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2600 Asks: Is Mafiaboy Real?
A couple of people sent the 2600 story that's currently running about mafiaboy, the alleged brains behind the spate of recent large-scale DoS [?] attacks. 2600 has an interesting claim - that they went on IRC as mafiaboy, and that the security expert who claims to have found mafiaboy was snowed by what they told him over IRC - snowed by lies.
(And why I'm posting anynonymously.)
The girl who committed suicide went by the alias "eriss" and "x-error" and "DarkRaven" on IRC. Her real name was Cheryl and she used to hang out in #depression back in April/May of 1999. She went to Simon's Rock College for a little while until the school found out she tried to kill herself so they sent her back home (Honolulu, Hawaii). It's sad she had to get attached so quickly to an IRC dork like icee, but she was an extremely depressed little girl. Oh well.. If you want more details talk to ObsidianZ, Kobi_, `6, or any of the other long-time regulars of #depression on EFNet IRC. One of the ops/regs should still have logs of her last words on the channel before she jumped...
Call him and find out, Mr. Insightful.
Moderators, -1 for missing the blatently obvious.
So there are too many posters. Shall the default threshold continue to be raised, drowning out the hopeful voices which made an effort to be heard?
The DoS attacks happened between February 7 and 14, and we had already identified the place of residence (but not the identity) of the then suspect by February 15, when we started electronic surveilance, physical trailing and ultimatly perquisition and arrestation. Despite popular belief and conspiracy theories fans, we actually know what we're doing (no, really!) and didn't just go pick someone randomly only because of some chat session on IRC. It would be ridiculous to think that our whole case rest on something as shaky as an online conversation (which I have no doubt his lawyer will have a blast with, or at least try). While I won't deny the fact that we were under a lot of pressure, we took the time to build a IMNSHO solid case, which is why we didn't arrest him sonner. I would also like to point out that the boy is far from being a genius, and wasn't able to cover his tracks carefully. I can also tell you that our investigation did not stop with the arrest of this teenager and that we are looking for both additional evidence supporting further charges against him (he is currently only charged with 2 counts of criminal mischief) and for (possible) accomplices.
And 2600 as a reliable source of information? No, seriously? =)
As as side note, many people where looking for the identity of this teenager and assumed they simply missed it in their local newspaper. The Young Offenders Act prevents us from reveling any information that may lead to his identification in order to protect his current and future life as an adult.
--Anonymous, but not coward (my regular account containt way to much information, and the last thing I want is a reporter at my door, which I'm not really sure my boss would appreciate).
This security expert is simply a fraud. I know this because he was a regular in #depression and I've talked to him many many times. His ex gf was a regular there, and she killed herself by jumping out of her window because he was screwing around with some other girl that night. But thats not my point, my point is... Anyone could claim they found who did it, and he's just an example of this. He isn't a Shumormrofhrfdjdieh (however you spell that guys name who "caught" mitnick, heh), he's just a normal person on IRC who thinks "traceroute" is a secret tool (and im serious, I wish I kept the irc logs.. but then again, as 2600 was trying to prove, what do irc logs show?)
taking someones virginity and ditching them in 3 days is hardly a normal romantic breakup, especially when the person kills herself
Several years back, I had the pleasure of working for the ISP mafiaboy used to use as a provider. Then he managed to steal our RADIUS password file ( mind you security was very lax at the time ). He had shown us that he was cluefull to a certain degree however he was mostly blinded by his ego. I am not surprised that he could be the one who was responsible for the DDoS a couple of months back. Nor would I be surprised if he tried to take credit for it. He was liked that. During the incident, we had taken it up with his parents, who seemed not to care too much about it. His father said that he had discpined the boy but we found out that Mafiaboy was still up to no good. So in light of all this, I do believe that the RCMP did get their man and that Mafiaboy was stupid enough to get caught. On a side note, I did not read 2600's post to the world. "Keeping anonymous to protect the ... innocent ?"
His homepage is http://www.ender.com/~icee/.
He dated a girl who later committed suicide, partly due to his idiocy.
He used to hang out on EFNet #depression.
See my tag line!
Hail Eris!
ttyl
Farrell
CAN-CON 2019 - Ottawa's only book oriented Science Fiction Convention! October 18-20, Sheraton Hotel, Ottawa, Canada h
I'm guessing that icee's real name has been in the media reports. (Haven't paid particular attention...) Check to see if that real name matches to the phone numbers given in the IRC logs.
Yeah, someone posing as someone else could've given out that other person's phone, but why risk blowing your cover like that?
