BOOM - The Source For h/p/a Information --------------------------------------- Issue Eleven ------------ Written by: -------------------- Crimson Jihad (formerly Case) Nihilist (formerly Dana) Shadows of the Condemned (formerly Cerberus) Watson -------------------- Halloween, 1995 -------------------- Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves -------------------- Issue 11 Dedicated To: Jerry Garcia - Good thing we went to our first Dead concert this year. Bill Gates - Thanks for releasing Windows 95, cocksucker. AOL - Extra special thanks for implementing a credit card checker, now only intelligent people can rip you off. Table Of Contents: 1. BOOM Disclaims Everything! - The 11th appearance of our disclaimer 2. BOOM Subscriptions - Yes, Boom delivers 3. BOOM On FTP! - Now you can get Boom off an ftp site! 4. BOOM Introductions - Listen to Shad bitch about everything 5. BOOM! - Learn how to blow up your school effectively 6. BOOM Revolts - Our guest author's great essay 7. BOOM Fucks With Renegade - It's so easy to kill Renegade 10-04 8. BOOM Shuts Downs Any Board - It's so easy to kill any board 9. BOOM Gets 300+ Disks - We love you Prodigy 10. BOOM Uses 300+ Disks - What the hell can you do with 300 disks? 11. BOOM Rips Off Candy Machines - Again, it's so easy to rip them off 12. BOOM Discovers The Wonders Of PCCs - These things rock 13. BOOM Read The News - There's lots of neat shit in the news 14. BOOM Talks To Watson - The pot-smoker speaks 15. BOOM Get Mail - What do you know, we got some mail! 16. BOOM Conclusion - The end. BOOM Issue 10 - Part 1 - BOOM Disclaims Everything WARNING: Use of the information presented in this publication is not a nice, kind thing to do (you would never see Barney doing any of it.) In fact, most people think even reading a magazine with this content is inappropriate. And then, there are those people who think it should be illegal. Well, anyway, we don't give a shit and hope you don't either. Have fun, and don't blow off your arm in the process (and if you DO blow off your arm please take a picture and send it to us, we'll scan it and put it on our ftp site.) WE, THE AUTHORS OF BOOM, ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGES CAUSED BY THE USE OR MISUSE OF ANY AND ALL INFORMATION PRESENTED IN THIS FILE. THIS IS PRESENTED "FOR INFORMATIVE PURPOSES ONLY!" BOOM Issue 10 - Part 2 - BOOM Subscriptions You can still subscribe to Boom. All you have to do is send mail to >-NEWS@MATCH.ORG-< saying you want to be put on the mailing list. The list is not automated, so there are no strict guidelines of what your letter must look like. And dammit send us letters, we will never get enough of them. Hey, and if you want send us original articles (or even newspaper articles you type up, but be sure to date those and tell us the source) go right ahead and mail them to our NEWS@MATCH.ORG address. We apologize if you tried to subscribe, but never got put on the list. Watson kindof screwed up our mail box (but that's all better now.) BOOM Issue 10 - Part 3 - BOOM On FTP! Thanks to the great folks at etext, we're now on ftp. The address is: FTP.ETEXT.ORG, and the directory is /pub/Zines/Boom. Make sure to check this directory every once in a while, because it will also have some Boom related WAV and GIF files (we won't rule out an AVI either.) The GIFs are going to be diagrams of complex things we discuss in the magazine as well as pictures of things we think you'll find interesting (we intend to have pictures of both the Ameritech logo, and Watson's 300+ Prodigy disks on there soon, as well as that little white shack we talked about in issue 10.) We don't exactly know what the WAV files are going to be... it's a surprise (yeah that's it), but guaranteed we will have WAV files. An AVI or two is a long-shot (btw, anyone have a VideoBlaster or other video capture device with which they could convert something we recorded on VHS tape to an AVI file?) Our www site is up now too! It's http://www.grfn.org/~benb/ we think it's pretty damn good, for something we made in three hours. Make sure to view it with Netscape if you can (Prodigy and Aol will suffice... but to get the full experience you need NetScape.) BOOM Issue 11 - Part 4 - BOOM Introductions Here's issue 11. It's late, but aren't they all? Hopefully, our mailing list will get fully delivered this time. Last issue it was one of those "hey wait, I thought YOU we're gonna do the mailing" things. For this issue we have a sophisticated system designed so that everyone should get their issue on time (btw, if you never got issue 10, e-mail us.) We'd like to welcome our newest full-time writer to Boom. He is Nihilist, formerly known as Dana. He was one of the few readers of the "old" Boom. Besides being our official photographer, he will also be providing us with several articles. Before I get started with the body of my introduction, I'd also like to note that we, the writers of Boom, are seriously considering the emmense project of creating a version 2 of the Terrorist's Handbook. Naturally, we want help. Please, e-mail us and tell us what you think needs updating or correction, and what new stuff should be covered. We hope to include a rough outline of our version of the book in Boom-12. But we can't do it without your help. Please e-mail your suggestions to NEWS@MATCH.ORG. Thank you. Have any of you looked at the lower right hand corner of the back of Micheal Jackson's HIStory (why the fuck do they capitalize HIS, I mean, it's the property of whoever bought it right?)? Okay, I know, why the fuck would any of you have seen HIStory? I don't know why you would have seen it, just go over to a loser's house and look at it. Well, if you look there, in real tiny letters in the corner it says: http://www.sony.com/Music/ MichaelJackson.html. Hmm... could it be? Micheal Jackson has invaded our internet too? I haven't had time to check the site out, but I'm almost positive it's an advertisement. About a week ago I was sitting at home flipping through the talk shows (hey, I love a dumb redneck as much as the next guy) when I say Jenny. I had just heard the day or two before that Jenny was one of the most popular talk shows around, so I watched it for a minute. They have a fucking AOL account! They didn't disclose the name, but they talked about it a lot. I guess the producer who's a real moron uses it to communicate with fans (I know, it was a surprise to me to that they had fans) and talk to her friends (and she probably hangs out in the warez and hack rooms a lot too...) What the hell? A