5 ms·

Hacking Real World Systems

20 points by mqt 19y ago

Tichy 19y ago
Interesting, but maybe better kept secret?
- immad 19y ago
  why?
  - Tichy 19y ago
    Well, it's kind of like admitting fraud in public (for lack of a better word). It reminds me of the recent incident were some gangsters were busted because they posted revealing videos on YouTube. Moreover, I wonder if some crawler could be devised looking for people admitting their scams on their blogs, and solve a huge amounts of crimes that way...
    - Sujan 19y ago
      Fraud is the best word you could choose. In several countries (e.g. Germany, France... don't know about US) this is called computer fraud. And because he did it to sell the goods and make money, some countries would add "professional" and double the punishment.
      - rms 19y ago
        But what was the fraudulent act? Clicking the deposit button?
        Tichy 19y ago
        OK on second reading, I guess it really was just stupidity of the poker site, for allowing withdrawal of the money after having received the bonus points. Sorry I misread, I thought he just gained the points for clicking the button repeatedly after a single deposit.
    - neilk 19y ago
      Kind of?
      - Tichy 19y ago
        I guess I was overly diplomatic...
    - yters 19y ago
      google "my (hack OR crack OR scam)"?
      - Tichy 19y ago
        it seems crack the drug is more popular than cracks of software ;-)
ks 19y ago
This was a crime. He stole money from the site.
- toffer 19y ago
  There's no crime here. He followed the rules of the promotion. Party Poker awarded points for making deposits. Matt deposited money. He would deposit so much money at a time (up to $50K) that he got bored clicking buttons, so he wrote a script to do it for him. So, if depositing money wasn't against the rules and withdrawing the money after he got the FPPs wasn't against the rules, how can you possible claim that "this was a crime"?
  - mrtron 19y ago
    I am quite sure poker sites have rules in their player agreements that strictly forbid and scripts or automation, which may overlap here to the cashier side of things.
  - yters 19y ago
    Making deposits with certain time restrictions...
    - Tichy 19y ago
      I could imagine there were others trying the same thing, but then gambling away all their deposited money within a week. So maybe it was all good for the poker firm after all.
- marvin 19y ago
  How was this a crime? He just exploited their dumb system. This "hack" is kind of obvious, and whomever implemented the system should have thought of it. The only remotely criminal thing I can see in this is using an automated script to move his money. The way I read the post, he deposited all his money ($50,000 or so?) into the account, withdrawing it again as soon as he was credited. He could have refreshed the page himself, hired a Chinese monkey to do it or create a script to log in and deposit money again and again...call me a genius, but I can't see how this is a very sophisticated or even defraud an obviously broken system.
hacker64 19y ago
This should disqualify him right away. Bragging about it tells me that he can't tell the difference between right and wrong.
- vlad 19y ago
  Too late.
- rms 19y ago
  What was wrong here? It's not like the gambling company needed the money.
  - rms 19y ago
    -2 and no one telling me what was wrong. Was it the clicking of the button? Or was it the scripting? Perhaps it was the not committing a crime part? People, reread the story -- he deposited tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars at once, only to withdraw it after a week.
Alex3917 19y ago
"Wow, I could write a book on these, as that's pretty much my one true passion in life..." I was thinking the same thing as soon as I read the question.
sspencer 19y ago
I'm not sure Paul Graham meant "publicly admitting to fraud" when he said "best non-computer hack." This would make me drop you like a sack of armpit hair if I were a VC...
mattmaroon 19y ago
I'm rather confused as to the code of ethics here. My hack was by no means fraud, I simply took advantage of a stupid system. I didn't cheat or steal, or even violate the site's Terms of Service (which said you couldn't use automated scripts to manipulate their GUI but nothing about the website). I did not break any law in any country, or even violate a site rule. It's preposterous to call it unethical. I simply took advantage of a flawed system.
- mattmaroon 19y ago
  As near as I can tell here, a hack is ethical unless it makes money. It's the tortured artist ethic perhaps.
  - deleted 19y ago
    [deleted]
  - Tichy 19y ago
    I for one misread your story, should have read more carefully. I thought you got points just for repressing the button after one deposit. The other way (as you described it), yeah, I guess it was just stupidity on the part of the poker firm. Morality would still be debatable - if it had not been a poker firm, but a charity or whatever, people might feel different about it. I also often have to sign contracts, and I am not sure if all of them are 100% waterproof - probably they are not. But even though the opposing lawyers could probably screw me over, doesn't mean it would be ethical for them to do so.
- mynameishere 19y ago
  I strongly suspect that the site had an agreement that said, "When you deposit x dollars, you get y points." You seem to be morally juvenile. When you crack (not hack) a computer system in order to steal merchandise, it doesn't matter how "stupid" the system was. I think a deadbolt is pretty fucking "stupid", but that doesn't make smashing it open somehow acceptable. EDIT: Frankly, I re-read the original post and I'm not sure what's going on. Is he actually depositing money or depositing a small amount and somehow refreshing it so that it reads like a larger amount? If he is doing the former, then it isn't a hack at all. If he is doing the latter, then it is thievery, pure and simple. I read it the latter way because the former way (as I said) makes no sense as a "hack".
bayareaguy 19y ago
There seems to be a good tradition of "gambler hackers", e.g. - Edward O. Thorp ("Beat the Dealer" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_O._Thorp http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_O._Thorp ) - Keith Taft (http://www.blackjackforumonline.com/content/taftint.html http://www.blackjackforumonline.com/content/taftint.html) - the MIT Blackjack Team ( "Bringing down the house" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bringing_Down_the_House_ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bringing_Down_the_House_(book) )
- mattmaroon 19y ago
  Amarillo Slim was a great one too, before he got all child-molesty.
mroman 19y ago
I represented myself in US Federal court on a civil rights action against a county and Sheriff's department, and prevailed. Had never previously picked up a law book. Gathered evidence myself, and circumvented the defendant's attempts at destroying some of that evidence. All things considered, it was a coup on my part.

