FEMA Phones Hacked, Calls Made To Mideast and Asia

purplehayes writes "A hacker broke into a Homeland Security Department telephone system over the weekend and racked up about $12,000 in calls to the Middle East and Asia. The hacker made more than 400 calls on a Federal Emergency Management Agency voicemail system in Emmitsburg, Md., on Saturday and Sunday, according to FEMA spokesman Tom Olshanski."

Comments

In FEMA's defense

[elrous0]

The hacker was in New Orleans. So they were obligated by official policy to ignore his calls.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[cayenne8]

"The hacker was in New Orleans. So they were obligated by official policy to ignore his calls."

Hey, it would be a little 'justice'...considering how badly FEMA screwed over many from the area.

Just another example of the incompetence of this Federal government agency. From my experience with them, and most all other govt agencies that have to deal with large numbers of people...sadly, the incompetence, red tape, and waste of money is a common denominator.

And now...we're wanting to put THEM in charge of our medical care? Scary.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[Shadow Wrought]

He was actually only trying to call one person, but every time the caller ID came up as FEMA the guy panicked and wouldn't answer. When the authorities showed up at the poor guys house he was in a fetal position, rocking himself back and forth saying over and over again, "FEMA. Keeps Calling. Won't stop. FEMA!!!"

Re:In FEMA's defense

[AlterRNow]

Did anyone else "hear" that in Abe Simpsons voice?

"Epa! Eeeepaaa!"

Re:In FEMA's defense

[apparently]

Just curious, would you advocate privately run police forces?

The DEA is already employing private security for their raids.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, it would be a little 'justice'...considering how badly FEMA screwed over many from the area.

Once upon a time, people believed these words: "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country!" Though, I doubt you can figure out what I'm getting at.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[Dantu]

...sadly, the incompetence, red tape, and waste of money is a common denominator.

And now...we're wanting to put THEM in charge of our medical care? Scary.

Well, as a Canadian I can tell you that you're right, health-care run but bureaucrats is a bit scary. But, there is a bit of a problem with the alternative: the nature of heath-care is such that unless you are VERY rich, you want insurance. The problem with insurance is that it's not their job to heal you, it's their job to make money - and they are very good at it.

So, an incompetent bureaucrat managing my health care dollars is still much better than an insurance company.

PS: This goes for car insurance to. British Columbia has mandatory crown insurance - the company makes money for the government and still has lower insurance rates than the privatized provinces (I now live in Ontario).

Re:In FEMA's defense

[mOdQuArK!]

I'm a little uncertain as to why you think private insurance provides more efficient health care? If anything, private insurance makes more profit by denying as much health care as possible.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[Dishevel]

Arm everyone. Not just the criminals.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[megaditto]

"Ask not what your country can do for you[...]

I recognize these words. I think these were uttered by JF Kennedy, the man who started the war in Vietnam, sent thousands of American conscripts to die there, all while snorting coke off Marilyn Monroe sweet butt (and while his brother the Attorney General Bobby Kennedy wiretapped Martin Luther King and other civil rights leaders).
No wonder that asshole didn't want us asking what our country could do for us.

[...] but what you can do for your country!"

You actually believe that shit? Talk about "useful idiots"...

Re:In FEMA's defense

[ColdWetDog]

So, an incompetent bureaucrat managing my health care dollars is still much better than an insurance company.

The big, really big, in fact just simply enormous problem with where the US healthcare system is heading is that you will have an incompetent bureaucracy subcontracting management to an insurance company. Worst of both worlds.