talk show on the net? All I can say is "go away." On July 22nd, I read a short article in our local paper, "McManus adds internet address." Briefly, it talks about Sen. George McManus has "decided to go on line because [he] felt it was important to adapt to changing technological needs." But the funniest thing is that he doesn't have a fancy GOV address, or a big long EDU address, or even an ORG address, but our Senator is on AOL! His address is "Geomcmanus@aol.com." It'd be a pity if he got oh say, a mail bomb. There is a very small silver lining. TV Nation, probably the best (okay, maybe it's the only) humor/documentary show around also has an address. It is "TVNatFans@aol.com." Please send these people some fan mail, they definitely deserve it. These are the people we want on our net; intelligent, rebellious, young folks. Thanks to the other people like Jenny, Michael Jackson, and George McManus, online services are experiencing a huge boom. Compuserve has 3.2 subscribers. America OnLine has 3 million subscribers, because it gained 1 million in April, May, and June '95 alone. And Prodigy has shrunk to 1.6 million (I wonder if it's making money yet!) Estimates say that 20 million people have addresses on the net, 7.8 million of these pay one of the three big services for their access! Worst of all, Microsoft is soon going to be entering the market. They even want to package their service with Windows '95. We saw what they did with GUIs, do we really want that done with our net? This points to an alarming trend, the commercialization of the internet. Think about the history of our net. It was created by the Department of Defense. Whether you support the military or not, you've got to give them credit for accomplishing incredible feats (with an even more incredible amount of our money). Just look at their net, the little hyped arpanet. It was amazing for it's time. Then, the scientists hopped on the bandwagon. All the universities got access. It became a college nerd kind of thing. Only the most intelligent people used it. Then it started to spread. People started getting access at home (still for free). And then it happened, the greedy corporate CEOs smelled a profit. They and their services began raping the net. And they are expanding right now at the rate of 14,000 users a day! I'm not bitching about the WELL, NetOne, the Sanctuary, or any other small internet provider. I'm bitching about Compuserve, AOL, Prodigy, Delphi, GEnie, Interchange, and soon the Microsoft Network. How much of their profit goes to the guys who deserve it, the guys who were involved in the creation of the internet? What these services are doing is like finding an orphan who is really smart and has a nack for inventing things, then telling him to go make something, then forgetting about him completely and mass producing his invention. The money is not where it should be. It isn't with the intelligent people, it's not even being used to pay back our military's huge investment in arpanet, it's with the people who were already wealthy, the investors. The internet has not been a place to make a fortune, it's been a place to make a fortune bigger. The huge boom in internet usage that is being caused by the commercialization is leading to an even worse thing - government involvement. You see, the government loves to fuck things up. Since the depression, they seem to have gotten the message that America needs more laws, more government involvement, and more censorship. Our government now seems to think it needs to protect us from ourselves! How ironic that we are slowly becoming a government as oppressive as the British one we overthrew. A government that can just piss on the Bill of Rights whenever it pleases. Look at the important issues: school prayer, abortion, and censorship. And this could hit real close to home. The government, half of which think the internet is JUST America On-line, Prodigy, and Compuserve, shouldn't be trying to expand, censure, sanitize, or otherwise fuck up the internet at all. The internet has done incredibly well without any government help at all (note that I am treating the military separately from the government, because it is.) The government's opinions about the internet tend to be incredibly naive, and their bill represents this well. The good thing is, the internet is here right now. Let's enjoy it will we can. - Shad/95 BOOM Issue 11 - Part 5 - BOOM! The Basics of the Lock Picking The one thing you have always dreamed of being able to do but could never quite figure out how to do, well we here at Boom are here to tell how to. Once you have the knowledge you will probably say to yourself, boy that is really not all that complicated after all. First you will need some picks, you can buy them but unless you live in a big city or you have some good connections they are king of hard to come by. This is where I come in. In the past I have seen many different ways of making lock picks but the one I like the most is this: Get the smallest type allen wrench you can find, but don't go for overkill, I would suggest that you get a size of 1/32, no more no less if it is to small it will break, if it is too big it won't bend easily enough. You can find any kind of allen wrench at your local Ace Hardware store. Now that you have the allen wrench go to a stove. This stove should be a gas burner, unless you want to sit over an electric for three hours heating the allen wrench, but I digress, you will also need a pair of vice-grip pliers, and a pair of needle-nose pliers too. Now clamp the allen wrench with vice-grip pliers and hold it over the flame until it is red hot. Then take the needle-nose pliers and bend the wrench to shape shown below. / ===========/ Then, when that's done, get a file and file it down so the end that will stick into the lock is flat. Now you will need a tension wrench, this just a fancy name for screwdriver, or anything else that will fit into the keyway along with the pick so you can keep the tumblers from falling back down. Anything that is flat will work. Just make sure that it, and your lock pick will fit in the keyway at the same time. This is what the basic anatomy of a lock looks like, other end key end |------------------ | | p p p p | | i i i i | | n n n n | | ------------| tension wrench | \ |____________| | \____________________ pick |------------------ Now take your homemade lockpick and the tension wrench and work form back to front. The best way to get practice is to buy a door knob from Ace Hardware and use that to practice with. I have heard of