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Sun designer admits hacking
Computer
Fraud & Security Bulletin
Zenith loses Ministry of Defence contract Following the security incident in January (see March issue of CFS), the UK’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) has reviewed its policy of laptop purchasing and has consequently cancelled a multi million pound deal with Zenith Data Systems which was awarded last October. Results of the enquiry into the theft of a laptop containing classified Gulf War plans resulted in a new requirement that all laptops must have removable hard disks. MOD procedures for sensitive data require the information to be stored on removable media. Traditionally laptops procured by the MOD include normal Zenith and Toshiba systems, with Grid Systems being purchased for ‘secure laptops’. Following the review, all laptops must now be ‘secure’. The original October deal was for the Zenith Slimport. In these the disk is housed under the keyboard and is therefore inaccessible. Zenith then modified an older, heavier model which it hoped would be an acceptable replacement, but the contract eventually went to Compaq’s removable hard disk version of its LTE 286.
UFO-hunters infiltrate US government computers In search of data on possible UFO sightings in US wheat fields, a group of British hackers broke into a US Government data network in October 1990. The intrusion was apparently not discovered until January of this year. The network was operated by the US Agriculture Department’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service Known as APHIS, it inspects imports to the US of plants and animals and connects 500 terminals at its headquarters with more than 175 terminals at its 40 field offices. The hackers gained access to the APHIS network through the US Sprint Communications
June 1991
TeleNet public network. They used relatively sophisticated file search methods and appeared to have access to the source code used with the APHIS network. They were active in the APHIS Jefferson City, MO, and Wilmington, NC, field offices as well as in the Hyattsville headquarters segment of the network. APHIS representatives indicated that, shortly after the unauthorized access to the network was discovered, the passwords in use were changed and more complex user personal identification codes were installed. Be/den Menkus
Sun designer admits hacking Robert Gilligan, a senior software designer at Sun Microsystems, has pleaded guilty to obtaining confidential customer information from Pacific Bell. He will serve three years probation and pay the telephone company $25 000 in compensation. As part of the plea bargain, Gilligan has agreed to help US authorities bring prosecutions against Kevin Poulsen and Mark Lottor, also accused of the eavesdropping offences. Gilligan has additionally offered to help the victims of the hack plug the gaps in their network security. Gilligan, Lottor and Poulsen were charged last year (see April 1990 issue of CFS) on 19 counts of using personal computers, stolen Pacific Bell equipment and stolen access codes to tap into government and telephone network computers to obtain classified military documents and FBI information on associates of the late Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos. If convicted on the original charges, Gilligan faced up to 20 years in prison and a $30 000 fine. Gilligan’s attorney maintains that his client fell in with bad company who wanted to use his networking experience. Gilligan has admitted accessing the US Army’s Masnet Computer network, but claims that he got no further than the login screen which warned against unauthorized entry. This he printed off and later gave to Poulsen. Federal officials say that the
01991
Elsevier Science Publishers Ltd
June 1991
Computer Fraud & Security Bulletin
incident came to light after telephone equipment belonging to Pacific Bell was found in a storage locker rented by Poulsen.
FAST successfully
prosecutes
pirate
The Federation Against Software Theft (FAST) has been successful in its prosecution of the UK computer dealer Ronald Ridgeway for illegally copying software. Ridgeway, who formerly traded in Bournemouth, UK, as lnfotec Data Systems and Delta Plus, was found guilty of offences under the Copyright Act 1957, the Trade Descriptions Act 1968, and the Criminal Attempts Act 1981. Ridgeway was sentenced for a total of ten offences, being given nine months imprisonment concurrent for each offence, suspended for two years, and was ordered to pay f 7500 towards the cost of prosecution. FAST became aware of the crime after a number of users had reported being charged the full list price for Wordstar and Compsoft Delta and Delta Plus, without having been sent original disks or manuals. This prosecution is part of a continuing campaign by FAST, whose MORI survey in June 1990 revealed that an estimated f 300 million was lost annually in the UK through software theft.