If you think the problem is bad now, just wait until we fix it! (attrib: somebody or other, use Google if you must know)

Re:In FEMA's defense

[pcolaman]

Before you start acting like you know what you are talking about...nevermind, just don't speak. You are from AR, your experience with Hurricanes amounts to what leftovers you may get with a storm that passes through Mississippi. I went through Ivan, Dennis, parts of Katrina, etc etc. I live in Pensacola, which is right in the middle of Hurricane Alley. The problems with New Orleans were primarily the fault of the state of Louisiana and the city government, not the Federal Government and FEMA. Mayor Nagin advised people NOT to leave town and only gave the order to evac less than 24 hours before the storm hit. And the city and state misused Federal funds that were supposed to be used to shore up the levies. Let's not forget that Biloxi had far worse damage from Katrina, but was forgotten because NO had serious flooding damage from the levies collapsing, not from storm damage. Most of the damage occurred days after the Hurricane, not while it was passing through. And the US Army and US Navy were the first on the scene, but even they had to wait until the storm was out of the way. No use trying to rescue people if your helicopters are damaged beyond use because of storm damage. Oh yeah, while we're on this discussion, let's talk about the fact that people were basically handed free money in the form of Debit cards after Katrina, without any vetting process to determine who needed money. Everything from Girls Gone Wild to Sex change operations were purchased with said free Debit cards. What major aid was given to Biloxi, given that their wind damage was far worse than that of New Orleans? For that matter, other than blue tarps and MREs, people in Pensacola had to all but fend for themselves after Ivan, but we managed just fine. If you REALLY had experience with Hurricanes, you'd know that you are responsible for surviving on your own for a maximum of 5 days, as the state and federal government will tell you, because sometimes it's not possible for them to get to you immediately. It was a failure on the city and state's fault to not prepare their populace, and the stupidity of the people of New Orleans for living in a city below sea level. It was bound to happen eventually.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[Das Modell]

He's wearing a Blackwater t-shirt. It doesn't mean he's actually a Blackwater contractor. I also don't see any reason for the DEA to hire Blackwater for something like this.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[jbezorg]

Thanks for answering it allows me to make my point now that I can see where you stand.

We accept public service in situations when speed of the response is more important than the choice of who is providing the service and since choice is not an option making the "who" publicly accountable is important.

As US citizens for the most part we readily accept police, fire and rescue services run by or answerable to a government agency be it local, state or federal.

My question is why do we suddenly not accept that system at the door to the hospital that may very well be privately owned and monopolize an area for the emergency services provided by police, fire and rescue?

Re:In FEMA's defense

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, and people are stupid for living in California with its earthquakes and wildfires, and people are stupid for living in the midwest with the tornados, and people are stupid for living pretty much anywhere in the U.S. with the yellowstone caldera overdue to blow, and people are stupid for living . . .

Pensacola has had the misfortune to be hit by several hurricanes. By your logic, you are a fool to still live there.

And for all of the smug idiots who think they are paying for me to live in what should be a swamp, you don't think my tax dollars go to benefit you in any way? I pay my own way just like you do. I just expected the government to respond more effectively to a disaster that happened to hit my home. And I expected my homeowners insurance and my federal flood insurance, which I pay for every month, to actually pay out at a reasonable rate when my home gets wiped off the face of the earth without endless delays and bureaucratic crap.

Enjoy your smug self-righteous attitude and hope that if anything ever happens to you the rest of us don't share your attitude.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[inerlogic]

you're just jealous you didn't get to snort coke off marilyn's crack....

Re:In FEMA's defense

[cayenne8]

"What's scary is that the rest of the world seems to be able to have the government handle health care and they pay less for it than we do. "

Yeah...and you end up paying like 60%+ or more in taxes on what you make? No thank you...I'd rather take my money and do it myself. I set up a HSA, max it out with money pre-tax, and pay as I go. I get discounts from physicans on office visits and tests when they find I'm paying for myself. I have a high ($1200) deductible account ONLY for disasterous emergency care if I need it....but, for the rest of the stuff...I like the way I have it. I can also take that HSA money, and invest it in the market.....what's left at retirement....is my retirement money too. In the long run, I can come put WAY ahead of anyone taxing my at such a high rate, or even paying for insurance that you pay higher premiums every month, and co-pays for ever visit...etc.

