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Mailing List Logs for ShadowRN

Message no. 1
From: Craigtw1@***.com
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Sun, 10 Mar 1996 19:21:46 -0500
Mark,
Look in the Denver Sourcebox...:) This is essentially our version of
Shadowland.
Tom
Message no. 2
From: Evan Hughes <ehughes@****.carleton.ca>
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Sun, 10 Mar 96 20:50:53 EST
GKoth2258@***.com writes:
> fool proof method of creating an untrace-able link. Trace IC can follow back
> a sat link (although there are hellish mods if I recall [decking isn't my
> strong suit]). My problem is with J&G's "SIGNAL ORIGIN CORRUPTED" and
other
> such crap. Here's why.

I'm still in the process of reading this post, but this is mostly just a
plot device to let everyone know that J&G are currently out of Seattle
(New Orleans right now, je pense)

> First of all, I firmly believe that if only expert deckers can alter their TD
> stamp, then only the very best of the best could hope to alter how their
> signal path.

Nah, shouldn't be too hard. Just make sure it goes through one of your
own nodes, or is tackled by one of your own peices of IC before it reaches
the target node.

Not to mention, by the appearences of the Srun universe, you should be
to include code in your messages: Just trigger it at the latest possible
moment and munge the hell out of your source path... =)


> You can play all sorts of games with the routing, like run
> through a dozen SANS and through a satellite, but it should still be possible
> to at least find the last SAN it went through. A sat link _has_ to come to
> ground somewhere, right? However, it is my impression that J&Gs nonsense
> doesn't even allow that. And there is no way on God's Green Earth that those
> two are anywhere near expert enough to even pull those stunts on their own.

Damn straight. Thats why they don't. Like I've said: They aren't
deckers. They're combat deckers. They're marginally good programmers
(could get their asses kicked by a normal decker if it came to running
naked), they have a _lot_ of rudimentry knowledge (they can talk
intelligently about a lot, but they can't do most of it). But who does the
goods: SI. (Well, not really, but SI is CENTRALLY responsible).

As to HOW it's done: SI has a very healthy and active EC unit
(DeltaCore). They are doing a Lot of Very Strange Things. But on a really
small scale (like munching the insides out of a lot of Ma and Pa systems,
and the like -- nothing noticable, and nothing to anyone who _would_
notice).

Since they own/have-access-to lots of these little systems, all they do
is route. Big Time. Bounce the message around for four or five minutes,
making sure to remove all trace information. Then give it a whack of
totally useless/corrupted routing info and send it to Sland.


> Second, while the sysops of SLand might occassionally have fits about users
> having multilpe aliases, I feel pretty damn sure that they would be in
> hysterics about messages that just "pop" up out of nowhere. Everything has
> to come from SOMEWHERE, and if mail and files and whatnot just "poof!"
appear
> out of no where, I know I'm going to be a bit worried.

We're talking Shadowland. Why would the sysops worry? They're running
this for fun (as far as I can tell from the sourcebooks). No damage is
being done to Sland, so why bother?

> Some other mechanism has to be at work, and I think it is something that is
> out of the league of everyone but the Big 8 and the top .05 percent of the
> world's shadowrunners. And there is no way in hell, despite Mr. Hughes' and
> J&Gs protestations otherwise, that they are capable of pulling this off.

Uh. No. I'm not a munchkin (usually). As everyone says: J&G have corp
backing. Just because my characters say or do something, doesn't mean I
beleive it. *grin* Which is a good thing, 'cause I've had some pretty
gross characters... =)


> If you want to take this as a personal attack Mr. Hughes, fine, take it that
> way.

*grin* If you want it to be, I will. Otherwise, I'll take your word. =)

> I'm more concerned about making sure EVERYONE here plays on the same
> field, with the same equipment.

Heheh. Sorry. SI has a shit-load of resources (stuff should be
happening this summer to make clear how and why -- this of course depends
on my summer job situation... =)



Evan Hughes | Webmaster
Honours Computer Science | Carleton Computer Science Society
http://chat.carleton.ca/~ehughes | http://omega.scs.carleton.ca/~ccss
Message no. 3
From: mneideng@****.caltech.edu (Mark L. Neidengard)
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Sun, 10 Mar 1996 18:57:54 -0800 (PST)
According to Craigtw1@***.com:
>
> Mark,
> Look in the Denver Sourcebox...:) This is essentially our version of
> Shadowland.