people taking the entire thing apart and just practice with one pin and adding more as they get better, but it really doesn't matter what you do. Just remember to keep constant tension on the pins by turning the tension wrench in the lock at all times. Light Bulb Bomb If you've ever seen the movie "Blown Away" you probably saw the part where the bomb squad dude was talking to Tommy Lee Jones and Tommy Lee said, "You have a beautiful family Liam." With every sentence the camera would flash back Liam's house and if you paid close attention you should remember the part where Liam's wife turned on the light bulb. What the hell was the big deal with that light bulb scene? Well, most of our readers probably know that there was a good chance that there was a light bulb bomb in that light bulb. If you were never sure how to make them or you just read what I typed and said, "oh my funking lord, that is the coolest thing I've ever heard of how can I make that?" then read on. These things aren't very hard to make. Materials ---------- 1. Light bulb 2. Glass cutter or heat source 3. Gasoline or some other explosive material Light bulbs work like this: they are glued at the bottom where the glass meets the metal part. There are about four basic parts that make them what they are, first there is the metal part which, for our purposes is relatively unimportant. Then you have the glass container witch will come into play later on. Third is the filament, a very thin piece of wire made from tungsten metal witch is extremely resistant to heat. And the fourth major part of the light bulb is the argon gas that fills the container. If you were to remove the argon gas from the light bulb the wire would burn itself to nothing; to say the least, the thing gets really hot. So, here is what you do. Take the light bulb to the heat source; make sure you are wearing a heavy apron, heavy shirt, face protection, and very heavy gloves. The light bulb could explode. But any way, heat the bottom of the light bulb where the glass meets the metal. The glue should melt and you should be able to pull the bulb apart. Fill the bulb with whatever you have picked for your explosive and put the light back together, screw the bulb back into the lamp, MAKE SURE THE GOD DAMN LAMP IS OFF!!!!! The next person that turns the lamp on will be extremely surprised that the lamp just exploded. If the idea of flying shards of glass don't make the cut of fun you can take a glass cutter and cut light bulb in half and epoxy it back together. We here at Boom really do not recommend making any type of explosive that requires the tester to be closer than 100 feet to the explosive. We also do not recommend killing anyone either cause that whole "killing" gig is really not cool (unless you are a disgruntled postal worker - then it's okay). Explosives should be used for entertainment purposes only, not killing. And if you think killing people with explosives is that cool you shouldn't consider yourself cool by any stretch of the word. Thank you, and good night, The Crimson Jihad BOOM Issue 11 - Part 6 - BOOM Revolts Our revolution will be a forcible, pervasive, and violent change in the "socio-political" structure, if you will, of cyberspace. Revolution of cours is the most extreme option of our dissenting group, and we have taken this course because people are sitting back and watching the BBS community fall apart. The moderate attempts to achieve recognition and reform have failed. Revolutions occur only through careful planning, and this has been taking care of. The success of a revolution depends on crucial timing: and the time is NOW. Revolutions depend on popular support, and a central power: a governing nucleus. The hierarchy has been formed, and we are looking for the support of you, the BBS community. This revolution will awaken and test the BBS community. A revolution is nothing more than a significant historical transformation. We are looking to change the system. Why a revolution? This action was designed because of what is going on in the 617 area code/Metro Boston area of Massachusetts. Being centered around a metropolitan area, there are many bulletin board systems. Some commercial, some underground, some public domain, most corrupt. Rather than make this applicable to our area only I will try to universalize our cause. "Knowledge is power". This revolution is one of the knowledgeable versus the ignorant. No longer are BBS's tightly woven 'communities' of people with a sincere interest in computing or a hobby, but they are being intruded on by ignorant, uneducated, computer-illiterate dolts. There will always be new users. I was one in early 1994. I didn't know much about computers. But I was willing to learned and I learned. I spent most of my time that summer on the computer, learning, reading, programming. Now am I not only knowledgable with operating systems, but I can program in Qbasic, Pascal, C++, and FCL: I'm a sysop on 15 area boards, and certainly know my way around BBS software. I've created complex programs that have made me money. I've taken part in in depth conversations on the internet or a local board about a hobby, or religion, or an aspect of computers. But now everyone has a modem. The ones who are uneducated are the ones who must be purged: weeded out, destroyed. The ones who all they know is the world of online services and "Online America" rather than America Online. You know the type. The kid or adult down the street, who just got a Pentium-100 with 32 MBs of RAM and a 1.4 gigabyte hard drive, 17" Sony Trinitron flatscreen monitor and quad speed CD ROM drive (a very expensive, high end system at the time I am writing this). They have all that. But they don't know how to use DOS. To copy or edit a file. Or how to make icons appear in windows. These are the people who are undeserving. You walk into a store in the mall and hear people saying either "oh I got your email last night..." or "he has email now..". How can someone "have email?" they dont know what they're talking about. They refer to it as "America's Information Superhighway". There is no superhighway. Under construction, perhaps. But as the country moves onto the net and computers, they talk of one in every home, and everyone hooking up to the net, an online service, or a BBS, you find these are ignorant people. They don't belong, they don't deserve. Some do. But the ones who don't bother to learn, to read a book on computers, to take part in anything, those are the ones we're after. These people want "anerchy" (yes, some dolts spell it with