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Yeah, and next we'll be tossing 8 year olds in jail. They should just grow up and be responsible for themselves! Just like that. All by themselves! If anything we've heard about this case is true, it sounds like the kids father is a lot more screwed up than he is. The kid should be punished, but not the way they seem to want to punish hackers these days. i.e. Lock 'em up and throw away the key. This is a kid. He deserves a chance to change. He isn't a violent criminal with no conscience. He's a kid that pulled a stupid prank. Yeah, it was a prank that caused a lot of commotion and probably caused some sites to lose some money, but I doubt the damage was anywhere near what they claim it was. They always blow hacking damages all out of proportion, usually be several orders of magnitude. Then they can never back up their claims. The kid should probably (at most) spend a month in juvie. Then they need to make sure he is taken care of. Sounds like his dad might not be around to do it.
I don't have a problem with people being held responsible for their actions, but there needs to be some perspective on things. Destroying a kids life because he made a stupid error in judgement is not the answer.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Try taking a look a CAIDA
-- Andreas
> The internet was designed to be resistant to assault (nuclear or conventional) by rerouting around missing routers. Given the huge percentage of trafic going through Mae East and Mae West I would be sorta surprised if a well placed conventional attack couldn't all but deystroy it.
Hi, my name is Andreas, I come from a different part of the world than the US. You might have heard of it? It's called Europe.
For once I'd wish that people start realizing that more and more Internet traffic stays within the respective countries borders. The US is not what the internet is all about anymore.
-- Andreas
Bowie, why did you shove this in a comment under a completely unrelated story? That's just bizarre, and perhaps unappropriate.
Enough people like propaganda that I'm sure Malda would be willing to make it a Slashdot story.
I like Propaganda, btw, and I might buy a T-shirt, but 100:1 seems kind of high. Dunno. How many shirts does copyleft push?
--Lenny
Nahh... they're not seceding from Quebec until Quebec secedes from Canada. It's called partitionism. And actually, only parts of Montreal have adopted partitionists policies.
:)
I guess it's supposed to make Quebec scared that the rich anglos are gonna leave them and not support their economy. Nope, wait, that already happened. Well... whatever
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Straight ahead of him, nobody can go very far... -- Le P
I don't know about anyone else, but I don't remember there being an awful lot of snow the day of those DDoS's. Am I wrong? Was there enough for some of the schools to have called snow days? I mean, sure, going to University, I'm not affected by the snow days as much, so a parent or high schooler would be best able to answer that.
I'm really impressed, though, that the U.S. media have refrained from using the kid's name or his father's. I mean, technically, since they're not Canadian Media, they're not bound by the Juvenile Non-Disclosure edict. It's kinda nice to see them being respectful.
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Straight ahead of him, nobody can go very far... -- Le P
Depends on the porn. We have an active censorship, and certain types of porn are not allowed past them. Sorry, don't remember which ones. Just remember, we don't have a first ammendment.
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Straight ahead of him, nobody can go very far... -- Le P
And the way they used "oui" to imply he spoke French as well? Not well done. I mean, it could at least have been a "ouai".
If they wanted to impersonate a Quebecor, they could've just asked some members here who would have gladly taught them how to swear in French, and then, when worked up, worked them in. You can usually tell whether the person swearing is from France or Quebec by this simple rule. If they're using holy words like chalice, tabernacle and so on, they're from Quebec. Anything else, and they're either from non-Quebec Canada or France. I'm not too sure exactly how the rest of the French world swears, just Canada and France.
And about the snowday... I already mentioned that I don't remember there being enough snow for a snowday that day. But, then again, I'm not affected by them, so I'm waiting for feedback on that.
I feel pretty sorry for the kid, though. In the Gazette(Montreal paper) they mentioned how some of his classmates said he said (check out the hearsay chain) he has to be uber careful... he can't even snark to the teachers or he'll be out on his ear. Damn, how an arrest sucks.
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Droit devant soi on ne peut pas aller bien loin...
Straight ahead of him, nobody can go very far... -- Le P
The internet was not designed to be resistant to nuclear or conventional assault. it was designed to permit people to timeshare on remote computers without the hassle of setting up direct connections each time.
iirc, there was even the idea (briefly) of setting up a centralized switch in Omaha. packets, a relatively new idea, were just liked better for this application.
At the time ARPANet started, ARPA financed all kinds of stuff not related to DoD. You can tell when they changed their policy to only financing DoD related work, 'cos they changed their name to DARPA.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
Imagine being a prosecuter trying to explain to a jury how 2600's logs are proof of some crime.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Okay, so I'm a lamer. The only IRC channel I've been on was #hottub back in 1991. So, I have to ask, what does this mean?
So what does 3090 mean? It's just clicks and whisles to me...
Potato chips are a by-yourself food.
logan
Actually, Mafiaboy is not supposed to have been working alone. The general media has been getting it completely wrong. According to the article in the Wall Street Journal that I read about way back & posted earlier this month (look for Zen), there are supposedly two, count 'em TWO people involved in the DoS attacks. One extremely bright individual, who took down Yahoo for an incredibly long time, and one not so bright cracker who decided that it was kewl to do copycat crimes, and got himself caught. This second individual is Mafiaboy, not to be confused with the genius that took down Yahoo! Mafiaboy apparently left his fingerprints all over the place, and the original culprit did not. But for some reason, the media is not making the distinction between the two, and while I have not read a report that claims that he is directly responsible for the Yahoo! attack, I have read many articles that say that he was involved in the attacks that took down yahoo, etc, etc... Leading everyone to believe that he was the 'real' cracker. Food for thought.