As I don't have access to the Denver Sourcebook, can you tell me what,
specifically, is being postulated for our ShadowLand?
--
/!\/!ark /!\!eidengard, CS Major, VLSI. http://www.cacr.caltech.edu/~mneideng
"Fairy of sleep, controller of illusions" Operator/Jack-of-all-Trades, CACR
"Control the person for my own purpose." "Don't mess with the Dark
Elves!"
-Pirotess, _Record_of_Lodoss_War_ Shadowrunner and Anime Addict
Message no. 4
From: mneideng@****.caltech.edu (Mark L. Neidengard)
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Sun, 10 Mar 1996 19:27:52 -0800 (PST)
According to Evan Hughes:
>
> I'm still in the process of reading this post, but this is mostly just a
> plot device to let everyone know that J&G are currently out of Seattle
> (New Orleans right now, je pense)

Sure, though calling something a plot device is by no means sufficient by
itself for motivating something's existence.


> Nah, shouldn't be too hard. Just make sure it goes through one of your
> own nodes, or is tackled by one of your own peices of IC before it reaches
> the target node.

This is only good until the signal leaves your part of the net. All things
being equal, the "packet" could be traced back to the subnet where it
originated. Now, if you wish to erase that sort of information, you need to
fuck up the mechanism that is keeping tabs on the routing, which is
normally not controllable through the same "channels" that the data itself
flows. And hence constitutes a much more annoying challenge.

> Not to mention, by the appearences of the Srun universe, you should be
> to include code in your messages: Just trigger it at the latest possible
> moment and munge the hell out of your source path... =)

A mail bomb. Which may or may not work depending on the amount of hardening
the target system has. Also, some systems are actually too unsophisticated to
support mail bombs.

> > You can play all sorts of games with the routing, like run
> > through a dozen SANS and through a satellite, but it should still be possible
> > to at least find the last SAN it went through. A sat link _has_ to come to
> > ground somewhere, right? However, it is my impression that J&Gs nonsense
> > doesn't even allow that. And there is no way on God's Green Earth that those
> > two are anywhere near expert enough to even pull those stunts on their own.
>
> Damn straight. Thats why they don't. Like I've said: They aren't
> deckers. They're combat deckers. They're marginally good programmers
> (could get their asses kicked by a normal decker if it came to running
> naked), they have a _lot_ of rudimentry knowledge (they can talk
> intelligently about a lot, but they can't do most of it). But who does the
> goods: SI. (Well, not really, but SI is CENTRALLY responsible).

We want to beware of any one list member munchkinizing their characters, either
directly or through the intervention of a Third Party(tm). I would like to
hear some justification for why S-I should invest this sort of effort in
the Dynamic Duo before I assent to it quietly.

> As to HOW it's done: SI has a very healthy and active EC unit
> (DeltaCore). They are doing a Lot of Very Strange Things. But on a really
> small scale (like munching the insides out of a lot of Ma and Pa systems,
> and the like -- nothing noticable, and nothing to anyone who _would_
> notice).

That S-I should do research in Matrix-related matters is neither anything new
nor anything unique.

> Since they own/have-access-to lots of these little systems, all they do
> is route. Big Time. Bounce the message around for four or five minutes,
> making sure to remove all trace information. Then give it a whack of
> totally useless/corrupted routing info and send it to Sland.

This breaks down when large corporations (who are harder to hack) own the
major pieces of the backbone web. Ma and Pa might get you across the town,
or even across the city, but it should not, in general, be possible to cross
the globe strictly on the basis of parochial net connections.

> We're talking Shadowland. Why would the sysops worry? They're running
> this for fun (as far as I can tell from the sourcebooks). No damage is
> being done to Sland, so why bother?

Ah, but damage is being done to ShadowLand's credibility as an "equal" forum
for data exchange, which would drive potential users away. As I take it,
the goal of the sysops is to foster free exchange of information, and this
is hampered by those who would participate on an uneven footing. The more
uneven the footing, the more worrisome to the sysops.