an e) text files that are 15 years old, and megs of XXX GIFs. You hear of legislation by Congress to put a ban on the freedom of communication, assembly, and information. If they do, they can't stop us. We'll go underground. But even so... computer related, modem related at least, things are in the media all the time. And you hear "Send your opinions on todays show to Prime Time Live, P.O. Box 19239, Los Angeles, Cali..." but then, then the evil thing... "or email us ONLINE at PrimeTime@aol.com..." or "We're now Prime Time ONLINE". Does having an email address make you "online"? Having an email address is no longer for convenience, fun, or neccessity. It is cool, or "in" now to have an email address. It's the latest fad. Everybodys doing it. Everybodys on the net. Everybodys invading our home. Now some of you might say, what's wrong with this? It's great that everyone's getting into computers. But just like society has it's bad people the BBS community does too: it has it's criminals, it's leaders, it's followers, the people in between. But the people who are in on all this to be "cool", the people who are unwilling to learn, and be educated, must "go down". We need to educate people first: and if they don't accept, then they must be weeded out of our 'community'. SOCIAL DARWINISM. SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST. But now the question is how do we do it. By now hopefully you see my point. The BBS society is being invaded by "lamers", ignorant people unwilling to learn, who decided to touch their modem on daddy's computer not to learn or because of a sincere interest to EXPLORE, to DISCOVER, to LEARN, but because they want to be "cool". They think they're cool too. Act like they know it all. You know the type. And I'd like to say also at this point, I am not an elitist, a racist, or trying to impress an opinion on you. Just showing you my opinion, and letting you decide for yourself. The time for change is now. It's time to take back cyberspace, which is entirely abstract bits of magnetic data and phone line noise, for ourselves, before it is invaded, regulated, corrupted, and destroyed. How do we do it? You all know the board in your area that thinks it's elite. It may be the pompous users. If it is a gathering place in particular for these users, then it must go. But the gathering places of intelligent intellectuals will be our havens. Rather than attempts to post ANSI drawings and one line replies to never ending message threads, we prefer INTELIGENT DISCUSSIONS and conversations. You see everyone runs the same software. Around here it's Renegade, by Cott Lang. A fine program, except everyone runs it. It's so easy to setup that there's no variety. Anyway, what we've concluded, the team of revolutionaries, or whatever we call ourselves, is that the problem is the sysops. GO FOR THE BOARDS WITH THE IGNORANT SYSOPS. AND TAKE THEM OUT. He thinks he knows everything. If he admits he's inexperienced, then the board stays. If he's willing to learn, don't touch it. BUT IF HE IS INEXPERIENCED, UNWILLING TO LEARN, AND IGNORANT, AND DOESNT KNOW WHAT HE'S DOING, HE SHOULDNT HAVE A BOARD IN THE FIRST PLACE. So you take it out. You hack it crash it, destory it by whatever means possible. Steal the user dat file, get some passwords and log on as ignorant users (don't touch the cool ones.. if they're willing to learn, take them under your wing. That PRINT "hello" line in basic is just the first step...), and take control of boards and accounts. We don't want the wanton destruction of boards and data and information here. We want to make our point. To have our revolution. To change the system, to reform, to leave our mark, and share the power and enlightenment. BBSing, and the revolution, is all about education, and information. We believe that the people with a sincere interest in computing are the ones who deserve to BBS, to run systems, not the ignorant and unexperienced ones who are unwilling to learn and doing it to be "cool". EVERYONE IS JUMPING ON THE MODEM BANDWAGON. SAVE YOURSELF. "Do not underestimate the power of information. Information is the most powerful thing in the world. To control the flow of information means even more power. In the future, those who control the flow of information, will control the world." ...the revolution has begun. - Archangel BOOM Issue 11 - Part 7 - BOOM Fucks With Renegade Here is a little tip on How to Hack Renegade 10-4. There are things in Renegade called MCI codes... they are li'l codes that SysOp's use to personalize ANSI to callers. However they can be used for evil (as most anything can) The MCI code you are going to learn is the %DF MCI... DF stands for display file. It is made to make ANSI display inside of ANSI menu's however it has otehr purposes. MCI codes are usally disabled by the SysOp to callers so they can not cause choas. However Renegade does not let the caller disable MCI codes in E-mail. Knowing this, you can figure out that using the DF MCI in E-mail to yourself will work. Here's the step by step. 1) go to Email menu 2) Send E-mail to yourself 3) On the first line of the message type %DFC:\RENEGADE\DATA\USERS.DAT% 4) Make sure the line ends with % 5) Hit /s to save the message If it does not work, try using a diffrent directory, for example the SysOp may have the Renegade BBS on the D: drive, so try %DFD:\renegade\data\users.dat% Also, this hack only works on Renegade 10-4, not the new 10-5 which most sysops have upgraded to (which we learned in a most imbarrasing way). -Watson/BOOM writer '95 BOOM Issue 11 - Part 8 - BOOM Shuts Down Any Board So, you want to kill this loser's board. Problem: he's running a very secure system... one without any hacks, backdoors, small eploitable flaws, or the like that you know of. Do not despair... shutting down a board is as easy as dialing the phone, uploading a file, or snipping some wires. Method #1 - Virus This is lame, I'll admit it. But it can work against stupider sysops. Simply upload a virus-infected program. Preferably something he'll run, like a DOOM upgrade. He's got a virus checker? No problem, write yourself a little Trojan to do the job. Once he runs the program, his board is down (hopefully). Method #2 - Let Your Fingers Do The Walking This is also pretty lame. If the board is elite, or even if it has XXX gifs that kids can get to, call the FBI. Don't even bother with your local or state police, go straight to the feds. It's not a sure thing they'll even investigate, but it has possibilites, and if they do check in it's a sure thing that that board will get shut down voluntarily by the sysop. Method #3 - Trunking This method requires that you find out the general physical location of the board. When you do, go there and find the trunk box (those big white boxes that say Ameritech on them.) Then open the trunk box (you'll need allen wrenches (or hex keys for you wierdos)) and find the wires that correspond to that board's number using a beige box and an ANI (automatic number identifier... 