(with apologies to Monty Python)
--
--
The Internet is the Suppository of All Knowledge. You get it in the end.
heh, make what you will of this, but here's a /wi mafiaboy from efnet at about 1:15am 4/20 edt. me, i'm going to sleep.
ÚÄ Ä Ä Ä ÄÄÚÄÄÄÄ Ä Ä Ä ÄÄ ÄÄ Ä
[mafiaboy.] (7777777@HSE-Toronto-ppp95609.sympatico.ca) [Canada ]
[ircname..] AODiSO-iCOiSO-HERITAGE-RTS-KNiFE-CADMiUM
[channels.] #irc.core.com #kznetworks #syndicate99
[server...] irc.nethead.com ([207.246.129.125] DOWN WITH PANTS)
ÀÄ ÄÄ Ä ÄÄÄÙÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Ä ÄÄÄ
Legend has it that the really good crackers never say anything and are never known to the world. I don't know if thats really true or not (how could you verify it, really?), but everyone else brags a lot.
Someone one asked Alfred Hitchcock what the ultimate crime was. His response: "The one we haven't heard about yet."
Seems apropos.
Why does the log even have to be real, its a collection of text anybody could simply type into vi. IRC logs are not evidence, especially without at least some server headers or something.
justin@jplt.com - http://www.jplt.com
I realize this is a bit offtopic, but interesting none-the-less. Has anyone paid attention to what Janet Reno has had to say about this whole thing? Here's an article at The Register. She says that this proves that the US can catch 'cybercriminals' but they haven't proven anything yet as Mafiaboy has not gone to trial. Reno is ready to let the kid hang. Anyone else thing that the US gov't is getting a little to crazy about this whole 'cybercrime' thing? IMHO, security belongs in the hands of the admins, not the gov't. If your computer is on the internet, secure it!
All the Reuters article says is that someone named Mafiaboy, like countless other "script kiddies", was looking for DoS programs. This is not exactly a smoking gun.
Someone on IRC lying about their identity? It defies belief. I'd write more, but this 19yr old 36DD nympho I met online wants to meet me "alone and unarmed". I'm so excited!
--Shoeboy
Because i'm in school, you nugget. Now scurry back into your cave, troll. Sheesh
Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)
Bowie J. Poag
I did the same thing for a year, actually. Except I wasnt Fry Clerk at McDonalds. I was the Network Manager for the Chem department's visualization lab.
Oh, and by the way, you're welcome. I'm glad you enjoy my work.
Bowie J. Poag
Project Founder, PROPAGANDA For Linux (http://metalab.unc.edu/propaganda)
Bowie J. Poag
I love how icee says that he's a 20 year old, sitting around, eating pizza. Then a bit further down the chat log, he starts in with this long diatribe about how back in the day, when he was "in the scene," things were different, and there was respect, and a bunch of other holier than thou stuff. Wow, those 20 years made him pretty wise, huh? I'm 21 now, and was following the hacking scene for a bit as a teenager, and it wasn't much different. Except people were using DOS instead of Win98. Big deal.
It cracks me up to see how much bragging some of these dumbasses do.
This really tells us absolutely nothing but NPR was just reporting that the father of the kid has been arrested too. Apparently on an unrelated charge: the phone was bugged because of mafia_boy and during the surveillance they heard the father planning an assault on a "business colleague"!
> Looks a bit like 'resume enhancement' for some has-been/never-was at some company..
.com.owners, .com.consumers, .com.shareholders, and venture capitalists of the world. It's OK, folks. We have the highwayman in custody. You can spend your money safely now.
More importantly, resume enhancement for some politician / law enforcement officer, who has just sent out a strong We Will Protect Your Money (TM) message to the
Any time you have a crime (or even a prank) that causes hysteria, The Man will gladly imprison anyone he can pin the blame on, guilty or no. This has been true from long before the Lindberg kidnapping right up to the latest child-care "reconstructed memory" witch trials.
In this case, they'll happily string up a Kipt Scriddie, so long as the media covers it well.
If^H^H When it happens again, well, there's always another Kipt Scriddie found easily enough. Sure beats having to find the brains that make it possible.
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Uhh...
DHCP servers keep logs. Easily. Web servers keep logs. Many firewalls keep logs.
IT's sort of like doing a manual phone trace.. but one CAN, with cooperation from admins along the way, find out *exactly* where packets are coming from.
And the guy bragged about it too... to top it off.
I'm probably not alone. My corporate proxy server does not allow access to 2600's web site. Could some kind soul mirror the article on a site that I can reach?
