5 ms·
Lessons from France's first cyber-attack, nearly two centuries ago
- joemi 9y ago"Cyber-attack" seems like the wrong term in this case. They weren't trying to attack or damage anything.
- AskewEgret 9y agoI agree. As well, these things were called semaphores rather than mechanical telegraphs. Furthermore, the British Navy sent many cannonballs in their direction during the Napoleonic Wars, which were long before 1834. That might count as a cyber-attack.
- KekDemaga 9y agoThey were attacking the market in a sense as it relied on latency of information to determine prices. Certainly I'd dub these gentlemen posthumously as hackers, maybe they were the first.
- francisofascii 9y agoAgree. Sounds like "piggybacking."
- mark-r 9y agoYes, that does seem like the wrong term. Maybe "network hack"?
- empath75 9y agoPhreaking.
- astura 9y agoPlus considering there was a manuscript on cryptanalysis written as early as 800AD (IIRC), it can hardly be considered the first. Additionally, I'd consider cryptanalysis (ie, decoding messages not intended for you) more of an "attack" than this nonsense. I'm sure there were a million other "interfering with communication" instances throughout history,why they picked this particular one is totally baffling to me.
- pavel_lishin 9y agoI'm surprised the data was transmitted "live", instead of being copied down and then re-transmitted.
- stephengillie 9y agoCut-through[0] has always been faster than store-and-forward[1]. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cut-through_switching https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cut-through_switching [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Store_and_forward https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Store_and_forward
- mabynogy 9y agoReminds me a similar story evoked in The Count of Monte Cristo. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Count_of_Monte_Cristo#Summary https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Count_of_Monte_Cristo#Summ...
- jalayir 9y agoYeah that was classic Man-in-the-Middle attack.
- pseudolus 9y agoThis was also taken up in a few of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels to some great comic effect. http://discworld.wikia.com/wiki/Clacks http://discworld.wikia.com/wiki/Clacks
- sharpercoder 9y agoAlso interesting is that 2 centuries later, we're still trying to fight latency. Now with specialized wireless lines and shorter distance fiber, then with pigeons and couriers.
- NegativeLatency 9y agoSome people still use birds to send data (river rafting photographers): http://origin.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_6209735 http://origin.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_6209735 also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers
- eric_h 9y agoThat article about using actually, for real using homing pigeons as data carriers is very cool, thanks. Also - excellent handle responding to a comment about latency.
- viksit 9y agoObligatory Terry Pratchett Clacks reference here :) this was a great article on how real life got into a story which got into a real life situation again.. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/books/shortcuts/2015/mar/17/terry-pratchetts-name-lives-on-in-the-clacks-with-hidden-web-code https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/books/short... http://discworld.wikia.com/wiki/Clacks http://discworld.wikia.com/wiki/Clacks
- shallot_router 9y agoThis seems more like a "hack" in the general tech sense than the security sense (even though it's probably technically illegal). I even think it'd be something YC would love to see on an application.
- eric_h 9y ago> (even though it's probably technically illegal) The article mentions that they weren't convicted for their hack because it wasn't technically illegal.
- mannykannot 9y agoThe bribing of government employees might not have been a crime then, but it is now. On the other hand, confidential contributions to help get politicians elected is back with us...