User/supplier legal action
clash may lead to
Heating Components of Cardiff, UK, ha. threatened its system supplier, Bivius Systems of Worthing, UK, with legal action under the Computer Misuse Act, according to a report in Computer Weekly. Heating Components has alleged that certain files on its bespoke Unix based accounting software, constitute a software ‘bomb’ which prevents the company from reloading the operating system without losing the system. Devon Jones, a partner with Heating Components, has requested that the set of files be removed from the system in order to protect the company’s rights under the Act. He claims
01991
Elsevier Science Publishers Ltd
that, “If we had an upgrade to our operating system we would be left without any software to run and the same if we had a disk failure”. Steven Kay, director of Bivius’ holding company stated, “We do not put bombs in our software, but we do put programs in to stop it being copied”.
Marketplace Demax Software, a supplier of VAX system security tools, has set up a German company which is based in Weisbaden. “Germany is the largest European VAX market after the UK with around 4000 sites,” said Graham French, Demax European sales and marketing director. Demax Software GmbH provides sales and a range of consulting and training services. For more information contact Graham French on +44 (0)81 307 7891. A keyboard lock to control access to the Mac llsi is available from PC Guardian of San Rafael, California. The lockbox plugs into the keyboard cable port leaving the keyboard and Mac Ilsi’s system configuration unchanged. The locks retail for around $100, and evaluation units are available. For more information call Pauline Basaran on +l 415 459 0190. A new opto-electronic device from Pilkington has been designed for monitoring up to 2.5 km of optical fibre cable. Fibrewatch works by sensing very small order changes in the cable’s optical properties caused by movement. This makes it unaffected by changes in temperature or long term aging. It enables discreet warnings to be triggered and, if necessary, for data transmission to be halted automatically until the situation has been rectified. For more details contact Jane Harrad on +44 (0)745 584500. BCL International has announced version 3.0 of its VMS security assessment utility, the Security Toolkit. The main theme is improvement to the user interface, with the existing menu system being reformatted, selection review added, along with on-screen tutorial, interactive help and generic system audits. Other features include improved reporting facilities. For more details contact Mike Simmons on +44 (0)71 251 1125.
5
Fraud & Security Bulletin
Zenith loses Ministry of Defence contract Following the security incident in January (see March issue of CFS), the UK’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) has reviewed its policy of laptop purchasing and has consequently cancelled a multi million pound deal with Zenith Data Systems which was awarded last October. Results of the enquiry into the theft of a laptop containing classified Gulf War plans resulted in a new requirement that all laptops must have removable hard disks. MOD procedures for sensitive data require the information to be stored on removable media. Traditionally laptops procured by the MOD include normal Zenith and Toshiba systems, with Grid Systems being purchased for ‘secure laptops’. Following the review, all laptops must now be ‘secure’. The original October deal was for the Zenith Slimport. In these the disk is housed under the keyboard and is therefore inaccessible. Zenith then modified an older, heavier model which it hoped would be an acceptable replacement, but the contract eventually went to Compaq’s removable hard disk version of its LTE 286.
UFO-hunters infiltrate US government computers In search of data on possible UFO sightings in US wheat fields, a group of British hackers broke into a US Government data network in October 1990. The intrusion was apparently not discovered until January of this year. The network was operated by the US Agriculture Department’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service Known as APHIS, it inspects imports to the US of plants and animals and connects 500 terminals at its headquarters with more than 175 terminals at its 40 field offices. The hackers gained access to the APHIS network through the US Sprint Communications
June 1991
TeleNet public network. They used relatively sophisticated file search methods and appeared to have access to the source code used with the APHIS network. They were active in the APHIS Jefferson City, MO, and Wilmington, NC, field offices as well as in the Hyattsville headquarters segment of the network. APHIS representatives indicated that, shortly after the unauthorized access to the network was discovered, the passwords in use were changed and more complex user personal identification codes were installed. Be/den Menkus
Sun designer admits hacking Robert Gilligan, a senior software designer at Sun Microsystems, has pleaded guilty to obtaining confidential customer information from Pacific Bell. He will serve three years probation and pay the telephone company $25 000 in compensation. As part of the plea bargain, Gilligan has agreed to help US authorities bring prosecutions against Kevin Poulsen and Mark Lottor, also accused of the eavesdropping offences. Gilligan has additionally offered to help the victims of the hack plug the gaps in their network security. Gilligan, Lottor and Poulsen were charged last year (see April 1990 issue of CFS) on 19 counts of using personal computers, stolen Pacific Bell equipment and stolen access codes to tap into government and telephone network computers to obtain classified military documents and FBI information on associates of the late Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos. If convicted on the original charges, Gilligan faced up to 20 years in prison and a $30 000 fine. Gilligan’s attorney maintains that his client fell in with bad company who wanted to use his networking experience. Gilligan has admitted accessing the US Army’s Masnet Computer network, but claims that he got no further than the login screen which warned against unauthorized entry. This he printed off and later gave to Poulsen. Federal officials say that the
01991
Elsevier Science Publishers Ltd
June 1991
Computer Fraud & Security Bulletin
incident came to light after telephone equipment belonging to Pacific Bell was found in a storage locker rented by Poulsen.