Terry Layne
Portland, OR
I fail to see how they can trace this type of DDoS back to a single individual. With all the firewalls, DHCP's and other addressing schemes, good luck finding him. I think that it's all made up for the media, and to put businesses and people at ease, thinking that "if you screw the Internet you can get caught."
We do. You just can't see them any more.
Have you been moderated up *once* so far as funny, insightful, informative, or even underrated?
Yes
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
think more clearly
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
well, I found this picture on his website. (I found it pretty quickly), and that should answer any questions as to his over all lameness...
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
What relevance do any of these tidbits have to the article? Sweet FA, execpt they're about the same guy.
It's gossip. It adds nothing to the story, or to whether mafiaboy exists or not.
Poor sucker, his home phone number is now posted
all over the net.
Anyone try calling him yet?
;)
-EH
Considering how Hasbro has been stingy with their circumstantial intellectual property not to mention unhelpful to hobbyist programmers, I'd say they aren't the real "Stella" either!
The nickname being used was mafiaboy, not [mafiaboy]. The brackets are convention used to notate private messages sent from the client user to someone else. Similarly, enclosing the nick in asterisks is used to notate private messages received from another user. And enclosing the nick in equal signs is used to notate DCC chat messages received from another user.
From the log:
>>> icee [icee@dragon.ender.com] requested DCC CHAT from mafiaboy
If the nick were [mafiaboy] this line would read:
>>> icee [icee@dragon.ender.com] requested DCC CHAT from [mafiaboy]
Got it? Good.
specially since they traced the logs on the routers..as the "security expert" who got trolled by 2600 pointed out, the QoS logs on the routers dont lie.
Mafiab0y even has an homepage!
[Also, no one from Quebec was arrested in this case; the 2600 people used some French to imply someone from Quebec
(as there are more people speak French in Quebec then anywhere else, except France). The "security expert" didn't catch on, apparently. Mafiaboy is from Montreal.]
Um...Montreal *is* in Quebec.
Isn't this wired tapping "illegal search and seisure" and the arrest based on "Prior restraint?" This type of arrest is Barbaric.
No. The wiretap was in place because the boy was a suspect. The RCMP would have had a warrant, signed by some judge or another, allowing them to put the wiretap in place.
Any evidence of any crime found in a legitimate investigation is permissable. This is why someone pulled over for speeding can be busted for, say, possession of a narcotic.
------
If a tree falls on an anonymous coward yelling 'first post' in the forest, does anybody hear?
Cheryl had something valuable, something icee wanted. It is obvious that if the story really played out the way it seems to have, she was a notch on his belt and a sexual experience to store away for the future. Of course she shouldn't have committed suicide, but should he have done this to her? Although, from some cultural perspectives that would allow her to hold on to her honor. No, and just because he hasn't been punished for his crime (which may not fall into the realm of law) doesn't mean he shouldn't have to suffer for it.
This guy pretended to care about her to get something from her, and then dropped her when he got it. It isn't helpful to anyone to allow a creature like this to go on in the world, unmarked and unscathed feeling no remorse for his actions.
Actually, the most disturbing thing about this story, to me, is how close it is to the famous opera, Madame Butterfly it's almost the exact same story. I liked it much better when it was just an opera.
I wish she hadn't killed herself, because that makes the nasty effects of one bad experience permanent. If she had survived it, she might've had a bright future. So, I would like to let anyone who has been used that it will get better and you can survive it. If you survive long enough, you may even get even, or have a chance to forget the thing because it becomes irrelevant. But this does not give people the right to use other people, it would be a really stupid world that allowed a guy like this to get away with no sanctions.
If I had been her, I wouldn't have committed suicide, I'd have followed the road of Hell and chosen vengeance over honor... ... ...
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
Informative? Funny, maybe. Informative, not a chance.
--GnrcMan--
Well..the guy they caught was on TV the other night and didn't ever deny he did it.
All the Reuters article says is that someone named Mafiaboy, like countless other "script kiddies", was looking for DoS programs.
Maybe he just has a very old, pre-Windows PC...
Who is this masked marauder known simply as mafiaboy, you ask? Well, if you must know, he's my Canadian dwarven father. You got a problem with that? He lives in a subteranean cave covered by snow and he's being sustained by moose droppings. If you are still reading this, you are obviously a media whore, looking for his latest scoop, not unlike the one who supposedly captured this notorious hacker.
Wow, I thought that the only diff between Canadians and americans are those floppy heads.
Isn't this wired tapping "illegal search and seisure" and the arrest based on "Prior restraint?" This type of arrest is Barbaric.
Call the phone number say, "Is icee there? This is mafiaboy."
- I like pudding.
It's a recursive prank! ;)
Hmmm, maybe 2600 is being secretly sponsored by a certificate authority ...
I am quite civilized, and I should be brought a beer immediately. -- Bruce Sterling
Just kidding.
