George W. Bush was visiting an elementary school, and the 4th grade class he sat through began a discussion related to words and their meanings.
The teacher asked the President if he would like to lead the class in a discussion of the word "tragedy." So, George W. asked the class for an example of a tragedy.
One boy stood up and said, "If my best friend who lives next door is playing in the street and a car comes along and runs him over, that would be a tragedy."
"No," said Bush, "that would be an accident."
A girl raised her hand and said, "If a school bus carrying 50 children drove off a cliff, killing everyone on board, that would be a tragedy."
"I'm afraid not," the President said. "That's what we would call a Great Loss."
The room went silent. No other children volunteered. President Bush searched the room and asked, "Isn't there someone here who can give me an example of a tragedy?"
Finally, way in the back of the room, Johnny raised his hand, and in a quiet voice, he said, "If Air Force One, carrying Mr. and Mrs. Bush, was struck by a missile and blown up to smithereens, THAT would be a tragedy."
"That's right! And can you tell me WHY that would be a tragedy?" asked the President.
"Well," Johnny said, "because it wouldn't be an accident and it sure as hell wouldn’t be a Great Loss..."
August 13, 2010
Classic Hack
Here is a story about one of the classic computer hacks.
Back in the mid-1970s, several of the system support staff at Motorola discovered a relatively simple way to crack system security on the Xerox CP-V timesharing system. Through a simple programming strategy, it was possible for a user program to trick the system into running a portion of the program in `master mode' (supervisor state), in which memory protection does not apply. The program could then poke a large value into its `privilege level' byte (normally write-protected) and could then proceed to bypass all levels of security within the file-management system, patch the system monitor, and do numerous other interesting things. In short, the barn door was wide open.
Motorola quite properly reported this problem to Xerox via an official `level 1 SIDR' (a bug report with an intended urgency of `needs to be fixed yesterday'). Because the text of each SIDR was entered into a database that could be viewed by quite a number of people, Motorola followed the approved procedure: they simply reported the problem as `Security SIDR', and attached all of the necessary documentation, ways-to-reproduce, etc.
The CP-V people at Xerox sat on their thumbs; they either didn't realize the severity of the problem, or didn't assign the necessary operating-system-staff resources to develop and distribute an official patch.
Months passed. The Motorola guys pestered their Xerox field-support rep, to no avail. Finally they decided to take direct action, to demonstrate to Xerox management just how easily the system could be cracked and just how thoroughly the security safeguards could be subverted.
They dug around in the operating-system listings and devised a thoroughly devilish set of patches. These patches were then incorporated into a pair of programs called `Robin Hood' and `Friar Tuck'. Robin Hood and Friar Tuck were designed to run as `ghost jobs' (daemons, in UNIX terminology); they would use the existing loophole to subvert system security, install the necessary patches, and then keep an eye on one another's statuses in order to keep the system operator (in effect, the super user) from aborting them.
One fine day, the system operator on the main CP-V software development system in El Segundo was surprised by a number of unusual phenomena. These included the following:
* Tape drives would rewind and dismount their tapes in the middle of a job. * Disk drives would seek back and forth so rapidly that they would attempt to walk across the floor. * The card-punch output device would occasionally start up of itself and punch a lace card. These would usually jam in the punch. * The console would print snide and insulting messages from Robin Hood to Friar Tuck, or vice versa. * The Xerox card reader had two output stackers; it could be instructed to stack into A, stack into B, or stack into A (unless a card was unreadable, in which case the bad card was placed into stacker B). One of the patches installed by the ghosts added some code to the card-reader driver... after reading a card; it would flip over to the opposite stacker. As a result, card decks would divide themselves in half when they were read, leaving the operator to re collate them manually.
Naturally, the operator called in the operating-system developers. They found the bandit ghost jobs running, and X'ed them... and were once again surprised. When Robin Hood was X'ed, the following sequence of events took place:
!X id1
id1: Friar Tuck... I am under attack! Pray save me! id1: Off (aborted)
id2: Fear not, friend Robin! I shall rout the Sheriff of Nottingham's men!
id1: Thank you, my good fellow!
Each ghost-job would detect the fact that the other had been killed, and would start a new copy of the recently slain program within a few milliseconds. The only way to kill both ghosts was to kill them simultaneously (very difficult) or to deliberately crash the system.