Re:In FEMA's defense

[pcolaman]

Why was this modded insightful? From someone that lives in Mobile, AL (formerly of Pensacola), that went through Ivan and Katrina, I find your comments both self-serving and wrong.

"The problems with New Orleans were primarily the fault of the state of Louisiana and the city government, not the Federal Government and FEMA" Wrong. That "not" should be "as well as". The feds send in the Oklahoma National Guard to disarm the populace.

Ok you did a clever thing in your post. Use facts to cover up your faulty logic. First, the OK Nat'l Guard was sent in, to control the populace, because the state and local law enforcement could not do the job. One of the reasons you mention for me, which is because the city police were taking part in the looting. Also, the US Army and US Navy were actually first on scene, and the very first thing they did was to rescue as many people as they could, and get as many people as they could to safe areas. Something Nagin could've done by alerting people to evac 36-48 hours before the arrival, but he failed to do this.

(1) Why wasn't the guard delivering water or handing out tarps ?!

"Debit cards after Katrina, without any vetting process to determine who needed money". The fact of the matter is each debit card was 2,000. Let's see. I just lost everything I own. The government's answer is to give me 2,000. I might get to go live in a trailer built by the lowest builder.

The debit cards were meant as immediate assistance, not total assistance. In other words, it was to cover immediate expenses such as food, hotel rooms, etc. The problem is not that they were given out. That was, in fact, a brilliant idea. Give the people some immediate assistance then follow up later with the real assistance. The problem is they gave them to whomever would stand in line, and many people got multiple cards by having more than one person in their family stand in line many times over. Like I said, there was no vetting process to determine need and if a card was already given. Nor was there any limit to what the cards could be used on, or in what purchase amounts. Making purchase amounts of around $200-400 (common limits for ATMs) per transaction or per day would've solved a lot of the "sex change operation" issues.

In 2006, there was a Mobile man convicted on defrauding Katrina. So those who abused the system are being brought to Justice. Slowly.

Yeah, and how many thousands upon thousands of people looted, defrauded, and murdered and got off scott free?

The snopes link (3) will serve to clear up the other bad information.

"What major aid was given to Biloxi," The state of Mississippi took it.

And yet Biloxi recovered very well, compared to New Orleans. Their recovery effort depended a lot more on help from Casinos, but even with that a lot of it was done simply by the common people, as the Casinos were more concerned with getting their cash cows back into operation.

"For that matter, other than blue tarps and MREs, people in Pensacola had to all but fend for themselves after Ivan, but we managed just fine." Two things. First, that's like compare minor and major league baseball. Katrina and Ivan were different classes.

I'd have thought that as someone who lived in the Gulf Coast you'd know better than to make a comment like that. When both storms were brewing in the Gulf, Katrina hit Cat 5 and Ivan was also a Cat 5. When Katrina hit shore between LA and MS (meaning that the weak side of the storm, the side that caused less wind damage, hit New Orleans, not the stronger side that hit Biloxi, Gulfport, and Bay St. Louis), it was a Category 3. When Ivan hit between Gulf Shores and Pensacola (unlike how you claim it was a direct hit on Gulf Shores, the eye of the storm actually passed East of Gulf Shores and West of Pensacola, meaning that the harshest winds fell upon Pensacola, Pace, and

Re:In FEMA's defense

[Lost Engineer]

Houses in California are earthquake resistant, by law, and you're not *supposed* to be able to build in wildfire prone areas. You'll notice when they do come, very small numbers of properties are damaged compared to say a hurricane because they're mostly burning empty land.

The fact that the only flood insurance available in NO is government subsidized should give you some indication of relative risk.

Hacker?

[ilovegeorgebush]

Shouldn't this be 'phreaker'? The article even states the break-in was over their PBX (i.e. a convential phone system, not VoIP).

Re:Hacker?

[Enderandrew]

He used a whistle found in a cereal box.

Re:Hacker?

[elrous0]

No, he trained his dog to howl at 2600 hz.