20 points by mqt 19y ago

Tichy 19y ago

Interesting, but maybe better kept secret?

immad 19y ago
why?
- Tichy 19y ago
  Well, it's kind of like admitting fraud in public (for lack of a better word). It reminds me of the recent incident were some gangsters were busted because they posted revealing videos on YouTube. Moreover, I wonder if some crawler could be devised looking for people admitting their scams on their blogs, and solve a huge amounts of crimes that way...
  - Sujan 19y ago
    Fraud is the best word you could choose. In several countries (e.g. Germany, France... don't know about US) this is called computer fraud. And because he did it to sell the goods and make money, some countries would add "professional" and double the punishment.
    - rms 19y ago
      But what was the fraudulent act? Clicking the deposit button?
      - Tichy 19y ago
        OK on second reading, I guess it really was just stupidity of the poker site, for allowing withdrawal of the money after having received the bonus points. Sorry I misread, I thought he just gained the points for clicking the button repeatedly after a single deposit.
  - neilk 19y ago
    Kind of?
    - Tichy 19y ago
      I guess I was overly diplomatic...
  - yters 19y ago
    google "my (hack OR crack OR scam)"?
    - Tichy 19y ago
      it seems crack the drug is more popular than cracks of software ;-)

ks 19y ago

This was a crime. He stole money from the site.