FAST successfully
prosecutes
pirate
The Federation Against Software Theft (FAST) has been successful in its prosecution of the UK computer dealer Ronald Ridgeway for illegally copying software. Ridgeway, who formerly traded in Bournemouth, UK, as lnfotec Data Systems and Delta Plus, was found guilty of offences under the Copyright Act 1957, the Trade Descriptions Act 1968, and the Criminal Attempts Act 1981. Ridgeway was sentenced for a total of ten offences, being given nine months imprisonment concurrent for each offence, suspended for two years, and was ordered to pay f 7500 towards the cost of prosecution. FAST became aware of the crime after a number of users had reported being charged the full list price for Wordstar and Compsoft Delta and Delta Plus, without having been sent original disks or manuals. This prosecution is part of a continuing campaign by FAST, whose MORI survey in June 1990 revealed that an estimated f 300 million was lost annually in the UK through software theft.
User/supplier legal action
clash may lead to
Heating Components of Cardiff, UK, ha. threatened its system supplier, Bivius Systems of Worthing, UK, with legal action under the Computer Misuse Act, according to a report in Computer Weekly. Heating Components has alleged that certain files on its bespoke Unix based accounting software, constitute a software ‘bomb’ which prevents the company from reloading the operating system without losing the system. Devon Jones, a partner with Heating Components, has requested that the set of files be removed from the system in order to protect the company’s rights under the Act. He claims
01991
Elsevier Science Publishers Ltd
that, “If we had an upgrade to our operating system we would be left without any software to run and the same if we had a disk failure”. Steven Kay, director of Bivius’ holding company stated, “We do not put bombs in our software, but we do put programs in to stop it being copied”.
Marketplace Demax Software, a supplier of VAX system security tools, has set up a German company which is based in Weisbaden. “Germany is the largest European VAX market after the UK with around 4000 sites,” said Graham French, Demax European sales and marketing director. Demax Software GmbH provides sales and a range of consulting and training services. For more information contact Graham French on +44 (0)81 307 7891. A keyboard lock to control access to the Mac llsi is available from PC Guardian of San Rafael, California. The lockbox plugs into the keyboard cable port leaving the keyboard and Mac Ilsi’s system configuration unchanged. The locks retail for around $100, and evaluation units are available. For more information call Pauline Basaran on +l 415 459 0190. A new opto-electronic device from Pilkington has been designed for monitoring up to 2.5 km of optical fibre cable. Fibrewatch works by sensing very small order changes in the cable’s optical properties caused by movement. This makes it unaffected by changes in temperature or long term aging. It enables discreet warnings to be triggered and, if necessary, for data transmission to be halted automatically until the situation has been rectified. For more details contact Jane Harrad on +44 (0)745 584500. BCL International has announced version 3.0 of its VMS security assessment utility, the Security Toolkit. The main theme is improvement to the user interface, with the existing menu system being reformatted, selection review added, along with on-screen tutorial, interactive help and generic system audits. Other features include improved reporting facilities. For more details contact Mike Simmons on +44 (0)71 251 1125.
5