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Web Hacks
Mike Hudack
Editor-in-Chief
Web hacks seem to have been making the Net go around lately -- at least legal-wise. Web hacks have been making headlines and web hacks have been inciting legal wars between hackers and the Federal Government.
Web hacks can cause some damage to companies, at least companies which do eCommerce. They are, however, a largely inconsequential portion of the computer security picture. Web hacks make good headlines, however, and are easily the most public security issue around today (besides, perhaps, bank robberies).
Web hacks, however, became true front page news -- and not just in computer magazines -- when gH (global Hell) attached whitehouse.gov, replacing the site with their own little tribute to themselves. It was at that moment that the administration decided to get tough on script kiddies (although they didnīt quite word it that way).
The FBI quickly started a series of raids, searching the houses or apartments of dozens of crackers, including members (and the head) of gH.
The second volley in the War of the Federal Web was fired by crackers shortly after the FBI raids began. Masters of Downloading (or an imposter group -- three members of MOD claim they didnīt hit the Senate) sniffed the passwords for the senate.gov website. They quickly acted, defacing the site with their own MOD page -- again exhorting their superiority -- but only to half the viewers of senate.gov (they only cracked one of two webservers).
The raids continued unfettered, however. More and more crackers were being investigated and a Federal grand jury began forming in Dallas, Texas. Soon, Israeli Ghost began flooding the FBI.gov webserver, eventually forcing the FBI to pull the plug on their server.
At this point, not many more raids are expected. No charges have been filed, but they can take months -- in some cases, even years. gH members are expected to be charged with the whitehouse.gov attack, but other charges are pretty much a mystery.
The government has to start getting tough on crackers who cause true damage -- not cosmetic damage. A web hack does very little damage, besides hurt pride. |