Re:Hacker?

[volxdragon]

Yes, the correct term is Phreaking, but come on, this is the AP....you expect them to get that right?

Re:Hacker?

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet a dollar that there was some sort of default password left intact, so it was
da fault of the installer. Thats the oldest school phreak in the book.
I remember in the 80's when we used to wardial to find computers and PBX's,
a friend and I discovered a DEC owned PBX with a dial in, input code, dial out line.
The code was only 4 digits long so before we brute forced it with a sequential
attempt, we kept trying to spell different 4 letter words. Lo and behold, the passcode was
ROCK, typed on the touch tone keypad. Unlike these hackers, we didn't call the middle east
and the PBX code stayed alive for our little group for over 6 years. That was way better than the Sprint, Metro, and MCI codes
that were going around back then.

Another of our members used a known exploit to completely take over a Nortel PBX, but
thats a different story.

Whats up 415 / 510 Scan club.

Re:Hacker?

[Anonymous Coward]

If the majority of society has changed the meaning of some workds (hacker/pirate), then the meaning has changed for THE MAJORITY, which now makes you WRONG.

For example - GAY used to mean happy. It doesn't, anymore... because the majority of people no longer think of it that way. Therefore, if you're GAY, you're homosexual, not happy.

Same thing with Pirate/hacker.

get a life, and move out of your mom's basement.

Re:Hacker?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually he is old school and trained himself to fart at 2600hz...

Re:Hacker?

[jeiler]

Changes in language can be classified as "ignorance" only by the same logic that Iraq can be classified as "Successful." As has been said before: language changes. Dealing with that change, or ordering it back like Knut ordered back the tide, is entirely up to you.

But please do not expect people to appreciate or respect you when you're being irrelevant.

Re:Hacker?

[Intron]

"If the majority of society has changed the meaning of some workds (hacker/pirate), then the meaning has changed for THE MAJORITY, which now makes you WRONG."

Please tell the biologists to stop misusing bisexual, then. Also tell physicists that quantum leap actually means a big change, not a small one.

Re:Hacker?

[cparker15]

this is the AP....you expect them to get that right?

No, but I do expect Slashdot to get it right.

Re:Hacker?

[AP31R0N]

See? Apologism and insults.

As if the rightness or wrongness of something depends upon how many people accept it. The majority can be wrong. Just because a use is accepted in everyday use, doesn't make it right. If you have to cite definition 3 to defend use of a word....

It follows that any struggle against the abuse of language is a sentimental archaism, like preferring candles to electric light or hansom cabs to aeroplanes. Underneath this lies the half-conscious belief that language is a natural growth and not an instrument which we shape for our own purposes.
- George Orwell

http://www.resort.com/~prime8/Orwell/patee.html

'But languages change'

There's evolution and there's corruption. By allowing the corruption of the word hacker, people who are hackers in the correct sense are lumped in with those in the incorrect sense. Now we have to come up with another word for those who are hackers in the original sense... when we already had words for both! By allowing copyright infringement to be called piracy, they are associating it with something far more sinister than kids swapping files. If some Germans were Nazis, it would be wrong to call all Germans Nazis, wouldn't it? Unless we water down what we originally meant by Nazi.

We think in language. Propagandists use this against us all the time. "It's not murder... it's execution."

Another clip from Orwell:

Consider for instance some comfortable English professor defending Russian totalitarianism. He cannot say outright, "I believe in killing off your opponents when you can get good results by doing so." Probably, therefore, he will say something like this:

While freely conceding that the Soviet regime exhibits certain features which the humanitarian may be inclined to deplore, we must, I think, agree that a certain curtailment of the right to political opposition is an unavoidable concomitant of transitional periods, and that the rigors which the Russian people have been called upon to undergo have been amply justified in the sphere of concrete achievement.

____

An Anonymous Coward saying something silly throwing in some childish ad hominem passes for insightful?