Finally, the system programmers did the latter --- only to find that the bandits appeared once again when the system rebooted! It turned out that these two programs had patched the boot-time OS image (the kernel file, in UNIX terms) and had added themselves to the list of programs that were to be started at boot time.
The Robin Hood and Friar Tuck ghosts were finally eradicated when the system staff rebooted the system from a clean boot-tape and reinstalled the monitor. Not long thereafter, Xerox released a patch for this problem.
It is alleged that Xerox filed a complaint with Motorola's management about the merry-prankster actions of the two employees in question. It is not recorded that any serious disciplinary action was taken against either of them.
Back in the mid-1970s, several of the system support staff at Motorola discovered a relatively simple way to crack system security on the Xerox CP-V timesharing system. Through a simple programming strategy, it was possible for a user program to trick the system into running a portion of the program in `master mode' (supervisor state), in which memory protection does not apply. The program could then poke a large value into its `privilege level' byte (normally write-protected) and could then proceed to bypass all levels of security within the file-management system, patch the system monitor, and do numerous other interesting things. In short, the barn door was wide open.
Motorola quite properly reported this problem to Xerox via an official `level 1 SIDR' (a bug report with an intended urgency of `needs to be fixed yesterday'). Because the text of each SIDR was entered into a database that could be viewed by quite a number of people, Motorola followed the approved procedure: they simply reported the problem as `Security SIDR', and attached all of the necessary documentation, ways-to-reproduce, etc.
The CP-V people at Xerox sat on their thumbs; they either didn't realize the severity of the problem, or didn't assign the necessary operating-system-staff resources to develop and distribute an official patch.
Months passed. The Motorola guys pestered their Xerox field-support rep, to no avail. Finally they decided to take direct action, to demonstrate to Xerox management just how easily the system could be cracked and just how thoroughly the security safeguards could be subverted.
They dug around in the operating-system listings and devised a thoroughly devilish set of patches. These patches were then incorporated into a pair of programs called `Robin Hood' and `Friar Tuck'. Robin Hood and Friar Tuck were designed to run as `ghost jobs' (daemons, in UNIX terminology); they would use the existing loophole to subvert system security, install the necessary patches, and then keep an eye on one another's statuses in order to keep the system operator (in effect, the super user) from aborting them.
One fine day, the system operator on the main CP-V software development system in El Segundo was surprised by a number of unusual phenomena. These included the following:
* Tape drives would rewind and dismount their tapes in the middle of a job. * Disk drives would seek back and forth so rapidly that they would attempt to walk across the floor. * The card-punch output device would occasionally start up of itself and punch a lace card. These would usually jam in the punch. * The console would print snide and insulting messages from Robin Hood to Friar Tuck, or vice versa. * The Xerox card reader had two output stackers; it could be instructed to stack into A, stack into B, or stack into A (unless a card was unreadable, in which case the bad card was placed into stacker B). One of the patches installed by the ghosts added some code to the card-reader driver... after reading a card; it would flip over to the opposite stacker. As a result, card decks would divide themselves in half when they were read, leaving the operator to re collate them manually.
Naturally, the operator called in the operating-system developers. They found the bandit ghost jobs running, and X'ed them... and were once again surprised. When Robin Hood was X'ed, the following sequence of events took place:
!X id1
id1: Friar Tuck... I am under attack! Pray save me! id1: Off (aborted)
id2: Fear not, friend Robin! I shall rout the Sheriff of Nottingham's men!
id1: Thank you, my good fellow!
Each ghost-job would detect the fact that the other had been killed, and would start a new copy of the recently slain program within a few milliseconds. The only way to kill both ghosts was to kill them simultaneously (very difficult) or to deliberately crash the system.
Finally, the system programmers did the latter --- only to find that the bandits appeared once again when the system rebooted! It turned out that these two programs had patched the boot-time OS image (the kernel file, in UNIX terms) and had added themselves to the list of programs that were to be started at boot time.
The Robin Hood and Friar Tuck ghosts were finally eradicated when the system staff rebooted the system from a clean boot-tape and reinstalled the monitor. Not long thereafter, Xerox released a patch for this problem.
It is alleged that Xerox filed a complaint with Motorola's management about the merry-prankster actions of the two employees in question. It is not recorded that any serious disciplinary action was taken against either of them.