I am quite civilized, and I should be brought a beer immediately. -- Bruce Sterling
as you can see from the IRC logs below, we dropped a few clues that the person was in a country with snow and at one point "accidentally" spoke French to imply the province of Quebec. We were amazed when the blame actually landed on someone from Montreal.
The snow reference referrs to the following block of text:
=icee= but WHY do it?
[mafiaboy] snowday
[mafiaboy] haha
And the French referred to a single use of the word "Oui", late in the chat log. Now, the first use of the word "Canada", appears way at the top and comes not from 2600 (mafiaboy), but from *icee*.. again, before 2600 mentions snow or french:
*icee* oh, did you listen to our radio stuff up there in Canada, too?
That's it. The rest of the conversation is harmless, and this portion would be harmless except for the statement that 2600 made implying that these comments helped lead researchers to Canada. Give me a break.
I've got no idea who *icee* is, and 2600's claims that mafiaboy is fake or at least not the right guy are fine with me, but this conversation makes 2600 look less like they have a clue than the FBI who at least are talking about routing logs and web logs and real data. At least I got a laugh out of this:
=icee= okay, we need to solve this trust problem, and prove you are who you say you are..
[mafiaboy] 3090
[mafiaboy] good enough?
Yeah. Good enough. :-P
You can format messages how ever you want them formated. My format is somewhat of an "information overload" :-)
Canadian? Everyone knows the real mafiaboy is italian. Damn you oppressive government, leave our teenagers alone.
When Michael Lyle, chief technical officer of Internet-security firm Recourse Technologies Inc., first accused Mafiaboy of the attacks,(just a couple weeks after they happened) he based it on chat-room talk. People were very skeptical then, and I recall someone making similiar claims - that they had impersonated the DoS perpetrator in chat rooms.
It appears the RCMP don't have much more. Maybe the arrest was just so they could search his computer for evidence, because from what's been reported in the press, there isn't any real hard evidence against him.
Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
James M. Atkinson, president and senior engineer of the Boston-based Granite Island Group, a technical counterintelligence firm, said computer logs show that Mafiaboy was looking for a "script" program and asking for information and assistance in IRC chat rooms last summer about how he can launch a denial-of-service attack
From Granite Island Group website, Mr. Atkinson's qualifications:
Reminds me of this college application essay.
Didn't somebody already mention that April Fool's is long past? Or is this the real life James Bond? What I can't figure out is why he's so eager to publicize his credentials... if I were he, I would imagine it would be more profitable to be invisible...
Here's an interesting quote:
James M. Atkinson has completed more Formal Technical Training (from Apple) than anyone else we have on record.
- Apple Computer Training Department, Austin TX, Fall 1995
And the kicker:
In order to remain proficient, Mr. Atkinson attends at least 500 hours of formal security and technical training each year (a average of one day a week). He has currently completed over 12,500 hours of advanced security and technical training with industry leaders such as: Microsoft, Apple, AT&T, Sun, Silicon Graphics, Digital, Watkins Johnson, Hewlett Packard, Northern Telecom, Rolm, Cisco, IBM, Motorola, Toshiba, and dozens of others (including multiple government schools).
He must be a God. (Or maybe he has a really boring life).
Sheesh. Am I the only one who laughed at this?
Mozilla
Has anything ever happened regarding the Internet that 2600 wasn't _completely sure_ was a conspiracy?
Yeah, right! 'Cause nobody ever lies on IRC.
The story also mentiones the same conspiracy theory:
I guess we'll never know...?
Hi!
[I have never seen a place that allowed a nick longer than 9 characters..]
Uhh, try irc.nevernet.net, for example..
First posting isn't trolling. It's...first posting.
Well, if 2600's mafiaboy isn't the real mafiaboy, then how do we know that they were talking to the real icee?
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
Other posters have commented that this seems a bit paranoid, what with the evidence and all. 2600 is claiming that the FBI doesn't have the real Mafiaboy.
Well, I claim that they're not the real 2600! We've been paying attention to a fake! Through subtle manipulation over an extended period of time, "2600" has usurped the rightful entity behind the name!
The true 2600 is, and always has been, here
-Denor
And his dad's too. I turns out that while they were after this canadian teenager, they discovered while wiretapping his house, that his 45-years-old dad was planning with a hitman to assault or scare the hell out of one of his business associates.
So, be careful, you never know when the police is coming to get your son =)
What a strange (and offtopic, I admit) coincidence.
"All the things one has forgotten scream for help in dreams". Elias Canetti
Someone working out their ability to write bad hacker plots for movies. Bah!
You forget that Mafiaboy was being charged before 2600 did anything.
that's what i was asking. i went through their article a couple of times and didn't think i saw which came first. i thought they were implying that it was their prank that was being used as evidence against the kid.
otoh, if he was already charged, shouldn't he have not been on IRC "bragging about it"?
that 2600 might actually be responsible for the arrest of that teenager in montreal? am i the only person this was suggested to by their writing? i mean, ok, they go on IRC and pose as someone from quebec. then someone from quebec gets arrested. maybe i missed something in 2600's write-up, but it seems to me they ought to be paying the kid's lawyer fees.
i'm hoping someone proves me wrong on this...