At least have the courage of your convictions. If you're you going to slam someone, don't hide behind anonymity where you can't be held accountable. You could try posting like an adult, and then you could make your point without cowering.

Re:Hacker?

[dave562]

Hell, you think that's bad? Back in the day AT&T left a huge swath of their unallocated Divinity Audix systems open with the default mailbox setup on 200 with the password 200. They were also nice enough to leave them sitting all on an 800 number pool where you could just dial 800-##AUDIX. The ones at 800-AUDIX## were only slightly more secure. I miss those days of easy to find exploitable systems. Well, I guess those days are still here if you're dealing with the government.

Re:Hacker?

[kwerle]

this is the AP....you expect them to get that right?

No, but I do expect Slashdot to get it right.

I'd say "you're new here", but your id is low enough that I have to resort to "you should know better."

Phone Hacking

[Anonymous Coward]

I never understood why someone would or could make exhorbatent amin long distance phone calls. The only thing I can figure out is that some nerd was busy talking to his girlfriend on vacation.
 
  While (Idiot.onphone) {
"Hang up!"
"You!"
"No You!"
"No You Hang up!"
}

Re:Phone Hacking

[Hognoxious]

The only thing I can figure out is that some nerd was busy talking to his girlfriend on vacation.

I'm sure there's a flaw in that theory, but I just can't put my finger on it.

Re:Who hacks phones anymore?

[hal9000(jr)]

because phones, and more likely modems attached to stuff, still provide reliable ways to break into systems.

You kids and your IP telephony. Get off my lawn!

Who is valuing these minutes?

[Sir_Real]

Twelve Grand?! Is this another indicator of inflation? Who is billing this out? For 12 grand the phone companies should give you a phone that will work for life, from anywhere, to anywhere. Are the same people responsible for claiming that a quarter of schwag has a "street value" of fifty grand?

Re:Who is valuing these minutes?

[halfEvilTech]

Twelve Grand?! Is this another indicator of inflation? Who is billing this out? For 12 grand the phone companies should give you a phone that will work for life, from anywhere, to anywhere. Are the same people responsible for claiming that a quarter of schwag has a "street value" of fifty grand?

Well look at it this way. $12,000 in calls divided by the 400+ calls would bring it to less than $30 per call. For anyone who has made calls to overseas knows that the rates are freakin expensive.

For example from the FCC
Here are sample costs for calls to France from the U.S. at basic and discounted rates:

Basic Rate is $1.77-2.77 per minute

Note: The actual rates and terms from companies you choose may be different than those shown.

Re:Who is valuing these minutes?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's the rate charged for this. Seriously. This same thing happened at one of my previous jobs and it left us with a $20K+ bill that we disputed with the phone company over a period of weeks.

Re:Who is valuing these minutes?

[e4g4]

Personally I've always thought people stupid enough to call weed "schwag" would be stupid enough to pay 50 grand for a quarter of it.

"Schwag" refers to the quality of the weed, like "middies", "kind" and "dank". "Schwag" refers to brownish, dry, shakey crap with seeds and stems (usually outdoor bud grown in Mexico). A quarter of schwag isn't worth much more than $20-$30 (at least on the east coast).

Verizon guy

[Enderandrew]

He kept calling that damned annoying Verizon guy.

"You're in Thailand now? Can you hear me now?"

Incompetence...

[nobodylocalhost]

DHS is like the laughing stock of government security. Being PBX Phreaked with a 15 year old hack is just bad... Hope the next administration isn't this incompetent.

Re:Incompetence...

[sm62704]

Hope the next administration isn't this incompetent.

I'd say it wasn't possible to have a worse President, but I thought I'd never see a worse President than Carter, either. Bush proved me wrong on that one, now I worry and just keep my fingers crossed. I'm not too thrilled with either McCain or Obama, and will be voting against both of them.

Default password?

[bsaxberg]

What are the odds he/she used a default password to gain access? I mean this is the government we are talking about here.

