Part 8 (2/2)

And CHAOS? Anyone?

BEST I'VE EVER HEARD 4 NEW VIRUSES SET TO GO OFF HIGHLY POTENT VARIATIONS OF JERUSALEM-B THEN SOME RUMORS ABOUT COLUMBUS DAY, BUT NOTHING HARD

When you get the code send me a copy, OK?

SURE HEY, REMEMBER SPOOK? STILL ASKING TO JOIN NEMO SEEMS HE BEEN UP TO A LOT OF SUCCESSFUL NO GOOD WE'RE ABOUT READY TO LET HIM IN HE BROUGHT A LOT TO THE PARTY

Careful! Remember 401

YEAH, I KNOW HE'S CLEAN GOOD GOVT STUFFHE BROUGHT US THE NEWEST IRS X25 SIGN-ONS, 2 MILNET SUPERUSER PassWORDS AND, DIG THIS, VETERAN'S BENEFIT AND ADMINISTRATION, OFFICE OF POLICY AT THE VA

What you gonna do, boy? In them thar computers?

I FIGURE I'D GIVE A FEW EXTRA BENEFITS TO SOME NEEDY GI'S WHO'VE BEEN ON THE SHORT END

Excellent! Hey, Lori's on the line gotta go

TA

< connection=”” terram returned to a list of names and phone nus was tempted to dial another couple of nu interesting it ht force hi second fiddle to a cos, known as ”KIRK, where no one before”, by fellow hackers, had finished his o State University The ritual labors were over and he looked forward to some relax time Serious relax time

The one recreation he craved, but downplayed to Lori, was spend- ing time with his computer She was jealous in some respects, in that it received as much attention from Steve as she did Yet, she also understood that computers were his first love, and they were part of his life long before she was So, they came with the territory Steve attended, upon occasion, classes at SDSU, La Jolla For a 21 year old transplant from Darien, Connecticut, he lived in paradise

Steve's single largest expense in life was his phone bill, and instead of working a regular job to earn spending money, Steve tutored other students in their computer courses Rather than flaunt his skills to his teachers and risk extra assignments, he was more technically qualified than they were, he kept his h classes, rarely studied and became a full time computer hacker He translated his every wish into a cos did not fill the picture of a coolden tanned 175 pound body, and dark blond hair that caused the girls to turn their heads He loved the outdoors, the hot war at the Cardiff Reef and betting on fixed jai-alai gao specific version of gloveless and topless co-ed beach softball In short, he was a guy A regular guy

The spotlessly groos in white tennis shorts and a ”Save the Whales” tank-top eclectically co-existed with the sterile surroundings of theand bad a computer as money can buy, and despite Steve's well known skills, the head of the Super Coe when Steve leaned his surf board against the helium cooled memory banks of the twelve million dollar computer

He ran his shi+ft at the computer lab so efficiently and effort- lessly that over tih other people's coh soe The ultie, an infinity of possibilities, an infinity of answers

The San Diego Union was an awful paper, Steve thought, and the evening paper was even worse So he got copies of the New York City Times when possible, either at a newsstand, borrowed froet a real perspective on the world This Sunday he spent the 400 to get his o, uncrumpled and unread copy of his revered paper, all thirty four pounds of it Alone Peace

Reading by the condo pool an article caught his eye Steve remembered a story he had heard about a hacker who had invaded and single handedly stopped INTERNET, a coether tens of thousands of computers around the country

Government Defense Network Halted by Hacker by Scott Mason, New York City Tih school student Galbraith High School in Ann Arbor, Michigan was indicted today on charges that he infected the nationwide INTERNET netith a computer virus This latest attack upon INTERNET is reminiscent of a similar incident launched by Robert Morris of Cornell University in Noveency Response Tearoup, if Mr Chase had not left his name in the source code of his virus, there would have been no way to track down the culprit

A coraned to cause dararalued' into the comput- er, it is reawakened on a specific date or by a particular se- quence of events

Chase, though, actually infected INTERNET with a Worra the co down its operation to a snail's pace In either case, the results are devastating - effectively, the co to his high school officials, released the Worust with a detonation date of Septe halt