Here's an interesting (to me at least) thought: What if this Mafiaboy was merely a rube in some bust to get his father? All we know right now is that his father (who can't be named, because it'll indirectly identify a youth) got caught discussing an assault on a business associate, because his phones were being tapped to get his kid. So so 15-year old in Montreal has a computer, a Sympatico account, and a father who's potentially nefarious for his underworldly exploits. Go to a judge, say "because of this information gleaned through IRC chats and router info, we need to investigate this household" then nab the father for tax evasion... ... whoops, that was a different mobster.
I us3d m4h l33t A0L H4x0r t00ls. err...wait. didn't i say that the Feds log everything on IRC a few stories ago? I doubt some 15 year old kid did it by himself. I bet it was some college kids pissed off cause their Univ. blocked Napster. Or maybe it was metallica...But to be honest. I bet Hoover had something to do with it. the CIA put 187 for MLK and JFK and CIA saw IRC say DoS...damnit i ran out of the 3 letter words and acronyms. German gives me more 3 letter prepositions.
Ok this is already offtopic and i can't think of any saving points. So karma police come and get me.
Chaos, Mayhem, and Destruction: Not
BTW, the fact that the situation was similar to one I was in was merely a coincidence. I wasn't trying to make a point with that.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
I don't give a fuck about icee, mafiaboy, 2600 or any of this, but your comments I had to respond to. You're calling this guy a predator because of a failed romantic relationship. Grow up. Relationships fail in the real world with just as much regularity as they do on IRC. Nobody's a predator - I've had my heart broken in almost exactly the manner you describe above, and I've broken at least one heart, as has almost every adult alive. I'm a stronger, more complete person because of it - all of it. I've never been "preyed" on or "preyed" on anyone else.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
> *icee* oh, did you listen to our radio stuff up there in Canada, too?
>That's it. The rest of the conversation is harmless, and this portion would be harmless except for the statement that 2600
>made implying that these comments helped lead researchers to Canada. Give me a break.
You weren't following the script closely enough! Here's the bits relevant to the Canada revelation.
[mafiaboy] i know you're not a fed. you're with Recourse Technologies in sunny palo alto
...
2600 cleverly plants the radio clue which crafty *icee* picks up on.*icee* oh, did you listen to our radio stuff up there in Canada, too?
[mafiaboy] you were on the radio too???
*icee* i think they're the only people i talked to who called it sunny palo alto
According th Reuters there are all sorts of ICQ, Usenet and IRC logs that connect Mafiaboy with the crime.
PS: Read the articles linked to the above article and judge for yourself if Mafiaboy is the real culprit or not.
Man, who ever wrote this script needs to do some sitcoms. The drama is wonderful...
----Quid
Less talk, more caffeine
I agree with you somewhat, but all relationships are different, and I don't believe this was a "failed" relationship as much as him using her. Yeah, I could believe he's sincere and he might not of used her, but I don't. It happens, and he used her, and unless you happen to be close to either of them and know what happened, I don't really think you can say much about it, can you? So I disagree with you, I certainly believe there are "predators" out there, men and women who use others for sex, money, weird senses of power they have over others. Human nature also states that predators go for weak and sick prey, and Cheryl was most certainly vunerable. You have been lucky if you haven't been preyed upon, or used, but your probably a lot stronger than Cheryl was. I'm consider myself pretty strong, and I've been used.
I realize it's offtopic and probably most unreasonable, because I'll never give the prick a chance, but I don't care. It's a failing I'm willing to live with. I lost someone very dear to me, and even if she hadn't committed suicide, I'd still be angry at him. Just maybe not as much as I am now.
Never the less, you said you were in a certain situation. Maybe you were used, maybe you weren't, but you could handle what happened, but Cheryl most certainly wasn't. Who knows why the person did what she/he did to you, but I believe "icee" used Cheryl, because she was weak, therefore he "preyed" on her. On top of all this, all people are different, so you can hardly judge other relationships to be just like yours, because it sounds like a similar experience.
no one from Quebec was arrested in this case
hey buddy, Montreal, the place in where mafiaboy was arrested, is in Quebec!
-- This sig is.
The media around my place is reporting that Mafiaboy is a 9th grade student at a local high school..
-FweE-
"QoS logs don't lie" etc..
That's a load of crap right there. There is no real way to establish the veracity of single log files.
Once you get a lot of logs from many different sources and they show similarities, *then* you have a case that it's very *probable* that the logs are true. But still no absolutes. It's just that tampering is less likely with different sources.