311 in our area.) Once you find the wire you have a few choices. You could just disconnect the wires. You could cut the off so as to make Ameritech's job harder. You could do either of the above and include a note to Ameritech telling them that there is a bomb planted 10 feet from the box and when the wires are reconnected... BOOM! Or you could switch the boards number with someone elses (people love prank calls at 2 am!) An easier method would be to simply disconnect all the wire in the specified box... but this is boring, and sure to attract attention sooner than if you did it just to the board's line. Probably the best thing to do is to simply install a line noise creator on the board's line... imagine the anger when 14.4k ld callers get 600 cps! And, the sysop probably won't think to call Ameritech right away. I saw the blueprints for one of these line noise creators somewhere... I can't remember where. Method #4 - Your Own Creativity There are millions more ways to shut a board down. Huge amounts of electricity through the phone line tend to fry modems. Deaths threats are always interesting. There is always a way to get that damned password file. And, blowing up a sysop's house will probably make him/her hestitant to put their board back up. Have fun! - Shad/95 BOOM Issue 11 - Part 9 - BOOM Gets 300+ Free Disks As many of you might have noticed, Commercial online services have really been trying to get a lot of customers lately. (Some say it's because they fear the new Microsoft Online service due out sometime kinda soon) but I think it's mainly just the fact that they want money, your money. Well why not take advantage of their greed? Prodigy, for example, has a feature that allows you to get a friend to join. You just JUMP: MEMBER GET and it will take you to a little menu where you order Windows, Dos, or Mac, versions of their software, and put in your friends address. Hmm ok.. that's kewl I guess.. but Prodigy also had the brains to install a Macro recorder and player in their software. Hmm G smart. Don't get me wrong it's a nice function, but it probably wasn't real smart on their half. All you have to do now is make a Macro that JUMPS to MEMBER GET and fills out all the info (name address etc... for yourself instead of a friend) then end the macro by having it play again. Now when you play the macro it will play over and over and over again. At 2400 baud through a local Tymnet extension, we here at Boom counted about 4 orders sent per minute. Not REAL great, but it gets the job done. We got a little carried away with ourselves however, and let the macro play for a little longer then we wanted. Prodigy is nice enough to send the kits first class mail, but a word of warning make sure you only run this macro on Prodigy's "FREE SHIPPING" deals. Otherwise you could be looking at about $2.50 a kit. Yeah that would kinda suck. Anyway back to the story, we got a little carried away and a couple days later I got a call from the post office (Does anyone know why the post office had MY number ? Maybe they used the phone book, anyhow..) The post office called and informed me that they had three trays of mail to be delivered to my house, and that they would need the trays back, so if they delivered them I had to bring them back, or otherwise I would have to go down their and just claim them in person. Hmm Yes I do admit I was a little freaked out to hear I was receiving three trays of mail all in one day. Well I told them to just stick it in my garage and I would get them their trays back later. Surprisingly when I actually got the mail I was still shocked at the number of kits. I called up Boom's editor, Shadows of the Condemned, and had him come over and help with the de-disking of the kits. We ripped through those kits like they where tissue paper, sparing nothing but the disks. (Needless to say I don't think it would have made Prodigy to happy to see, we were thinking about making an .AVI file to distribute and E-mail include to Prodigy Reps but decided to pass on that one) When all was said and done we where knee high in garbage and had a pile of disks that would make even 3M proud. We through the garbage in the back of my truck and hauled it off to a remote dumpster. The next day when I came home from summer school, my brother dumped out a duffle bag full of that days mail, hmm not to my surprise another load of kits, but that wasn't all, he then proceeded to dump out another bag full of yet more disks. If you could have only seen how many kits their were. It was amazing. As Shadows noted it was a sight that would take any phreaks breath away. We are going to attempt to put some pictures of this article on our FTP site. Keep your eyes open if your interested. Oh and one last comment, Prodigy has no limit to kits per house hold, just to free trails per house hold, as far as we can see it's perfectly legal, but I'm sure there's some way they could nab ya, so be carefully, and also realize Prodigy is not the only one vulnerable to this, AOL, Compuserve, Delphi, all the major online services will let you scam them a little. AOL has a fax number for disk orders. You could always make a GIF of a prefilled out kit order and fax it all day long. Good luck, and don't be too greedy. (save some for others :) Watson/Boom Writer -1995 BOOM Issue 11 - Part 10 - BOOM Uses 300+ Disks Ok, so now you have yourself a huge mother lode of disks. What the hell are you going to do with them? After Watson got his monster shipment of Prodigy disks, I started wondering that very thing. Being employed in the up-and-coming service industry, I had plenty of time to ponder what to do with hundreds of disks while at McWork. Then Shadows and Watson asked me if I wanted to write something for BOOM, so I thought this would make a halfway decent article. -The Nihilist formerly DANA What To Do With Hundreds of Floppy Disks First thing in coming up with something to do with the disks is to remember that it has to be something malicious. I mean, c'mon, this is BOOM. You need to break something or blow the shit out of something or get really smashed on some home-brew