Netscape Technical Support Folly
Tech: Internet Technical Support this is so-and-so speaking. May I have your username please?
Female Customer: Yes I want to speak to the person in charge immediately!
Tech: Speaking. What can I do for you?
Female Customer: I want to complain about the pornographic bookmarks your company put in my web browser!
Tech: We didn't put any pornographic bookmarks in your web browser.
Female Customer: Oh yes you did! I'm looking at them right now!
(Tech remembers the Netscape history list and grins to himself)
Tech: Where exactly are these "bookmarks" located?
Female Customer: In Netscape!
Tech: And where exactly in Netscape would that be?
Female: In that little list that comes down when you click the little down arrow!
Tech: The one right above the Net Search button?
Female Customer: Yes that one!
Tech: Miss, that's the Netscape history list. Netscape keeps the past ten links you typed in that box. The only way to put an address in that box is for someone to physically sit at your computer and type in a web address.
Female Customer: Well I certainly didn't type in those X rated web addresses!
Tech: Well somebody did. Who else has access to your computer, and uses the Internet?
Female Customer: Just me and my husband!
(Several seconds of silence pass ... Hey! I wasn't going to say it!)
Female Customer: ........ oh............. OOOH! ... Thank you.
(She quickly hung up)
Female Customer: Yes I want to speak to the person in charge immediately!
Tech: Speaking. What can I do for you?
Female Customer: I want to complain about the pornographic bookmarks your company put in my web browser!
Tech: We didn't put any pornographic bookmarks in your web browser.
Female Customer: Oh yes you did! I'm looking at them right now!
(Tech remembers the Netscape history list and grins to himself)
Tech: Where exactly are these "bookmarks" located?
Female Customer: In Netscape!
Tech: And where exactly in Netscape would that be?
Female: In that little list that comes down when you click the little down arrow!
Tech: The one right above the Net Search button?
Female Customer: Yes that one!
Tech: Miss, that's the Netscape history list. Netscape keeps the past ten links you typed in that box. The only way to put an address in that box is for someone to physically sit at your computer and type in a web address.
Female Customer: Well I certainly didn't type in those X rated web addresses!
Tech: Well somebody did. Who else has access to your computer, and uses the Internet?
Female Customer: Just me and my husband!
(Several seconds of silence pass ... Hey! I wasn't going to say it!)
Female Customer: ........ oh............. OOOH! ... Thank you.
(She quickly hung up)
Irish Bank Robbery
Excerpted from an article about a bank robbery which appeared in the Dublin Times (metropolitan edition, page 2A) on 2 March 1999:
Once inside the bank shortly after midnight, their efforts at disabling the internal security system got underway immediately. The robbers, who expected to find one or two large safes filled with cash and valuables, were surprised to see hundreds of smaller safes scattered throughout the bank.
The robbers cracked the first safe's combination, and inside they found only a bowl of vanilla pudding. As recorded on the bank's audio-tape system, one said, "At least we'll get a bit to eat,"
The robbers opened up a second safe, and it also contained nothing but vanilla pudding. The process continued until all the safes were opened.
They found not one pound sterling, a diamond, or an ounce of gold. Instead, all the safes contained covered bowls of pudding.
Disappointed, the robbers made a quiet exit, each leaving with nothing more than a queasy, uncomfortably full stomach.
The newspaper headline read:
IRELAND'S LARGEST SPERM BANK ROBBED EARLY THIS MORNING.
Once inside the bank shortly after midnight, their efforts at disabling the internal security system got underway immediately. The robbers, who expected to find one or two large safes filled with cash and valuables, were surprised to see hundreds of smaller safes scattered throughout the bank.
The robbers cracked the first safe's combination, and inside they found only a bowl of vanilla pudding. As recorded on the bank's audio-tape system, one said, "At least we'll get a bit to eat,"
The robbers opened up a second safe, and it also contained nothing but vanilla pudding. The process continued until all the safes were opened.
They found not one pound sterling, a diamond, or an ounce of gold. Instead, all the safes contained covered bowls of pudding.
Disappointed, the robbers made a quiet exit, each leaving with nothing more than a queasy, uncomfortably full stomach.
The newspaper headline read:
IRELAND'S LARGEST SPERM BANK ROBBED EARLY THIS MORNING.
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