382 DEAR HACKER

382 DEAR HACKER

A word of advice to your readers: If you ever come face to face with the Secret Service, keep your mouth shut. Nothing you say will help you. They feed on intimidation and threats and can make an arrest

a horror scene. They will then try the smooth and friendly approach to get what they want. They will promise you the world if you will just cooperate before it is too late. (It will not be too late — no mat- ter what they say.) They will start with only wanting your help with your software or your little tricks of the trade. Don’t do it! They lie! Someone will always have a superior who will overrule them when they are done with you. The government will screw you over. Keep your mouth shut and never, never say anything without a lawyer.

The Secret Service promised everything they could to get all the copies of my ATM software, along with the message protocols and technical manuals on the ATMs. They didn’t want that crap on the streets. When they thought they had everything they wanted, the U.S. Attorney’s Office proceeded with the screwing over and their lies came out. Don’t trust — don’t believe. You’ll regret it — I do.

ATM Bandit This is a valuable lesson a lot of people have learned and one that even more will

still have to experience. Many of us read about your ATM “hack” in the papers — while the idea was quite clever, setting it up and taking people’s money was pure theft. Not bowing to this kind of temptation is one of the hardest challenges hack- ers face.

Dear 2600: My handle is Alphabits and I’ve been in the H/P scene for over nine

years. I’m currently in federal custody in New Jersey waiting to go to trial for cellular phone fraud, mainly “trafficking in counterfeit access devices” in violation of title 18, section 1029(a)(2) of the U.S. code. In September of 1995, I was indicted by the U.S. government, and then shortly thereafter I was arrested by Secret Service agents on

BEHIND THE WALLS

a freeway in southern California. I was one of the key figures busted in the “Celco 51” incident. The U.S. Secret Service, Cellular One, and an informant operated an H/P BBS in New Jersey for about two years. To my knowledge, there were a total of 15 other people arrested across the country during September. Since Cellular One was a key partner in the operation, they were mainly targeting cellular fraud. On September 3rd, I was extradited from Los Angeles to New Jersey to stand trial. During my two-week journey, I was incarcerated with

a few hackers including Agent Steal and Kevin Mitnick. Although I cannot talk specifically about my case now, I can say it is amazing how small the government’s knowledge is regarding computers and hacking. One example is that on one of the computers they found a text file of FTP sites. They are trying to figure a loss value of $500 per site, $73,000 for the file. Excuse me, loss value of what? Did ftp.cso. uiuc.edu (exec-pc) lose money somehow? In any case, hopefully I will

be free sometime around January of 1997. I’m currently being held in a 100+-year-old jail (similar to Alcatraz),

which is a total intellectual wasteland. I would appreciate it if you could post my address or forward it to someone who could. Any letters, printouts, etc. would be greatly appreciated!

Jeremy G. Cushing #63366 Union County Jail Elizabeth, NJ 07207

We wish you luck and encourage people to send mail because prison can be a very lonely and mentally crippling environment. While we don’t know particu- lars about your specific case, we do know that many questions are being raised about the Celco 51 sting operation of 1995. In particular, we have heard numerous reports of the informant you mentioned appearing at 2600 meetings trying to get people to commit crimes. We know this is accurate because we’d been getting complaints about this individual back in 1994. Tainted though this case may be, it’s quite likely these questions won’t change a thing. But we can learn something important. Odds are that if someone approaches you and tries to get you to turn your knowledge and interests toward the world of crime, they are either trying to trap you or they are trying to con you. If you feel nice and secure because the person you want to commit crimes with is a trusted friend, be aware that nothing tears apart a friendship more quickly than a federal indictment. There is absolutely