vodka. If not that, at least get something good out of it; like respect from your peers, upstanding citizen awards, or money. That last point is what led me to the first idea. You could sell the disks. Disks are kind of expensive, if you really think about it. A late night shopping excursion to WalMart five minutes before they closed revealed that a box of ten high density floppies runs about 7 bones. But that's for brand name high quality stuff [formatted too! :)]. Browsing through some office supply catalogs, I found that I could get about 50 HD floppies for about $20, not including S&H. Isn't that kind of pricey, now that you have an excellent low cost source for storage media? ;) Perfect! It's expensive. You aren't the only one who thinks they're expensive. Joe Fuckmeover, who, incedentally, bought his PC at the mall, thinks they're expensive too and is looking for a cheap source of media to back up his mission critical Windoze apps, like Terminal and Write. Here's what you do: Decide on a price for your disks. Make it something 'resonable' seeming. Not too low so that the buyer will think that they're burning hot, and not too high so that the buyer will think you've got lost clusters filling your head. For this example, I'm going to price my disks at 25 for $10. Now peal all the labels off your disks. Good thing these are Prodigy disks and not AOL disks, or you would spend a few weeks getting the labels off. Save wear on your disk drive and don't bother to reformat them or anything. No one can tell if the disk is blank or not. Be sure to make sure that they aren't write protected - it looks suspicious. Now put them neatly in some sort of container, preferably plastic. It looks professional. Go to the mall or in front of some computer store or WalMart or something and set up a little table to peddle your wares. This is a pretty good setup. Sell 25 disks, and you're $10 richer. Not bad for very little work. Just remember to leave the spot you're at at the first sign that some one has called the pigs to come and kick your ass. That would be bad. The next idea I had is a little more time consuming, but has a greater potential for destruction. For this, you'll need to acquire some nice virii or trojans. There are plenty of places to get virii or trojans, often without knowing it. The alt.2600 FAQ has some FTP sites listed that carry these guys, or you can monitor the newsgroups alt.comp.virus or comp.virus. Please tell me you have FTP and newsgroup access. With it being so that any inbred bastard with a computer and a modem can get access, there is no excuse for you not to have access, even though it would probably be best for the rest of us if you didn't. Ok, here's what you do now that you have some virii or trojans (Note: be sure that the ones you have are compiled. Files with extensions like ASM, C, and PAS make for good reading, but otherwise they won't do shit for you). Ok, copy the virus/trojan (to be referred to now as the 'virus', to make things easier on me) onto the disk. Now copy some other files onto the disk. Files with extensions like CFG, TXT, LOG or whatever. There are two things that you must remember when doing this: there can be only one executable file on the disk (the ones with extensions COM, BAT, or EXE), and that all the other extensions should reflect the name (well, REname) of the virus. I.e. call the virus SCANNER.EXE and name a few of the other files *.SCN, SCAN????.CFG, or the like. Those are the two really important things. The other not so important thing to remember is that any text files on the disk should talk about some 'feature' of the 'program'. Since it would be a real pain in the ass to write a text about some fake program, it would probably be a good idea to leave those guys out completely. Stick a label on the disk. Give it a good name to reflect the files on the disk so everything looks really real. Now it's time to disseminate your evil. Take the fake disks down the the computer lab or the mall or whatever and leave them there. Hahahahaha... you've just infected a few machines. Congratulations! If you left them in a computer lab or some other place where you can check up on their 'progress', go back later that day or sometime the next day and see what's going on. If there's some guy with his hair all ripped out who looks like he's been up all night close by, that would be the sysadmin. Go up and ask him what's wrong. I'm sure he would be happy to tell you. For added realism, put a PostIt on the disks saying something like "Bob, run this disk util ASAP!", then leave the disk. Cool, huh? Here are some more suggestions for fun with the disks that I'll list but don't feel like taking the time to describe them, because they're pretty self explanatory: 1. Put slow curing epoxy inside the disk. Put a note on the disk saying something like "DO NOT TAKE THIS DISK OUT OF THIS COMPUTER!" Leave it on top of a computer. 2. Take the disk apart. Carefully cut away all but the inner 1/8" of the plastic of the disk (don't cut any of the metal part!) (the red circle inside the plastic case is the 'disk' in this example). Replace what you cut out with 1500 grit sand paper. (avaible at your nearby hardware store. 50M-^[ a sheet.). Repeat step 2 and 3 of suggestion 1. 3. Get some construction adhesive. Put a little dab of the construction adhesive on the back of the disks. Put the disks on some not-so-nice persons' car. Or put them on a window or a door. 4. Build a wall of disks by stacking them on top of each other out in a road. Make the stack about 3 feet high and as wide as you want. Get a car. Get in the car. Take the car up to about 45 MPH and drive through the wall of disks. Any faster and you'll go through too quickly and miss the fun. 5. Stand on a bridge over a road and throw the disks at cars. Ok, that's all I've thought of. I'm sure you can think of many more. Have phun! -The Nihilist BOOM Issue 11 - Part 11 - BOOM Rips Off Candy Machines Don't ask why you would want to, but I found this works in case you ever do. Go to a candy machine that has small candies. First insert your 25 cents (Yes you do use it, but you get your moneys worth) Turn the crank just slightly till the first bit of candy comes out. No shake the machine in a circluar motion. At the same time you do this, turn the crank back and forth slightly (Not all the way otherwise you won't be able to turn it) Every now and then pound on top the stupid machine. This should have all the candy comeing out into your lap. I did this with a candy machine full of Mike 'n Ike's (not