.
Note..to..Hackers
If you are considering downloading 1.800eMail and plugging in a bogus credit card number, there are a few things you should consider!
1. We're not a huge company like America Online, or CompuServe. Our system notifies us of every single account registration, including via digital pager, and voice mail. We take every opportunity to find out where our calls are coming from in order to track our advertising, store locations, and press release information.
2. Our web version has a different tracking number than the version available in the stores, so we are especially curious about "web registrations".
3. We log all HTTP transfers. In fact if you are reading this, there is an entry in our log files that looks something like this:
betty.psiatl.com - - [12/Oct/1996:22:26:57 -0500] www.one800.net "GET /hackers.html HTTP/1.0" 200 26344. We log all FTP transfers using the logging facilities built into the WU-Archive FTP software, and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to do a reverse look-up by host name, or IP address to find out what service you're using, and working with *YOUR* system administrator, figure out who you are based on the date/time stamps correlated against their login files. And those logs look like this:
Tue Oct 8 20:24:59 1996 794 z014020.mmm.com 2291824 /pub/one800/one800.exe b _ o a whoever@microsoft.com ftp 0 *5. And finally, we've got your number! You might not realize this, but since we are paying for the phone call, YOU CANNOT BLOCK YOUR CALLER-ID. Its this last little "feature" of 1.800eMail, and our wonderful electronic phone bill that comes on a CD-ROM with search and retrieval software that will allow us to track you down to your house or business. And if PHONE*DISC doesn't have you listed....well, we'll just call you directly.
If you're under 18, your parents will just love to hear about what you're up to, and if you're over 18, well, just keep in mind, we might not be able to do anything to you, but the credit card companies can and will.
And we're going to help them.
Sincerely,
David V Duccini
CEO
BackPack Software, Inc.
PS: I know you are creative, have more energy and free time than most small island nations....I used to be a hacker. If you're looking for something to do, I'd suggest refining your skills in reverse engineering, or game-programming, or write a Java to C xlator and become mega rich....or poke our friends at Secure Computing Corp where we've been known to do some consulting from time to time....
If you're a hot shot Mac Programmer, and think you can crank out 1.800eMail for the Mac before we can, we'll give you the royalties (and even the server spec, subject to all sorts of little restrictions of course)
or here, take this challenge: read and understand Albert Camus's "The Myth of Sisyphus".