speed again, and suffered another bout of psychosis. He kept reading medical papers on the Internet about his condition and his psychiatrists worried that his detailed research might interfere with their ability to treat him.