Fw: The Internet's Zen Pirates

[Vitaly Osipov]

> oh my god :)
>
> one more example of how the Western media writes about Russia and
> Russians... I knew this "Arvi the Hacker" a bit when he tried to earn some
> media attention at 1999. Sorry to disappoint the author of the article,
but
> that guy is no hacker at all. He likes to be a teens leader - so he has a
> very eclectic philosophy - Zen, martial arts etc. At least a year ago
there
> were no talks about  real hacking - he stressed that he wanted to teach
real
> programmers, and all hacking was to be old good MIT stile. The problem is
> that this approach is not very popular - so his courses are called "hacker
> school" and here comes the general blahblah about Yahoo outages by the
media
> etc. They also supported the "Free Kevin" movement... etc. I can assure
you
> that no of the types who steals card numbers from CDnow were studying at
his
> "school"... Also the "Hacker" magazine mentioned there is nothing more
than
> very funny popular thing from which you may learn nothing harmful to you
or
> anybody else...
>
> So there is NO hacker schools in Russia, and things happen exactly as in
US
> or everywhere else
>
> W.
>
> P.S. maybe it looks like rant, but the thing that offended me most was the
> mention of Zen...
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Alex Shirado" <shirado at m-net.arbornet.org>
> To: <cypherpunks at einstein.ssz.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, December 19, 2000 6:58 PM
> Subject: CDR: The Internet's Zen Pirates
>
>
> >
> > Toronto Globe and Mail
> > December 6, 2000
> >
> > The Internet's Zen Pirates
> >
> > A guru preaching moral cleanliness develops a breed of crime-fighting
> > hackers
> >
> > By Geoffrey York
> >
> > MOSCOW -- They call themselves the Viper Brothers, the Software
> Underground
> > Empire, and Armageddon in Russia.
> >
> > They borrow their philosophy from martial arts and Zen Buddhism. They
> study
> > at the feet of a bearded guru known as Arvi the Hacker, or simply the
> > Teacher.
> >
> > They are the teenaged students of Russia's first school of computer
> hacking.
> > And while their skills and bravado might seem dangerous, they say they
are
> > the good guys, defending their clients from an international war of
> viruses,
> > hack attacks and computer crime.
> >
> > The Civil Hackers' School, operating from a shabby little Moscow
> apartment,
> > is helping shape the new generation of Russian computer whiz kids who
have
> > provoked fear and anxiety in the West.
> >
> > Russian hackers are blamed for a series of spectacular feats in recent
> > years. These include stealing the secret Microsoft source codes;
> ransacking
> > the Pentagon's computers; hacking into Web sites of the North Atlantic
> > Treaty Organization; posting thousands of credit-card numbers on the
> > Internet; and stealing millions of dollars from Western banks. The
> country's
> > post-Soviet economic collapse, combined with its rampant software piracy
> and
> > its prowess in mathematics education, has created a breeding ground for
> > aggressive young hackers. U.S. commentators have described the hackers
as
> > "perhaps the most talented in cyberspace."
> >
> > In Moscow, the Hackers' School sees itself at the forefront of a
> revolution.
> >
> >
> > "A hacker can do something that influences all of mankind," says the
> > school's founder, 27-year-old Ilya Vasilyev, a former software pirate
who
> is
> > better known on the Internet as Arvi the Hacker.
> >
> > "Every country, every company, needs hackers now," the long-haired
teacher
> > tells his students. "You have a feeling that you can do anything. You
> don't
> > have that in any other job."
> >
> > Several hundred have studied at the hacker school since 1996, earning
> > bracelets with ranks similar to judo belts. (The highest honour is a
black
> > bracelet, known as "guru level.")
> >
> > The school, preaching an altruistic moral code, says it trains students
> for
> > legitimate jobs in computer security, defending employers against
viruses
> or
> > hack attacks.
> >
> > "I won't take students when I see they have a criminal tendency," Mr.
> > Vasilyev says. "A hacker must be a wise person, like a samurai or a
karate
> > master. You have to use all of your wisdom not to harm people."
> >
> > But the temptations are constant. The first lesson for freshmen students
> is
> > a stern warning against illegal hacking.
> >
> > "Many people read about hackers in the newspapers and they think how
great
> > it is," Mr. Vasilyev tells the teenagers. "But they don't read to the
end
> of
> > the article, where the hacker gets sentenced to jail."
> >
> > The students sit at the guru's feet on the floor of his cramped
apartment.
> > When he asks them to name the school's goals, 15-year-old Kirill
Boldyrev
> > replies, "To break into things."
> >
> > The teacher quickly corrects him, but later the teenager acknowledges he
> > sees hackers as heroes. "They have achieved a very difficult thing, a
very
> > unusual thing, so they are admired by a lot of people. Maybe it proves
> that
> > we aren't stagnating in Russia, that we are progressing."
> >
> > The latest hacker exploit was the daring raid on Microsoft, in which the
> > secret source codes for the latest Windows program were taken. The
raider
> > was traced back to Russia's second-biggest city, St. Petersburg, which
has
> > become a hotbed of hacking.
> >
> > Russian hackers first captured the world's imagination in 1994 when a
> young
> > mathematician, Vladimir Levin, hacked into the computers of Citibank and
> > transferred $12-million (U.S.) to the bank accounts of friends around
the
> > world. He conducted the entire operation from a computer in his St.
> > Petersburg apartment.
> >
> > He was eventually arrested and jailed, but others were inspired to
similar
> > feats of cybercrime. Ilya Hoffman, a brilliant viola student at the
Moscow
> > Conservatory, was arrested in 1998 on charges of stealing $97,000 (U.S.)
> > over the Internet. He served a year in jail.
> >
> > Another group of Russians stole more than $630,000 by hacking into
> Internet
> > retailers and grabbing credit-card numbers. Banking-fraud specialists
have
> > warned that Russian hackers are the greatest single threat to security
at
> > European banks.
> >
> > Crime has become institutionalized in Moscow's outdoor markets and
street
> > kiosks, where about 90 per cent of the computer software is pirated. The
> > widespread acceptance of piracy has made it easier for hackers to ignore
> the
> > law.
> >
> > "Piracy is prospering, and nobody is fighting it," said Sergei
Pokrovsky,
> > the 25-year-old editor of Khaker, a hacker magazine that has built a
> > circulation of 50,000 in just two years of operation.
> >
> > "Pirate software is for sale everywhere. People get used to the idea
that
> > piracy is normal. Computer crimes aren't seen as very serious. The
police
> > have so many other problems on their hands. A lost credit card is seen
as
> > nothing, compared to murder and all the other crimes in this country."
> >
> > Because of the shortage of high-paying computer jobs in Russia, even
> skilled
> > specialists can be limited to salaries of just a few hundred dollars a
> > month.
> >
> > Hacking is a tempting alternative. By stealing a password, they can use
> the
> > Internet for free. And by cracking programs or doing pirate software
jobs
> in
> > the evening, they can boost their incomes considerably.
> >
>