"New Hack City; Putting the Con in Silicon"

By Michelle Valdez

For Click Magazine

October 1999

Inside the circuitous city of San Francisco, a group of hackers gather on a daily basis to study secret source codes, utilize invaluable algorithms and play pranks on the unsuspecting corporations of America. At New Hack City, it's a matter of brains versus bits. New Hack City emerged from a cluttered, clandestine basement in Boston where local teens with an affinity for technology would meet, sleep and conspire. Hackers reminisced about days of sorting through obsolete hardware at "M.I.T. fleas" where deals depended on pounds per CPU. One woman named "Window" was renowned for her three mini VAX computers that she kept crowded in her dorm room, referring to them as computer livestock or VAXEN. The over-sized space heaters ran a type of UNIX system called VMS.

There are three core members of New Hack City: Marc Powell, Reid Fleming and Emmanuel Goldstein. As the Editor-In-Chief of 2600 Magazine, Goldstein provides an important forum for hackers throughout the world. Only one of the 15 ancillary members, Majik Thys, holds a college degree (two, actually). He is considered an outcast.

"Most of the people who work for Internet securities [companies] used to be hackers at one point," Powell said while taking a break at New Hack Headquarters in the shadows of Potrero Hill. The 1300 sq. feet that they've called home for the last two years will be vacated next month due to a 75% rent increase. The 3-story warehouse, formerly a fruit cannery, is full of foreboding hallways and a rooftop which serves as a helicopter-landing pad. Inside the loft, a leftover exhaust fan whirs steadily 20 feet above at least 14 computers in various stages of dismemberment, running on a T-1 set-up. The coveted connection processes 1.5 million bits per second through a 24-phone line digital circuit, hooked up as part of their rental agreement. A T-1, similar to DSL, currently costs approximately $1,000 per month.

The hackers are taking the eviction and loss of a precious connection in good humor.

"Before we leave we could pour concrete in here, or raise minks," Powell said.

Fleming, credited with coining the term "hacktivism," smiles as he contemplates the traditions that will transfer to the next New Hack City home, wherever that may be.

"We'll still have Naked Day at New Hack," he said. "You gotta get your CRT tan. You know, work on yourself, be proud of your body."

"New Hack City was a place to have parties back when we were very crazy and stupid and young," said the 22-year-old Powell, "Now we all have real jobs and we don't want to go to jail."

So, what's a hacker's definition of a computer crime?

"A computer crime is vandalism, theft or trespassing," Powell said, "The same things that would be called crimes in the real world. Hacking is when you don't get caught. It's exploring a system, pushing its limits and doing things the creators didn't intend for it to do." Most hackers are seemingly subdued, but Powell talks at speeds that would make ticker tape seem slow. He has canary-yellow whorls of hair that he brushes with his hands while going into technical tangents or goofy jokes.

"I'll drink anything with little LEDs on it or chrome colors, anything cyberee."

When asked what their favorite algorithm was, Fleming and Powell acted like two kids who had been asked what their favorite all-time bands were. They stared at the ceiling, Powell paced for awhile and finally Fleming focused on some unknown point and just shook his head.

"The Brute Force Maze Attack," he said in a hypnotic tone.

Powell hesitated, then began to explain his choice. "Radix Exchange is a sorting, bin-based algorithm. It sorts things really, really fast."

A recent segment of Dateline consulted with New Hack City, where they demonstrated how easy it is to hack into online bank accounts.

Powell wanted to emphasize the fact that New Hack keeps the hacker community together and informed. They plan on teaching tricks to the next generation "on the learning curve of a hacker, not lame-ass college level classes."

"I think New Hack is more impressive these days. Here [in San Francisco] we're getting back to our roots. We're a pretty low-key hacker community-sans anyone who learned how to use a computer after 1995." Powell said. "That's really important to pick young people up and take them in and say,"Here's how you get into backdoor Cisco and here's how to patch it."

Some upcoming classes include how to crack open airport kiosks, aim them at other machines and access all vulnerable systems within. Other favorite subjects include 3-D interfaces to create telepresence and operate various apparatus remotely. This is where definitions get blurred and references to the media and specific investigative arms of the law come into focus.

As other members drift away to play Galaga or return to work on their current projects, a visitor points to an orange banner above one of the black screen terminals. It reads "EZ-Wider, Slow Burning."

Powell shakes his head in affirmation and smirks knowingly.

"You can take the new hack out of the ghetto, but you can’t take the ghetto out of the new hack."

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SIDEBARS:

• DefCon- July 28-30, 2000 in Las Vegas, NV: Sponsors annual contest called "Spot the Fed."
• H2K- July 14-16, 2000 in NY, NY Hotel, Pennsylvania
• Chaos Community Congress- Dec. 27-29, 1999 in Berlin, Germany: Held the conference outdoors last year with tents and portable toilets converted into wire closets.
• Rubi-Con- April 28-30, 2000 in Detroit, MI- This conference focuses on Internet and data security systems.

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