Re:government waste or what?

[Trigun]

The 400 calls aren't necessarily consecutive.

Many times these hacks are done to provide low cost calling to immigrants calling back home. $20 bucks can buy you almost unlimited phone time to talk to your entire village back home.

Government Accounting

[lewko]

400 calls totalling $12,000.

That is, about $30 per call.

And from the article: "Most of the calls were about three minutes long, but some were as long as 10 minutes."

As long as 10 minutes? Not only did FEMA have a badly configured phone system, they must have had some of the crappiest call plans I could possibly imagine. I mean, where were the calls terminating? The moon?

Your tax dollars at work.

Re:Terrorist?

[flitty]

Ahhahhahha. What terrorist is dumb enough to route the calls directly through the DHS and FEMA monitored lines! Somehow, i doubt it. This sounds like the "good" kind of hacking, showing a major security hole, doing a proof of the work, not destroying anything, but making the DHS look closer at their security. Poor Hacker though, I imagine he's in Guitmo already as an "enemy combatant".

Re:No Skype?

[BitterOldGUy]

So he doesn't have a Skype account?

Pfft! Who needs Skype when you have the FEMA Phone! Yes! With the FEMA Phone you can call anywhere in the World for FREE! And if you act now, you can get your own FEMA Trailer for Free!

Subject to criminal prosecution and penalties. Offerer is not responsible for purchaser's stupidity.

Re:Who hacks phones anymore?

[sm62704]

I saw this on Yahoo news this morning (and submitted it, apparently my submission wasn't the first). It looked to me like the purpose of the hack was to discredit the DHS, which is FEMA's parent organization.

Note that all the calls went to middle east countries, including Afghanistan and Yemen, both Taliban havens. IMO the hacker did the US a great service by exposing FEMA's incompetence. Katrina is fading in folks' memories and "Brownie", who took the fall for that cluster fuck, is long gone but the agency is still apparently still incredibly dysfunctional and run by incompetents.

Excellence and failure both start at the top. When the head guy is incompetent, he will hire incompetents.

What a surprise

[hyades1]

If anybody ever doubted that these clowns are better at sucking up tax dollars and destroying the US Constitution than providing security, look no further for the proof.

Osama must be laughing his ass off.

Silly

[X.25]

Hacking PBXes was ok 15 years ago.

Hacking them now is pretty much guaranteed to get him caught.

Oh well...

But he assured the hole has since been closed...

[s.d.]

Olshanski did not know who the contractor was or what hole specifically was left open, but he assured the hole has since been closed.

"I don't know who it was or what they did or didn't do, but I assure you they fixed it."

Re:Who hacks phones anymore?

[seeker_1us]

It should be pointed out that FEMA used to be a very competant organization before GWBush merged it into his Department of Fatherland Security and cut it's budget.

Re:Who hacks phones anymore?

[megamerican]

Katrina is fading in folks' memories and "Brownie", who took the fall for that cluster fuck, is long gone but the agency is still apparently still incredibly dysfunctional and run by incompetents.

Excellence and failure both start at the top. When the head guy is incompetent, he will hire incompetents.

If you haven't noticed, the best way to get a bigger budget and more power is to be incompetent. That's the supposed reason why DHS was created in the first place.

If you subsidize stupidity, that is all you'll ever get.

Re:An act that merits actual attention

[Tuoqui]

Its quite possible the person who broke into the PBX also sold the information on how to make 'free' calls to wherever which would result in multiple people accessing it simultaneously thus making it possible to rack up $12,000+ in very short periods of time.

Expensive rate (was:Government Accounting)

[Lead Butthead]

Assuming the phone was "off the hook" for the entire 48 hours and only one call is placed at any given time, that's 2880 minutes, or $4.17 a minute. Any phone company charging that kind of rate per minute will get call into the capital by state utility commission (AT&T charges just over a buck a minute for cellphone roaming calls originating in Asia.)

Re:Terrorist?