really a good candy but hey) I ended up filling my shirt, before some people looked at me. -Watson / BOOM '95 BOOM Issue 11 - Part 12 - BOOM Discovers The Wonders Of PCCs Halmark's CEO is a phreak. Ok so maybe that's not true, but it sure seem someone in charge has us in the underground in mind. Why do I say that? Look at Halmark's recent line of cards. Recordable greeting cards make excellent Red boxes for ripping of pay phones. And now (in my opinion even better then a red box) They offer a PPC (a pre-paid calling card) It is good for 10 minutes any where in the US. Yes I know ten minutes is not that great. But if it's free hey kewl. Halmark has some new cards and the back they say like 590TEL the 590 is the price 5 bucks and 90 cents. The tel is for telephone card. The goal of these cards is to get you and your loved ones talking on the phone instead of just in the card. These cards are wrapped in that see-through plastic shit. The cards are glued on face down. Here's the good thing. The numbers you need (the pin numbers) are located near the top of the plastic calling card. Bend back the calling card from the card board Halmark card. Write the numbers down on your arm (well if your like me that's what you'll do, but if you have more guts just write them down on some paper then you won't have your whole arm filled with numbers. ) If you do that wear a long sleeve shirt so the lady at the counter doesn't see it (not that she would think much of it anyhow) I personally always where a long shirt for no apparent reason other then it's just how I dress. Ok when you leave the store transfer the numbers from your arm to something more permanent like say paper. Now call up anyone of the following Halmark PCC numbers: 1-800-504-1115 1-800-203-1225 1-800-214-0214 Then follow the instructions and your all set. This can be done from home, without worry. Halmark expects your calls to be made form home and they don't (to my knowledge) keep records of the calls. The only thing you have to worry about is if some punk who gets the card after you scammed the numbers offa it calls up Halmark and says. 'Hey some asshole used my pin numbers` then maybe they might trace it back to you but.. I seriuosly doubt it. If that idea really bugs you then you could always just shoplift the card and you don't have anything to worry about, assuming you don't get caught ripping it off, but Halmark people are usally chicks so you could probally out run them (Not trying to offend any female readers of Boom, females are far more supiour then men are, and if you are a chick I think you should know I really respect you, and think you should have sex with me, not becuase I'm horney but becuase I care about you deeply.) Ok now offa that li'l tangent. Like I said you can rip off a card, but thats petty, any moron can do that, if you think like I do (which would be a scary thought) then your not into average crimes that the normal highschool brainless burnouts can pull off. (nothing against burnouts, but from what burnouts I have met, I can say, wow.. these people would never make a good phreak) [notice by burnout I mean a nonsocaily acceptable loser, not nessicarly limiting it to someone who smokes, or labling all smokers as burnouts] Do something smart, maybe it's illegal but make it something that confuses the li'l piggie who busts ya... something tech, something evil, something hard for the average Joe (aka moron) to grasp. If you are a real phreaker, or a semi-real hacker, then you should be above B&E unless it's breaking in for the reason of getting info to commit further crimes or something more then just stealing a TV (or stealing a system password... which Shadows and Jihad pulled off once). That's just my opinion which does not nessicarly reflect the views of Boom, it was just my little hacker/phreaker ethic rant that everyone has of their own, and I appologize for throwing it in if you don't agree with it. Until later good luck and have fun phreaking! (one last note, I haven't tried it but you may want to consider trying to get the Customer Service Operator at Halmark into giving you a new card number by saying: "Hi I just got a new halmark prepaid long distance card, and it tells me it's used all the time already... am I doing something wrong?" Then see if they give you another one to use because they feel bad for you getting riped off. Or try "Hi I just bought a Halmark card and I guess there was supposed to be a little plastic card that went with it, but mine is missing, could you send me a new one?" I doubt any of these will work becuase Halmark kinda blows, but it might give you a reason for spending their money in long distance. Good luck. Watson/Boom Writer -1995 BOOM Issue 11 - Part 13 - BOOM Reads The News Boom didn't read the news much these past few months. Or, more accuately, the writers of Boom didn't feel like typing out the news much these past few months. You'll only find one quote and one article to follow. But, we figure you guess read newspapers too, so why type them out if you've already seen this shit? "I am not a regular commuter on the information highway. I am more like hitchhiker." - George Bush No matter what you say about George Bush, you've got to give him credit for being honest about his ignorance. But that's probably because he's not running for office anymore. "Con Artists Take Information Highway For a Ride" Late July, 1995 If often boils down to greed; the lure to make easy money or avoid conventional wisdom when you discover a big offer while surfing through computer bulletin board programs. In a highly unregulated industry, "cyberscams" are cropping up all over the electronic superhighway and online subscribers are exposed daily in a more exotic fashion to the age-old problem of financial scams and fraud.] Kenneth VanderMeeden, president of the Better Business Bureau of Western Michigan, Inc., said the organiztion has not recieved any complaints about cyberscams, "but it's such uncharted territory, no one really knows who to complain to." VanderMeeden said federal regulators such as the FCC are scratching their collective head ove who is in charge of high-tech scams problems. "It is basically unenforcable right now because the programs are just coming fast and furious," he added. "We don't scope the Internet and it's really up to the consumer to bring problems to out attention. If nothing else, a file of questions or complaints would help build a data base for checking against fraudelant claims, he said. The North American Securities Admninistrators Association estimates