toffer 19y ago
There's no crime here. He followed the rules of the promotion. Party Poker awarded points for making deposits. Matt deposited money. He would deposit so much money at a time (up to $50K) that he got bored clicking buttons, so he wrote a script to do it for him. So, if depositing money wasn't against the rules and withdrawing the money after he got the FPPs wasn't against the rules, how can you possible claim that "this was a crime"?
- mrtron 19y ago
  I am quite sure poker sites have rules in their player agreements that strictly forbid and scripts or automation, which may overlap here to the cashier side of things.
- yters 19y ago
  Making deposits with certain time restrictions...
  - Tichy 19y ago
    I could imagine there were others trying the same thing, but then gambling away all their deposited money within a week. So maybe it was all good for the poker firm after all.
marvin 19y ago
How was this a crime? He just exploited their dumb system. This "hack" is kind of obvious, and whomever implemented the system should have thought of it. The only remotely criminal thing I can see in this is using an automated script to move his money. The way I read the post, he deposited all his money ($50,000 or so?) into the account, withdrawing it again as soon as he was credited. He could have refreshed the page himself, hired a Chinese monkey to do it or create a script to log in and deposit money again and again...call me a genius, but I can't see how this is a very sophisticated or even defraud an obviously broken system.

hacker64 19y ago

This should disqualify him right away. Bragging about it tells me that he can't tell the difference between right and wrong.

vlad 19y ago
Too late.
rms 19y ago
What was wrong here? It's not like the gambling company needed the money.
- rms 19y ago
  -2 and no one telling me what was wrong. Was it the clicking of the button? Or was it the scripting? Perhaps it was the not committing a crime part? People, reread the story -- he deposited tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars at once, only to withdraw it after a week.

Alex3917 19y ago

"Wow, I could write a book on these, as that's pretty much my one true passion in life..." I was thinking the same thing as soon as I read the question.

sspencer 19y ago

I'm not sure Paul Graham meant "publicly admitting to fraud" when he said "best non-computer hack." This would make me drop you like a sack of armpit hair if I were a VC...

mattmaroon 19y ago

I'm rather confused as to the code of ethics here. My hack was by no means fraud, I simply took advantage of a stupid system. I didn't cheat or steal, or even violate the site's Terms of Service (which said you couldn't use automated scripts to manipulate their GUI but nothing about the website). I did not break any law in any country, or even violate a site rule. It's preposterous to call it unethical. I simply took advantage of a flawed system.

mattmaroon 19y ago
As near as I can tell here, a hack is ethical unless it makes money. It's the tortured artist ethic perhaps.
- deleted 19y ago
  [deleted]
- Tichy 19y ago
  I for one misread your story, should have read more carefully. I thought you got points just for repressing the button after one deposit. The other way (as you described it), yeah, I guess it was just stupidity on the part of the poker firm. Morality would still be debatable - if it had not been a poker firm, but a charity or whatever, people might feel different about it. I also often have to sign contracts, and I am not sure if all of them are 100% waterproof - probably they are not. But even though the opposing lawyers could probably screw me over, doesn't mean it would be ethical for them to do so.
mynameishere 19y ago
I strongly suspect that the site had an agreement that said, "When you deposit x dollars, you get y points." You seem to be morally juvenile. When you crack (not hack) a computer system in order to steal merchandise, it doesn't matter how "stupid" the system was. I think a deadbolt is pretty fucking "stupid", but that doesn't make smashing it open somehow acceptable. EDIT: Frankly, I re-read the original post and I'm not sure what's going on. Is he actually depositing money or depositing a small amount and somehow refreshing it so that it reads like a larger amount? If he is doing the former, then it isn't a hack at all. If he is doing the latter, then it is thievery, pure and simple. I read it the latter way because the former way (as I said) makes no sense as a "hack".

bayareaguy 19y ago

There seems to be a good tradition of "gambler hackers", e.g. - Edward O. Thorp ("Beat the Dealer" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_O._Thorp http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_O._Thorp ) - Keith Taft (http://www.blackjackforumonline.com/content/taftint.html http://www.blackjackforumonline.com/content/taftint.html) - the MIT Blackjack Team ( "Bringing down the house" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bringing_Down_the_House_ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bringing_Down_the_House_(book) )

mattmaroon 19y ago
Amarillo Slim was a great one too, before he got all child-molesty.

mroman 19y ago

I represented myself in US Federal court on a civil rights action against a county and Sheriff's department, and prevailed. Had never previously picked up a law book. Gathered evidence myself, and circumvented the defendant's attempts at destroying some of that evidence. All things considered, it was a coup on my part.