> > Some other mechanism has to be at work, and I think it is something that is
> > out of the league of everyone but the Big 8 and the top .05 percent of the
> > world's shadowrunners. And there is no way in hell, despite Mr. Hughes' and
> > J&Gs protestations otherwise, that they are capable of pulling this off.
>
> Uh. No. I'm not a munchkin (usually). As everyone says: J&G have corp
> backing. Just because my characters say or do something, doesn't mean I
> beleive it. *grin* Which is a good thing, 'cause I've had some pretty
> gross characters... =)

But it is not legitimate to claim "corporate backing" and then proceed to do
whatever you feel like. Certainly there are other characters with corporate
backing who may not have access to the same "plot device". I think this
particular excess (totally anonymous signal origins) needs to be corrected.

> > I'm more concerned about making sure EVERYONE here plays on the same
> > field, with the same equipment.
>
> Heheh. Sorry. SI has a shit-load of resources (stuff should be
> happening this summer to make clear how and why -- this of course depends
> on my summer job situation... =)

My apologies, but I'm not content to wait until summer while some list
participants enjoy apparently unequal access to world resources. Please
clarify the reason why S-I is able to cause this nonuniformity.
--
/!\/!ark /!\!eidengard, CS Major, VLSI. http://www.cacr.caltech.edu/~mneideng
"Fairy of sleep, controller of illusions" Operator/Jack-of-all-Trades, CACR
"Control the person for my own purpose." "Don't mess with the Dark
Elves!"
-Pirotess, _Record_of_Lodoss_War_ Shadowrunner and Anime Addict
Message no. 5
From: Robert Rodriguez <Robertr%tfn-ny.com@*********.tfn-ny.com>
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 09:24:54 -0500
I think this thread of messages will be coming back to hunt us and ripp
our throats out. I for one agree with Nightfox, Shadowland is not, I
repeat, IS NOT the equivalent of a usenet, or AOL, or what ever publicly
accesable information services you might want to compare it to, the BBs
isn't supposed to exist for one, and is all ways under persecussion by
(darn it, don't you hate it when you forget the names of important
fictional governmental intitutions) 2057's version of the FCC. Yes,
shadowland is immensly insecure, hence encription programs and the like.
you guys forget, unlike us, the people in the 2050's arent abunch of
whinners, "ohhh the damm BBS, wont let me post my 20 gigabite txt file.
what ever shall I do???" Yak-dung!!!
the find a way "period" and the sysops at shadowland don't really give a
flying cucumber about there respective users, unless someone tries to
crash the system, or destroy data...

I don't know...

Robert
--
"Intellectual growth and discovery clearly demonstrate the need to
THINK the unthinkable, DISCUSS the un-mentionable and CHALLENGE
the un-challengeable." ----- [C. Vann woodward]
----- "Do you wanna dance, or Did you pay 20 bucks to just
stand there lookin' stunning?" ---- [The only pick-up line]
Message no. 6
From: Evan Hughes <ehughes@****.carleton.ca>
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Mon, 11 Mar 96 10:26:01 EST
Mark L. Neidengard writes:
> Sure, though calling something a plot device is by no means sufficient by
> itself for motivating something's existence.

In this case, I think it is. Possibly from now on I should put a
warning on plot D. =)

> normally not controllable through the same "channels" that the data itself
> flows. And hence constitutes a much more annoying challenge.

Everything in the Matrix seems to be controlled by software. I think a
majority of the routing is also controlled by software. Which is
inherently Not Secure.

> A mail bomb. Which may or may not work depending on the amount of hardening
> the target system has. Also, some systems are actually too unsophisticated to
> support mail bombs.

True. This was only an idea.


> We want to beware of any one list member munchkinizing their characters, either
> directly or through the intervention of a Third Party(tm). I would like to
> hear some justification for why S-I should invest this sort of effort in
> the Dynamic Duo before I assent to it quietly.

They have been planted by SI as sleepers (after Righteous and Dana went
semiAWOL). They are there to receive a certain Very Important Package
after it has been removed from it's Rightful Owner. They are also a pet
project of SI (ie, they are a Linked Pair), and hence extremely important
(if they fall into the wrong hands, the process involved in building them
may be determined. It is in SI's interests to keep one of their four or
five Linked Pairs safe)

> That S-I should do research in Matrix-related matters is neither anything new
> nor anything unique.

