The life and times of, R.A.T. F.I.N.C

Subject: OSCAR MALLORY: Hacker Handle = R.A.T. F.I.N.C = [Remote Access Technology Finding Interesting Networks to Control]

Oscar Mallory was 9 years old in 1999. His father had divorced from his mother when Oscar was 7. Now days his father was a contract COBAL programmer working to provide Y2K patches for legacy computer systems operated by the US government and various state governments.

Oscar loved to watch his dad code. Since his dad spent so much of his time on the computer coding it didn't take Oscar very long to realize that the best way to get his dad's attention was for him to watch his dad code and then when he saw dad code something he did not understand he would ask his dad to explain the code sequence to him. This made his dad proud because it demonstrated clearly that the boy was able to grasp the code enough to ask relevant questions about it.

It was on Sunday, October 31th 1999, that Oscar's dad Mike Mallory got a call that changed their lives. Oscar's mother Mary was aboard EgyptAir Flight 990 traveling from New York City to Cairo when it crashed off the coast of Nantucket, Massachusetts, killing all 217 on-board, including Mary Mallory. Mike was devastated by this news. Mike loved his wife very much. Their breakup was due to Mike's Y2K obsession. Mary could not bare his gloom and doom about the end of the millennium.

Mike was crushed by the news of Mary's untimely death. It only served to punctuate his end of the millennium doomsday paranoia. Oscar was also devastated by the news of his mother's demise. Soon Oscar found his dad up at all hours of the night. Mike would rant and rave on and on about the millennium bug. Mike did well on these contracts financially but he saw the length and breadth of the problem and worried allowed in front of young Oscar that the government could not possibly be ready in just one short month for the Y2K cyber disaster event he predicted. While his dad was struggling with his Y2K code patches for IRS and Social Security computers Oscar started to notice commonalities in the various government computer systems that sparked his interest.

Oscar started to find that the TCP/IP communications protocol in COBAL on various government computer systems contained network-based vulnerabilities that his dad was working to create countermeasures for, the database security was also weak by today's standards, intrusion detection was in it's infancy. It was in this learning environment that Oscar learned that he was becoming a nascent computer hacker.

One of the hottest technological products of 1999 was high-speed Internet access, which made Web site information download more quickly and eliminated lengthy logins. There were three types of high-speed internet access: digital subscriber lines (DSL), which used existing telephone lines; cable modems provided by cable TV companies; and satellite download via home satellite dish. High-speed connections ranged from 256,000 bits per second (256 kbps or 256K) for the most widely used consumer version of DSL to 1.5 million bps for most cable modem systems. Mike Mallory's employer provided his home office with a 256K DSL line. This allowed Mike to upload his Y2K patches to the government servers over night while he slept. No more bringing dozens of floppies into work to install his software upgrades.

This provided Oscar something very rare at the time which was a then considered high speed internet connection as well as his Dad's computer with all his government network access available to him. Mike Mallory had developed quite a predictable drinking habit since his divorce. Oscar knew that his dad would be down for the count by 10PM just like clockwork every night. Oscar would have about 2 hours of uninterrupted network access on his dad's machine every night before he would get tired and head for bed himself. It was typical for Oscar to backtrack hid dad's work and review the patches his dad had uploaded in his last session. The network revealed to him some programming shortcuts that had been installed by the network admins to make things quicker and easier for them to manage across multiple systems that they routinely worked on. These are refereed to as back doors. Oscar became aware of certain commonalities among these programmer back doors. It was one thing to come on a system his dad had access to, but he found it quite exciting to access networks that he simply deduced the login for. At 9 years old Oscar had done his first hack.

Oscar was 10 when his Dad who was now an unemployed COBAL programmer in the year 2000 had long passed his Y2K hay day. He now worked as a manager at a Subway sandwich shop across the street from the Computer Science building at the Berkly College Campus. Oscar liked to hang out and listen to the college kids. The computer science majors liked to hang out and listen to his dad tell stories of the now old days of computers. What Oscar thought to himself but did not speak to others about was just how short his Father's career was and how technology could quickly change making their entire young education experience obsolete and no longer marketable just like what had happened to his father.

These young college grads were coming up during the beginning years of the 21st century tech-bubble. The Future Was So Bright They Had To Wear Shades it seemed. On March 10, 2000 NASDAQ hits its record high and marks the turning point of the dot-com boom. For the first time more than half of the households in America have Internet access on August 17, 2000 according to Nielsen.

Oscar Mallory AKA [R.A.T. F.I.N.C.] was bored and his dad was passed out so he was online. In Washington D.C. air traffic control computer problems causes a shutdown of air traffic across the U.S. East Coast on January 6, 2000.

Oscar is back online at the beginning of April on IRC talking to some young Filipino students. Later they release the ILOVEYOU e-mail virus that begins infecting computers and spreading over the Internet starting on May 4, 2000. The virus becomes one of the most costly viruses ever, estimated causing over $10 billion dollars in damages.