"l0pht taking down the net" etc
also not very likely. Seriously disable several segments, maybe. The closer you get to the core of the internet (there no longer is an actual core, but...) the more highly skilled the operators become. Not to discredit the l0pht people, though. They're definitely on the level.
"buggy routers" etc
Oh, man. Like you wouldn't believe. The main reason routers don't usually come under direct attack is because most of the hacking/cracking/whatever activity comes from 31337 kiddies on IRC. Sure, they have linux on their machine, but how many of them have a stack of Cisco routers to experiment with? IOS doesn't really resemble linux all that much, you know and equipment like this is usually operated and hacked on by people who get paid to keep them running. Not very likely that they'd be spreading around exploit code until after the problem has been fixed, right?
*borkborkbork*
It requires BIG skills to use ddos.exe nowdays. I'm very impressed wether it's MafiaBoy or not 8-).
Je ne sait pas pourquoi tout le mond parle de 'mafiaboy'? Il ne pas un 'mafiaboy', il est un 'mafia-garcon'!
Have you ever being in Montreal? I spent 2 years there. Very nice downtown, it's called the "Old City" etc. On the other hand I think Canada has one of the highest rates of suicide among teenagers. Some of them commit suicide quitely and some become "Mafia-Garcons".
On the other hand, I don't believe this story has any merit and BTW. why would a serious person cracking into some servers try to remove all his/her trails just to leave huge foot-steps all over IRC channels?
You can't handle the truth.
I thought trolls lived under bridges. Do /. trolls live under routers?...
---
How am I supposed to fit a pithy, relevant quote into 120 characters?
...he lives in the heart of you and me, in anyone who's every sat bleary-eyed in front of a CRT at 3-am, anyone who has subsisted on Pop-tarts, Zingers, and Mountain Dew, anyone who has been shunned by society only to find acceptance in the warmth of a x86 processor! Yes, he even lives in you, Scarecrow! Every time you lick the neon Cheet-o residue off your fingers so you won't get it lodged in your keyboard...MafiaBoy is with you...each time the BSOD causes you to flop on the ground like a Pokemon-induced seizure...MafiaBoy is there flinching too!...every time you've told a newbie to try 'this really cool command, rm -r *'...MafiaBoy was laughing right along! Don't you see, Timmy? You can't touch or see MafiaBoy, he surrounds us, invisible yet guiding us. So, when those kids tell you there ain't such thing as MafiaBoy, you tell em' what ol' MorboNixon told ya! And that, ya see, is the real meaning of MafiaBoy. Now let me tell ye how I invented the question mark...
lots of people are engineers at IBM...does this mean anything?
WYF? "I come from a different time and a different ethic" WTF???? This kid is younger than me. And that ain't saying much. I have been round long enough that I used to hang out in IRC channels when only the 31337 were on. But everyone cool has since left...or so I thought. WTF?
Come to papa!
tcd004
Danny: Hosts a boring local radio program
Emmanuel: Hosts a boring local radio program
Danny: Quasi celebrity status among '70's freaks
Emmanuel: Quasi celebrity status among telephone phreaks
Danny: Periods of heavy drug usage
Emmanuel: Periods of heavy drug usage
Danny: Involved in sex scandal with another man
Emmanuel: Involved in sex scandal with another man
Danny: Last name is "Bonaduce"
Emmanuel: Friends with Phiber Optik whose first handle was "Il Duce"
Danny: Supplements income by doing desperate local talk shows whenever he can
Emmanuel: Supplements income by doing desperate talk shows whenever he can
It seems to me everytime an alleged hacker is caught the media seems to just assume they are guilty. In the newspaper I see mafiaboy described as the hacker that did the DoS attacks. Meanwhile, on the front page I see a story about an ALLEGED shooter who shot and killed two people in front of a room full of people. I guess some guy who kills two people in front of a room full of people deserves a greater presumption of innocence then some 15 year old kid who brought down a couple of web sites.
:P
The media also seems to imply that these attacks had to do with some sort of great computer skills; any person with basic computer competence could do these attacks, most of us just aren't stupid enough to actually do it
About all I've heard about this case is that they caught the guy because he bragged about doing it on irc. Lots of hacker wannabes brag about doing stuff they never did all the time. The bigger the better. It's kind of like in high school when guys brag about having sex with so and so, when the people doing the most bragging are really virgins. This is pretty thin evidence to convict someone with, and besides, didn't this happen before with the last guy they arrested for exactly this crime?
---
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
If he actually did it, do you think he'd actually be "braggibg" about where he can be discovered?
Yes, actualy. Crackers (even bad ones like what the mainstream media says Mafiaboy is, which is fairly plausible) very often brag about their exploits. Legend has it that the really good crackers never say anything and are never known to the world. I don't know if thats really true or not (how could you verify it, really?), but everyone else brags a lot.
You are right about the government and media just needing someone to point a finger at, though.