Yep.

> This breaks down when large corporations (who are harder to hack) own the
> major pieces of the backbone web. Ma and Pa might get you across the town,
> or even across the city, but it should not, in general, be possible to cross
> the globe strictly on the basis of parochial net connections.

I thought the major corps DIDN'T own most of the backboning. If they do
entire segments of the Srun universe starts to collapse... (The entire
idea of the matrix with deckers isn't really reasonable, especially if
corps own part).


> Ah, but damage is being done to ShadowLand's credibility as an "equal"
forum
> for data exchange, which would drive potential users away. As I take it,
> the goal of the sysops is to foster free exchange of information, and this
> is hampered by those who would participate on an uneven footing. The more
> uneven the footing, the more worrisome to the sysops.

The field is still even. Everyone can post. When people are stopped
from posting, THEN there will be an uneven footing. Thats when to be
worried.


> > Uh. No. I'm not a munchkin (usually). As everyone says: J&G have corp
> > backing. Just because my characters say or do something, doesn't mean I
> > beleive it. *grin* Which is a good thing, 'cause I've had some pretty
> > gross characters... =)
>
> But it is not legitimate to claim "corporate backing" and then proceed to
do
> whatever you feel like. Certainly there are other characters with corporate
> backing who may not have access to the same "plot device". I think this
> particular excess (totally anonymous signal origins) needs to be corrected.

I am not doing "whatever I feel like". The "anonymous" messages
are
all originating from the same source. Make it just like any other
character, neh?

Also: All messages to Shadowland should be anonymous. What Johnson is
going to post to a board where their source path can be easily picked up?
(ie, all a runner has to do is look at the header and see
"buddy@*****.com") It should be just as it is on Sland in the sourcebooks:
all you see is the TD stamp and the name.


> > Heheh. Sorry. SI has a shit-load of resources (stuff should be
> > happening this summer to make clear how and why -- this of course depends
> > on my summer job situation... =)
>
> My apologies, but I'm not content to wait until summer while some list
> participants enjoy apparently unequal access to world resources. Please
> clarify the reason why S-I is able to cause this nonuniformity.

Because it's a corp with a few hundred million nuyen worth of resources.
It is NOT unequal. ANYBODY can push their own corp forward and have it do
anything that registers as somewhat legit.


***DISCALIMER MODE ON***
J&G are not invincible and are not played as invincible. They are played
as corporate darlings however. Why not? =)



Evan Hughes | Webmaster
Honours Computer Science | Carleton Computer Science Society
http://chat.carleton.ca/~ehughes | http://omega.scs.carleton.ca/~ccss
Message no. 7
From: mneideng@****.caltech.edu (Mark L. Neidengard)
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Mon, 11 Mar 1996 12:19:43 -0800 (PST)
Thank you for your reply. If my message was worded in a terse or otherwise
overabrasive manner, it might be due to the half-gallon of iced Dr. Pepper and
the final that preceeded its posting.

> Everything in the Matrix seems to be controlled by software. I think a
> majority of the routing is also controlled by software. Which is
> inherently Not Secure.

Perhaps I should give a concrete example. One of the current top-tier routers
is the Cisco 7000, capable of routing between many dozen interfaces at once
(and draining the bank account of whoever buys one in the process =) It is
possible to configure the firmware in such a manner that none of the interfaces
can log into the router itself and alter its configuration, requiring a
serially connected terminal to perform the feat. The same goes for the
Combinet ethernet-ISDN bridges. While many sites (including ours) don't go to
this length, the most paranoid sites certainly would. The drawback to such
draconian measures is that it makes it harder to administrate from afar. Oh
well. =)

> They have been planted by SI as sleepers (after Righteous and Dana went
> semiAWOL).[snip]

Ok, that helps.

> > This breaks down when large corporations (who are harder to hack) own the
> > major pieces of the backbone web. Ma and Pa might get you across the town,
> > or even across the city, but it should not, in general, be possible to cross
> > the globe strictly on the basis of parochial net connections.
>
> I thought the major corps DIDN'T own most of the backboning. If they do
> entire segments of the Srun universe starts to collapse... (The entire
> idea of the matrix with deckers isn't really reasonable, especially if
> corps own part).

