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Television's Most Infamous Hack Is Still a Mystery 30 Years Later (vice.com)

Posted by msmash on from the unsolved-mysteries dept.

It has been 30 years since the Max Headroom hack, arguably the creepiest hack in the television history took place. Caroline Haskins, writes about the incident for Motherboard: It was a few minutes after 9 PM on Sunday, November 22, 1987. Chicago sportscaster Dan Roan was cheerily summarizing the Bears's victory that day for Channel 9 local news. Suddenly, televisions went silent, and their screens went black. At first, it seemed like an equipment malfunction. Without warning, televisions in the area blasted loud radio static. It was overlain with the screech of a power saw cutting into metal, or a jet engine malfunctioning. At center screen, a person wore a Max Headroom mask -- a character who appeared on various television shows and movies in the 1980s. He appeared to have yellow skin, yellow clothes, and yellow slicked-back hair. As purple and black lines spun behind him, Max nodded and swayed back and forth. His plastic face was stuck in laughter, and opaque sunglasses covered his eyes, which seemed to peer through the screen. The screen went black again. After a moment, Roan reappeared. "Well if you're wondering what'll happen," Roan said with a laugh, unaware of what had happened during the interruption, "so am I." Two hours later, it happened again on another channel. This time, Dr. Who had just turned to get his companion, Leela, a hot drink, when a line of static rolled across the screen, revealing the yellow man. After 30 years and an intense FCC investigation, the people behind the Headroom hack remain unknown. The correspondent has spoken to the newscasters who were interrupted and mocked that day. You can read the interview here.

15 of 116 comments (clear)

  1. This Hack Was... by Zurkeyon3733 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...One of the most "Interesting" Parts of being a kid in Chicago in the 80's. It stands as one of the most successful TV hacks of all time. After 30 years. Whoever did this, was either a super genius, or should have flown to Vegas and hit the tables the day after!

    1. Re:This Hack Was... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Thank you for becoming part of the problem and not part of the solution.

    2. Re:This Hack Was... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      These days, the most "interesting" parts of being a kid in Chicago involves trying to dodge a hail of bullets every time you walk home from school. I've actually purchased two handguns and given them to my kids to have in their backpacks, just in case.

      You stupid dumbass. This is exactly the problem.

    3. Re:This Hack Was... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

      Not really a hack per se (but phreak as fuck). They just overpowered the uplink to the transmitter with their own signal. Back in the 80s no one bothered with spread specrtum or encryption or any of that crap. No one would build a microwave transmitter in their garage and then use brute force and ignorance to overpower competing signals....

      I've heard semi-credible reports it was a pair of brothers known to area phreakers of the day.

    4. Re:This Hack Was... by Skuld-Chan · · Score: 3, Informative

      Really all he did was overpower the microwave input the broadcaster was using to the transmitter - which are relatively low power, but even then - it's not like building or buying that kind of equipment is easy and certainly would have left a paper trail (it sounds like the FBI investigated it as well). These days of course all those aux broadcast channels are encrypted.

      Maybe he was an ex employee who carted off backup or discarded spares or something?

    5. Re:This Hack Was... by Tablizer · · Score: 2

      Come on, T barely changed anything about the economy. The economy has been on cruse control for several years.

      And while things are good now, we are do for recession soon (AKA "business cycle downturn"), and the ugly circumstances that usually entails. The rust belt is still trailing the rest of the country: a recession would thus hit them harder.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    6. Re:This Hack Was... by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The studio-transmitter links of the time were all analog, all NTSC, no security at all. The transmitters were all on the same tower. All one really had to do was get a hold of the STL hardware, set the channel, beam a signal from a nearby location, and roll tape.

      It used to also be that you could set the brakes on a freight train with a walkie-talkie, by sending the right command to a device at the end of the train. It might even still be the case. Nobody considered that someone else could get on your frequency back then.

      --
      Bruce Perens.
  2. The second breakin - My Story by nevermindme · · Score: 2

    I was 16, dead asleep on the couch that night, never could make it through a Dr. Who on WTTW at that started at 11pm and sometimes ran as late at 12:30 or 1. The VCR did start on time and on channel, that spinup and hum allowed me to crash to sleep at 10:55. I heard about it on the news in the morning and sure enough I had a perfect recording of this "event". Beyond a few minutes of attempting to decipher gibberish, watched the Dr Who episode and taped over it the next week. Local story, thought this happened everywhere when uplink signals were still sent up and down to national satellites in the clear.

    With about 5 to 10 thousand dr who fans in the greater Chicago area it was the local did you see it in sci fi event to talk about.

    1. Re:The second breakin - My Story by Obfuscant · · Score: 2

      Local story, thought this happened everywhere when uplink signals were still sent up and down to national satellites in the clear.

      The local news program does not uplink to a satellite for distribution to the transmitter. It's a simple STL - studio transmitter link. Studio in middle of city needs way to get programming to the hilltop where the transmitter is. Radio. Not magic.

      If you have a transmitter that sends the same signal, and your signal is stronger, well, you get the idea.

      Back in those days, stations did not do live link to satellite feeds, they recorded the downlink for later play. I remember watching many programs coming down and going onto two inch tape just that way.

  3. Re:Collection is only available in DVD... by Desler · · Score: 2

    What would be the point? It was finished at 480i on videotape.

  4. Easier than you think. by jrmcferren · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This kind of attack was easy for an advanced electronics experimenter to pull off. All that needed done was to overpower the studio's signal on the studio to transmitter link with the appropriate signal and you were in. Most of the information was provided by the sign off program as the studio to transmitter link station identification occurred during this time and the frequency was provided. This was basically a terrestrial version of the HBO attacks.

    --
    sudo mod me up
    1. Re:Easier than you think. by Mister+Transistor · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Exactly this. The STLs (Studio->Transmitter Links) are on 900 MHz and 2.8 GHz in Chicago. The studios are in smaller buildings (not many stories) but the main TX sites are all the tall buildings (Sears/Willis, Hancock, etc.).

      The links are directional beams or dishes and they are usually directly aimed at one another, but they are not that high power and can be overridden, especially if you have equipment maintenance penthouse access and can get up to the levels those things are at. Getting that access these days is much harder, post 9/11. It would probably be impossible to replicate that hack today, plus the STL's are digital and probably encrypted these days.

      Every once in a while some of my old acquaintances used to get drunk and someone would bump into one of the STL dishes causing a momentary "outage". :)

      --
      -- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
  5. Movie Used Cars by p51d007 · · Score: 2

    Reminds me of this https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

  6. Just ponder what this would get you today by Opportunist · · Score: 2

    I think it's a bit like hacking back then. Nobody really cared TOO much if you did. Getting caught meant a slap on the wrist, if that, and a stern lecture.

    Try any of this shit today and you'll probably be doing quite some time for a lot of ridiculous reasons and everything that COULD have happened. Not to mention the billions of damage you did because a network couldn't broadcast their bullshit for 2 minutes.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  7. Because the hacker was SMART. by Chas · · Score: 5, Informative

    He limited his exposure.

    And he hasn't succumbed to the need to "be famous".

    The FCC had essentially NOTHING to go on.

    FLAWLESS VICTORY!

    --


    Chas - The one, the only.
    THANK GOD!!!