It is the summer of 2,000. Oscar is walking to the library to get on the internet while his dad is sleeping one off. His dad had a big download going on so Oscar dared not use his dad's PC at home. Oscar had no clue about the FBI surveillance team shadowing him. As Oscar fumbled through his backpack looking for a 3.5" disk he used to set up his own custom system on one of the library PCs he did not notice the van pull up next to him in the street.

2 men got out as the van slowed and then sped up to turn right at the next intersection. As the van turned the 2 men grabbed young Oscar under each arm and lifted him into the waiting van. His muffled cry for help was noticed by no one.

The agents had placed a black bag over his head when they stuck Oscar into the Van. At that point Oscar knew at some level that these guys did not mean him harm. He felt strongly that they were on to his hacking talent. Instead of struggling or continuing to cry out Oscar quieted himself and listened. His heightened auditory awareness cued up by the blindness of the hood caught his attention. Oscar heard the radios of the med. He could judge by the uniform volume levels in their com systems the number of men, their distance from him and even the orientation of their bodies relevant to his.

Next Oscar intuited the hierarchy of this unseen group. Based on their auditory clues he determined who was in charge of this group. By listening Oscar became aware of their mission objectives. He also was aware of who the group was commanded by on the other side of the radio link. By the time this small FBI field unit had arrived at the safe-house they were taking young Oscar to, he knew more about their mission than many of this crew knew of it themselves.

Oscar was led out of the van. His hood was removed so he could navigate himself as directed mostly by fingers pointing directions for him to go. They still had Oscar under one arm but it seemed to him they were being very careful not to frighten him further. This helped Oscar become more at ease and allowed him to focus on all of his surroundings. Oscar noticed in the distance a reflected building on a glass wall that faced the entrance to the parking garage that he was being taken into.

The building was in reverse and at an odd angle but his strangely wired brain quickly reformatted the image and he understood it to be the First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley. He thought quickly about maps of the area he had studied and quickly deduced that he was being taken into the Ellsworth Parking Structure, at UC Berkeley. He had seen the campus a few years ago when his dad was there attending a conference.

Oscar was led through a doorway in the underground garage area marked Police Access Only. This door required one of the agent's accompanying young Oscar to swipe a key card in front of a sensor. Oscar noticed that the system was an advanced version of a NOTIFIER security system manufactured by Honeywell. He noted this fact for future use.

The doorway opened into a well lit, security camera laden hallway. Oscar was led through a maze of unmarked hallways but kept an orientation in his memory based on the lighting and shadows from overhead lights, as well as windows and glass door ways he took note of out of his peripheral vision. His mind was so stimulated by this activity in his brain caused by the stress of his abduction that he felt like he was involved in a computer hack. This was a different but related experience he thought to himself. He was being taken into what his mind considered to be like a new game level.

This new level had some very interesting inputs for him to consider. First in his mind was why was the government involved with UC Berkley? Why did they need him so bad they would abduct him? The answers he would get would lead to more questions of course but he had never felt so stimulated. They finished winding around hallways and he was taken into an unmarked room. The room was full of computer terminals. Some seemed familiar to Oscar, some looked rather strange to him. There were several people in this room and it was clearly connected to other similar rooms as could be seen through the abundant glass dividers. They sat Oscar down in one of the connecting rooms which had a large conference table with flat screens arranged in front of each chairs at the table. He could see these were full color plasma screens.

Oscar had seen these monitors in magazines. He knew they were the new plasma displays even though his dad had only CRT monitors on his home rig. This fact confirmed to young Oscar that this was an advanced outfit. He still had not been given any indication by his abductors what they wanted from him but he considered were he was and the technology around him and deduced that he was here because of his hacking skills. This made him even more vigilant and aware.

Then he saw a man coming into the room with 2 agents escorting him. His face seemed familiar to Oscar. Perhaps he thought he might have read some article about him. Oscar realized that he was looking at the well bearded face of Professor Gaetano Borriello. Oscar remembered his face from an article that discussed small portable devices that had access to the new GPS navigation system. As the agents sat them down at the conference table Oscar extended his hand and said much to everyone's surprise, "It's a pleasure to meet with you Dr. Borriello, what brings you back to UC Berkley?"

The Dr, and the agents both looked shocked at young Oscar's utterance. He just displayed with that utterance that he had a grasp not only for where he was but knew who he was meeting. The display of shock from everyone but Oscar drove home for him that this was a very serious situation and the parties involved made this not just note worthy to him but provided him with context as to what must be at stake here. The present situation must be dire indeed to cause such an assembly of minds in computer craft with this level of government interest.

Oscar further deduced that since the government was so interested that this interest might lay in the GPS position information of a government asset with a small handheld computer of some sort. He would soon realize that he was way out in front of these assembled folks.