Well, the way it _currently_ works is that Sprint, MCI, and AT&T are the
people that actually _own_ and operate the long-haul fiber and copper trunks.
The Internet backbone is just so much business-class leased line stuff, with
routers stuck all over the place and run by the Backbone Cabal. Private
individuals, and even small to moderate private companies, cannot finance
running fiber across the country or along the bottom of the ocean floor.

Now, the local "affiliates" will surely run the local phone exchanges. But I
can't see anyone but the megacorps, who already cross national boundaries,
running the backbone of the Matrix. This means two things. First, it may be
possible to circumvent most, or even all in some cases, of the backbone by
leaping from local exchange to local exchange, at the cost of increased
routing hops and performance latency (if I ran decking full out here at Tech,
I'd allow people to try this). Second, because the volume of data is so
_enormous_, the corps aren't going to be able to monitor even a small
percentage of the stuff flowing over the Matrix. They pay some people to
keep the routers afloat and investigate any acute complaints brought by the
latter day equivalent to CERT, but by no means would there be fulltime
wiretapping. There isn't today.

> The field is still even. Everyone can post. When people are stopped
> from posting, THEN there will be an uneven footing. Thats when to be
> worried.

That would, of course, be the worst case. =)

> Also: All messages to Shadowland should be anonymous. What Johnson is
> going to post to a board where their source path can be easily picked up?
> (ie, all a runner has to do is look at the header and see
> "buddy@*****.com") It should be just as it is on Sland in the sourcebooks:
> all you see is the TD stamp and the name.

Well, noone said it was at all easy. =) The point is that if a message is
posted to ShadowLand, a sufficiently placed and sufficiently motivated
individual could conceivably try to query the phone company for its routing
logs and try to trace interesting-looking transfers toward ShadowLand's
ever-elusive SAN back toward their source. This runs into messages changing
exchanges, changing service providers, changing national boundaries, possibly
going transoceanic or sattelite, and so forth and is generally an _IMMENSE_
pain in the ass, but is not beyond the realm of all conjecture. For example,
with comm sattelites that use highly directional communications, it is
conceivable to look at the sattelite's logs and see where it was pointing its
dish at the time a certain communication was happening. Good enough to
localize a message to a "moderate"-sized geographic region, for sure. And
with precise laser links, considerably more accurate than that.

> Because it's a corp with a few hundred million nuyen worth of resources.
> It is NOT unequal. ANYBODY can push their own corp forward and have it do
> anything that registers as somewhat legit.

This is true to an extent, although to "register" as legit we have to hear at
least some rudiment of what's going on, which I thank you for providing. =)

> ***DISCALIMER MODE ON***
> J&G are not invincible and are not played as invincible. They are played
> as corporate darlings however. Why not? =)

Corporate darlings is no real problem. I mean, what have they actually
_done_? Not much, actually, other than irritate some of the folks on the
board with their chatter. Most of the people have actually overreacted to the
Duo, which might go to show that the _rest_ of the runners are not so secure
in their own minds as they might think. =)
--
/!\/!ark /!\!eidengard, CS Major, VLSI. http://www.cacr.caltech.edu/~mneideng
"Fairy of sleep, controller of illusions" Operator/Jack-of-all-Trades, CACR
"Control the person for my own purpose." "Don't mess with the Dark
Elves!"
-Pirotess, _Record_of_Lodoss_War_ Shadowrunner and Anime Addict
Message no. 8
From: GKoth2258@***.com
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 14:34:28 -0500
Let me try this again. The fact that J&G are in New Orleans does not
predicate the usage of a possibly munchkinous and unjustifiable plot device.
Why? It's simple.

Shadowland is virtual. People post in SLand from all over, NOT just Seattle.
It doesn't matter, geographically, where you are. Because you can still
access SLand. There is no inherent need to corrupt signal origins, which I
still believe should be difficult to do anyway.