[SCHecklerX]

So, while illegally wiretapping citizen lines, the government *should* have been wiretapping itself...

Re:Who hacks phones anymore?

[photon317]

I'd like to offer a dissenting opinion on the FEMA issue in New Orleans. States are supposed to have some kind of emergency preparedness of their own. It's not enough to just fall apart and beg for FEMA to save you. FEMA's traditional role has been to show up late and provide sustaining support in the aftermath of an event, not to be the first responders at the moment of crisis. Many other states understand this. Texas (a nearby neighbor who ended up bearing the brunt of the NO disaster refugees) for example rarely needs FEMA - when hurricanes head for Texas, they deploy their local resources to remedy the immediate situation.

The problem with the NO disaster was not FEMA. The problem was the bankrupt, ineffective, unprepared, and completely corrupt local and state governments in the area who had nothing to offer their citizens when disaster struck.

Re:Who hacks phones anymore?

[dfetter]

Katrina is fading in folks' memories and "Brownie", who took the fall for that cluster fuck, is long gone but the agency is still apparently still incredibly dysfunctional and run by incompetents.

That's true of most of the government. All the more reason to reduce the government's role in our lives rather than expand it.

This is the "piss on you an say it's raining" school of government indulged in by the Bushies and all their forbears back to Goldwater. When you deliberately place incompetents in government, you undermine it. There's nothing essential about incompetence anywhere, not even that giant bastion of incompetence, big business.

Excellence and failure both start at the top. When the head guy is incompetent, he will hire incompetents.

The truth is that the government will always be inept and inefficient regardless of who's at the top. But having someone at the top that you don't like makes you more prone to be more critical of the entire government apparatus even though the majority of the government apparatus does not change from administration to administration.

There is much better evidence for incompetent (but nonetheless gigantically paid) CEOs than for incompetent public servants. Public servants are subject to sunshine laws that would make the aforementioned CEOs run away screaming in terror. Libertarian duckspeak like the above paragraph just looks more and more ridiculous each year.

Re:No Skype?

[jaymzter]

What's scary is that I read the disclaimer at 3x actual talking speed.

Emmittsburg?

[weiserfireman]

Emmittsburg, MD? There is only one major FEMA facility there, The US Fire Administration National Fire Academy. Happens I am going to be there for a week next month. Wonder if the phreaker will offer instructions so that I can call home free too. Beautiful campus btw, about 3 miles from Camp David

oh come on...

[Net_fiend]

"This illegal activity enables unauthorized individuals anywhere in the world to communicate via compromised U.S. phone systems in a way that is difficult to trace," lol. Well of course its difficult to trace. Anyone with enough cajoles knows this. All you have to do is go to a phone box out in the middle of nowheresville and patch into it (illegal of course) and make calls. Its all untracable to the actual person who did it, but not untraceable to the poor schmuck who has to pay for the bill the calls were made from. Of course there are more ways to do this then the one described, but my point is it is completely feasible to do this so the person is completely untraceable. The fact that these are known issues in the PBX system and have been known for, oh 20yrs, is ridiculous that they're able to still occur. I've read many a story both online, in 2600, and when reading about Mitnick's escapades and those things usually happened back in the 80s. Hell, find a lineman's handset clip it to any phone line and viola free phone calls at least for you. Really....its not *that* hard.

what was the point?

[DragonTHC]

is this terrorism? or just plain old hacking?

what's the point of breaking into a federal telephone system to call asia and the middle east?

surely if you have the know-how to pull that off, you could have gotten the calls for free anyway?

so what was the point? was it a diversion? or a lesson hack?

Re:what was the point?

[I'm not really here]

Think of the possibilities... Call around to people unfriendly to the US. Mention that you are calling from FEMA, and that you've hacked their system. Mention that your services are available for hire, and that a simple message posted on some board somewhere and money placed into an account will activate said services. Now imagine who might be willing to pay money for access to FEMA or DHS?