| From: | mneideng@****.caltech.edu (Mark L. Neidengard) |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Re: Trace Back |
| Date: | Mon, 11 Mar 1996 12:19:43 -0800 (PST) |
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