more than 5 million consumers with home computers subscribe to commercial online servces which allow messages to be posted and recieved. Many services have few restrictions on the communications, creating a new meaning to the old adage of "buyer beware." One example involoved America Online's Investor Network. Over 20,000 investors paid $200 each to be some of the first involved in what was touted as a worldwide telephone lottery, which would bring them more money by signing up other participants. The Securities and Exchange Commision eventually stepped in, calling the operation a pyramid scheme. "People using the Internet or other serviuces are not gullible and in a certain sense they brinmg (a scam) on themselves," said Justin L. Moran, associate director of corporate finance for Roney & Co. in Detroit, and former spokesman for the Michigan Bankers Association. "I'm certainly not defendingg the scam artists, but greed will motivate people to do some dumb things." Financial advisors warn to be leery of extravagant claims and catchy headlines. Follow the same reasoning you would if considering merchendise or investments offered through mail or by phone. Never buy something based solely on information you pull off an electronic network. Never put your address, telephone number, or credit card number over the system. Moran said the scammers aren't doing as well as they could because money cannot be transferred over the electronic network, "a saving grace" against crooks for the moment. "And an overwhelming concern is the lack of confidentiality of credit cards," Moran added. "Most people are very reluctant to give out a number because it can be picked up by anyone." Moran said subscribers should keep three things in mind when tempted by offers: "Don't deal with strangers and stick to the theory that if it's too good to be true, it is," Moran said. "The third is that there is no secure means of transferring money. Simply put, don't look at the Internet as a means of doing business, good or ill." Nice to know it's not just the big corporations on the Internet who are making the profits huh? BOOM Issue 11 - Part 14 - BOOM Talks to Watson Once upon a time I had a fish. It wasn't a good fish but damnit it was my fish! Someone stole him from me! Do you know who it was!! No neither do I. He was a gold fish. I named him Sam the first week I got him he learned a new trick, he could float motionless on top the water for days! When he got bored of doing that he learned a new trick. he began to shed (ok so my brother said decompose [it's just a fancy word for shed]) body parts. I was amazed with my fish, he learned so many tricks and lived just like all those high class fish who's owners can provide those loving extra things like, food, and water. I miss my fish, but now on to more important issues, one time I had a dog, it was a good dog, wait no that wasn't the issue I was looking for. Hi and welcome to Watson's thoughts if any..... Hmm this article has been in like all the Booms since issue 5 so even though I don't want to do it I will continue the tradition. This weeks article: the do's and don'ts of socially 'fitting in.` 1. Do not call your mail man Big Daddy G. 2. Do not call anybody Big Daddy G. 3. Do Always floss before going to the bathroom. 4. Do make sure when taking a shit at a friend's house that at least half of it go into the toilet. 5. Do make sure when smoking pot at the dinner table at your girl friends house to offer her parents a hit. 6. Do make sure when eating dinner with your girl friends parents to tell them how good sex with their daughter is, and how she gives good head. 7. Do tell all your friends that your a virgin (even if your not) 8. Don't ever shave cause that makes you look sanitary. 9. Do Talk like a hick. 10. Do Tell everyone you meet that your butt looks like your grandma's hairy cunt. If you follow these rules you will be considered popular and in... just look at me... I don't follow these rules and I suck, so if I did follow these rules, the opposite must be true right? All it takes is some good old fashion Watson logic, and a couple of 40's on a hot saturday night to figure that one out. BTW: If you didn't already know, it's always a good idea to throw a 5 lbs bag of sugar over a very hot fire. Watson / Boom Court Jester -1995 BOOM Issue 11 - Part 15 - BOOM Gets Mail Letters: Date: Tuesday, July 4, 1995 8:25am From: INTERNET: BDEY45A@prodigy.com Re: Send me Doom! ---------------------------------- Date: Friday, July 7, 1995 6:46pm From: INTERNET: Quacker144@aol.com Re: boom! BOOM! ben :) ----------------------------------- Date: Friday, July 14, 1995 6:06am From: INTERNET: WolVSPY@aol.com Re: boom issue # 10 was cool i want the previous issues and to subscribe to boom."bombs are cool heh heh heh" wezman american online ----------------------------------- Date: Friday, July 14, 1995 5:41pm From: INTERNET: PHREAKKKER@aol.com Re: Zine Hey Boom rox. I would really like to subscribe to your mag. It has everything that I am into. Thanx a lot, Phreakkker ----------------------------------- Date: Friday, July 21, 1995 4:59pm From: INTERNET: IXxDETHxXI@aol.com Re: BOOM Hey!! I LOVE your mag!!! I was wondering if i could please get on the mailing list?....If you can, just send to Slayer15...Thanks in advance! L8r!! ----------------------------------- Parts of Chat Logs: Golbez000: Focus more on the BOOMBOOM shit ---------- RecklessX9: yup...Watson is funny as shit BoomMag: what did you think of the letter from Garry in NY? RecklessX9: Christ, is that BS or what RecklessX9: that's pretty cool...are u friends with Watson? RecklessX9: He probably smokes pot as much as I do LOL RecklessX9: cool...mainly around this area, pipe bombs are most popular..some kid in Delaware recently blew his hand off with one ---------- Suzy: yeah, i understand. r u looking 4 true love? hey wait, how'd that get in here? ---------- Aieeeeee: They can't trace through sprint net....they can trace through aolnet if you don't use *67 BOOM Issue 11 - Part 16 - BOOM Conclusion Now that you've read Boom, what are you going to do? Go to Disneyland? NO! Blow up your neighbor's house? WARMER... Blow up an entire block on the other side of town? EVEN WARMER... Burn down the nearest town... entirely? REALLY HOT... Dress up as O.J. Simpson and go tricker treating? DISCO. Well, atleast, that's what's we're gonna do up here in the frozen tundra called Northern Michigan. When you do it, make sure to pack all the tricks... M-80's, homemade gunpowder, C-4, etc... and have a whole shitload of fun.