The Hacker Essay, Research Paper
It was a lonely Saturday night. The wind was howling through the branches of the old oak tree outside my window. The branches swayed back and forth, creating faint tapping and screeching sounds on the glass. And so, I sat? It was a night like any other; my music playing in the background and the room was illuminated only by the changing shades of green from my lava lamp. I waited. Suddenly, a came from the system unit of my computer, signalling that it was ready. I sat in my big leather chair, leant forward, and logged on. Immediately, the computer went through a series of programmes, checking the system was operating correctly, and so on. The status bar reached 100% and the computer was now ready for action.
I sat with the bright glare in my eyes. The once room, once light by a perpetually changing shade of green, was now light up with a brilliant sky blue.
?Good evening, Dave. Would you like me to log on to the Internet?? It was a synthesised voice coming from the computer. It was a voice interface I had made by piecing together things my girl friend had said. I had it on the computer to remind me of her, and to give me hope that one day I would see her again.
?Hmm?yeah, log me on.? I said. My voice was grotty and weak. Although I had a voice interface, I rarely spoke, even though I used my computer 24/7, I?d normally use the keyboard and mouse. Still, having a voice interface was pretty nifty, but I couldn?t help but think that one day, it may not recognise my voice?.it was getting worse by the day. The modem clicked.
?Log on complete. Have a nice day.? It said. I almost broke down. I hadn?t heard this voice for some time?.it brought back memories. I had forgotten what she sounded like?She? My god! I?d started to think that this machine was my girl friend. ?The late nights must be getting to me.? I thought
?Thanks.? I said. I could hardly stand it?it felt like there was a rock in my throat; you know the one I mean? When you?re upset and you feel like your going cry? Well, anyway, I cracked my knuckles, for no reason what so ever, knowing full well it could give me premature arthritis. , and started typing. When I looked at the clock in the bottom right of my screen, it read 21:30, when I glanced at it again, it was 23:00!
?DEAR SWEET JESUS!!! What the hell have I been doing for the past hour and a half?!?!? I shouted. I looked at my Internet browser window, and found some page about government conspiracies. ?Uh huh?so, em, why did I come here?? I asked myself, in a patronising voice. Although I had no recollection of the last hour and a half at all, I decided to ?go with the proverbial flow?. I scrolled up and down the page for a bit until I saw something that grabbed my attention?. and no, it wasn?t something to do with the Clinton-Lewenski affair, no, this was something far more deadly?
It looked mighty interesting. The heading read ?Ion Cannon Tests on the Moon?. Having and insatiable curiosity for weapons of mass destruction ever since my girl friend died (The probable cause of all the hate inside me), I had a gander. Of course, there was nothing in the section, load of lying scumbags cheating my imagination. Never the less, this set back did not deter me. I decide to make a call in the Pentagon?s web site. And I must admit, even I was surprised to find they had one. I phoned around my friends and told them to log onto the Internet and activate my IP scatter program I had given them all, then to link to my computer. I then stocked up on drinks and food and brought some surplus to my computer, just to nibble on. I activated my server scatter and got ready for business, and cracking my knuckles of course.
The server scatter program made a continuous loop between my friends? and my own computer, making tracing impossible, or at least, virtually impossible. I played the ?Mission Impossible: 2? theme, as it was a fitting music track to listen to given the situation. I entered the Pentagon?s URL into my browser, and stuffed my face with some more food. The first page was, I expected, boring as hell.
?Damn visitor?s pages slowing me down again? I said to myself. I sent E-mail to the ?Administrator?, ?who? was most likely to be a computer, with a modified ?Trojan? virus. Luckily, the E-mail was accessed immediately, meaning I could access the primary server immediately. A strange looking page came up, not like anything I had seen before. I realised that it was the HTML code for the main server with hyperlinks imbedded in it. It took me some time, but I finally found the link to the page I wanted. I clicked on it, and the information filled the screen.
?Oooohh baby! JACK POT!? There was limitless information in there, and what could I do, but copy it all? I cackled like an evil witch as copied the text into a file for myself. Then, a small red box appeared in the centre of my screen that said ?Tracing? in it with a status bar. As it reached 80%, I sat back. I could imagine the stupid idiots at the Pentagon sitting and getting excited, in the false knowledge that they would soon be able to get me. It had taken 30 minutes for the bar to get to 97%, when it froze, and restarted. I savoured the moment, laughing at the fools in America. It then reset the transmitted IP address of my computer to somewhere in Belgium, then France, then Germany, then China. The Pentagon had no chance of catching me. As far as they were concerned I was moving all over the world in a half an hour every time they tried to trace me. I finished getting the information I wanted and logged off.
I published each section of my file to a different newspaper, nation wide. Each one had a different story to sell, new stories and old stories that were very entertaining. Not only that, but from the proceeds, I had gained a VERY fat bank balance. And people say money doesn?t bring happiness? The US government denied everything, obviously, but I knew it was true, or did I?
So, regardless of the uproar and political upset I had caused, I spent the rest of my life in a big house, with a flash car, and people who cleaned up after me. Even though, I must admit, I did find life empty without that special some one. I kept my old computer, seeing as it helped me get all my vast fortune and for a VERY small slice of my wallet, I had a new computer custom built. Perfect???for hacking.
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