Not a typewriter
In all the mainstream Mafiaboy stories, they point to IRC logs. Where are these logs? Why aren't they linked to, if they exist? If they aren't allowed to, then why not? Shouldn't that be evidence to show the press? Or is the FBI worried that anyone viewing the logs might see holes in their case? Or do the logs not exist? Is some FBI lacky makeing fake logs now to show later?
What about Twinkies? When can I DoS a Twinkie? Will it work with fat free Twinkies? The people want to know!!!
Not a typewriter
"hey! maybe mafiaboy is symbolic of our teamwork!"
"hmm... nah, they said there'd be sandwiches."
Judge Pag is a character from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. He was a judge, though he never judgemental, and indeed rarely sober.
Pag is sort of my alter-ego, the kind of person I would want to be if I wasn't so darn busy being the person I am. I'm not learned, I'm not impartial, and I'm usually not very relaxed. but a geek can dream, can't he?
Judge Pag, the Learned, Impartial, and Very Relaxed
As soon as a person is accused of an internet crime, create and publish some believeable yet absolutely fake backstory that brings the evidence into doubt
to be fair, though the govt. was asking for it. Arresting somebody based on something as unsubstantial as an irc chat was bound to backfire.
I know that when I was a kid I would have gladly claimed responsibility for some hack if it made complete strangers admire me. But I was young and stupid then. Fortunately, I'm not young anymore.
Judge Pag, the Learned, Impartial, and Very Relaxed
Somebody impersonates someone else online (President Clinton ring a bell?) and the one getting (supposedly) impersonated gets arrested?
I don't want to "predict" the future or anything, but watch this case closely, it sounds like the government has found a new Mitnick to replace the old one that they finally let out after years of abuse.
"See, we plan ahead! That way, we never have to do anything now."
It's all over the news here for sometime. They can't say its name because he's a minor but he certainly does exist and apparently the GRC has proofs.
I'd have to say that that makes sense...
Kindof.
...not much to add really, it's just well, ythe average joe busness would probably be more at ease.
;-P
- AZ
- AZ
According to a Wired story the father was evidently involved in some illegal activities of his own. Sounds to me like they decided to charge the kid with some stuff so they could tap the phone, search the house, etc. and find some details on the father's crimes. The dad was the real target, they just went after the kid so that they had a legal excuse to raid the dad.
`Lex - Find Me Here: Text Appeal
Reminds me of the time a sometimes friend of mine accidentally erased /etc/passwd on a box he and another guy were using for penetration tests. He said that he had to crack the box to get back in and wouldn't tell me how he did it (at the time I knew nothing about linux).
If you need text styles to communicate then you don't have a message.
Yes he's real... I've seen some people being online with him and even talked about it... - before all this became public. Bleh.
Tomorrow will be cancelled due to lack of interest
as 2600 demonstrated (but should already be obvious to the novice net user), anyone can log in to IRC and claim to somebody else. there is no strong evidence in the chat log to prove that this "security expert" is who he claims to be. perhaps BOTH parties were falsely representing themselves.
...that basically this whole deal is going to turn into a huge media circus to make some opportunist, -somewhere-, some beaucoup cash. It might just be me, but everytime I see some 'expert' on computer security talking to the media at large, that we're probably dealing with some half-wit who can string the words together to get he sound bite.
Looks a bit like 'resume enhancement' for some has-been/never-was at some company who'd look really good with some press attention, not investigation, n'est ce pas? Too bad that some 15 year old kid in Canada is probably going to take the fall so they can fatten their bottom line.
But I'm an old fogey who checks my electronic fences, writes my letters to congress, opts out of as much as I can, and keeps my nose clean.
In space, no one can hear you moo.
I own one of your t-shirts. Here's an idea: for everybody who buys one of your shirts, make them a made-to-order desktop tile. How about that?
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Visit
A quick quote:" Montreal police hauled the father in last week after investigators, who were monitoring his 15-year-old son via tapped telephones, overheard the father and another man make plans for the assault, police officials said"
Well, if not me, who? If not now, when?
fnord!
like I said, nobody says fnord anymore.
...the story was exactly that, fiction. If they could log on as mafiaboy, I'm sure someone could log on as icee. icee seemed more paranoid than 2600 posing as mafiaboy. What if...they are desperate for some good press after all this bad press from the whole MPAA/DeCSS thing? What if...this was all true? What if.../*insert conspiracy here*/?
"The quality of life is determined by its activites."--Aristotle
On the Wotld Net Daily (worldnetdaily) site there are two articles in the archives regarding a supposed group called the Hong Kong Blondes. The latest article is an interview with a Thailand cell of the Blondes. They claim responsibility for the wave of DOS attacks. One thing that does make some sense is their claim that they used the FBI's own computer system at the launch point for the attack. Perhaps this could explain why the FEDs had such a major burr under their butt, and why the real source of the attack will not be disclosed, and why they have to pick a Canadian teenager as their culprit. Anyway, check out the two articles, search term - Hong Kong Blondes.