You say this is all part of what Shepperd-Intrepid does. Just how big is
this corp? Using the rules and framework of Corporate Shadowfiles, how big
is this company? They sound awful big, as they have a navy, do heavy duty
genetic and bioware work (the Linked Pairs), do some Matrix research, do
weapons manufacturing, and do heavy duty security work. Sounds like a corp
in the tops of the second tier to me. Which is too damn big for this list
(witness Maxim).

I think it's about time you answered your critics and laid it out for us Mr.
Hughes.

Erik
Message no. 9
From: Evan Hughes <ehughes@****.carleton.ca>
Subject: Re: Trace Back
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 96 18:01:57 EST
*notices another posting on this thread*
*bursts into tears*
=)


GKoth2258@***.com writes:
> Let me try this again. The fact that J&G are in New Orleans does not
> predicate the usage of a possibly munchkinous and unjustifiable plot device.
> Why? It's simple.

1. It's not munchkin.
2. It's not unjustifiable.
[Keep reading to find out more!]

> Shadowland is virtual.

Not all of it. Notice that things are being posted in a bulliten board
format. ie, all text, and no MOO-style interactions [THANK GOD!].

> People post in SLand from all over, NOT just Seattle.

Yes, but I understand that, for the purposes of ShadowTk, Shadowland
has been split into a number of nodes. That is the only way to justify the
absence of messages from other parts of the world.

> It doesn't matter, geographically, where you are. Because you can still
> access SLand. There is no inherent need to corrupt signal origins, which I
> still believe should be difficult to do anyway.



> You say this is all part of what Shepperd-Intrepid does. Just how big is
> this corp? Using the rules and framework of Corporate Shadowfiles, how big
> is this company? They sound awful big, as they have a navy, do heavy duty
> genetic and bioware work (the Linked Pairs), do some Matrix research, do
> weapons manufacturing, and do heavy duty security work. Sounds like a corp
> in the tops of the second tier to me. Which is too damn big for this list
> (witness Maxim).

It's almost as if they had some huge source of outside funding isn't it?
Or at least a very willing local workforce...


> I think it's about time you answered your critics and laid it out for us Mr.
> Hughes.

Mister. Why thankyou. Although I do expect an "esq" to be added onto the
end of my name next time. =)

In a word: No. I refuse to do this. I will not "lay it all out", but I
will give an idea of what is going on (I agree that doing anything less
than this would be unfair, verging on anal. =).

[Lot of vaguely useless information follows]

Intrepid was formed about fifty years ago (2000 or so) in the Croation
city of Dubrovnik. It was originally an arms reseller responsible for
moving around antique military goods (ie the ones left over from the
'Slavian civil war, exUSSR, and Isreal). As time went on, it slowly came
eased it's way into the light -- becoming a full-fledged legal company
that not only resold arms, but built their own.

Time passes. Another piddly Yugoslavian war. The world again ignores it.
After all, VITAS and the Awakening are occuring.

More time passes. The Croations have been forced into the south eastern
portions of the ex-yugoslav. With the awakening, it seems that there is a
high awakened population in that part of the world.

(ex)Yugoslavia is also the gateway to europe: it is through here that
many of the awakened try to pass to escape the purges happening in their
home countries.

Then the purges start occuring in Yugoslavia. Under the guise of
another cleansing, the croations are again hammered into the Med. Lots of
people die. Badly.


I would rather not give out too much more information.


At the same time, I would also like to ask Gkoth to chill it. If you don't
appreciate my style, or the manner in which my characters act: fine. Say
so. There's no need to go ultra-anal. As said in a previous posting, this
is a friendly list. The characters do bad shit, not the players. Keep
friendly.

*grin* Maybe it's just spring, but there seems to be a sudden jump in
everyone's respective territoriality... =)



Evan Hughes | Webmaster
Honours Computer Science | Carleton Computer Science Society
http://chat.carleton.ca/~ehughes | http://omega.scs.carleton.ca/~ccss

Further Reading

If you enjoyed reading about Trace Back, you may also be interested in:

Disclaimer

These messages were posted a long time ago on a mailing list far, far away. The copyright to their contents probably lies with the original authors of the individual messages, but since they were published in an electronic forum that anyone could subscribe to, and the logs were available to subscribers and most likely non-subscribers as well, it's felt that re-publishing them here is a kind of public service.