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The typical 80's hack I always think of is in Ferris Buellers Day Off where Ferris hacks the schools records to change the number of days he was sick. Not only

The typical 80's hack I always think of is in Ferris Buellers Day Off where Ferris hacks the schools records to change the number of days he was sick. Not only was there no internet, but how did he connect to the network? It's something I've always wondered if it would've even been possible.

mad_ned 5y ago
possible, maybe not likely. our school for instance had a modem line you could dial into, that let you access this one program that was for career counseling, it was like a buzzfeed quiz that asked you questions, and then recommended a career for you. I think I got plumber. we tried to hack past this to get at the general OS, but no luck. I suppose someone could set something like that up for the school record access, but would they? (like I claim in the article, it was the 80s so maybe)
kgwxd 5y ago
He learned a lot while hacking the WOPR.
dave_sullivan 5y ago
I had a project one time for a school district and had access to all of that. Made me think of the "changing grades remotely" trope and had a pretty good chuckle. Wouldn't have been possible when I was a kid but it is now I guess.
dragontamer 5y ago
> Not only was there no internet, but how did he connect to the network? Most "networks" were over phone lines those days. You call in with a modem, and that connects you into a particular computer (or in the general case: a network). BBS for example was just a shared computer on a modem on a well-known publicly posted telephone number that many people called every now and then to check for message. If you knew the correct telephone numbers and the proper parameters to connect (baud rate, modem type, etc. etc.), you could even get a printer (aka: Fax Machine), a UNIX login prompt, or other equipment inside of an office (and presumably a school). ---- Now why would a school put their grades database on a publicly facing telephone number and hope it doesn't get hacked? Well, that's a good question. But then again, ATM machines in tiny liquor stores are still largely on this telephone-line / modem technology (I dunno if its still like this today, but even just 10 years ago, a surprising number of ATM machines were still accessible over dial up). So why don't you ask the ATM machine engineers why they think that this practice is safe. After all, if its safe enough for ATMs, its probably safe enough for a school network. If this thought process is horrifying to you, then welcome to the 80s / 90s era of computer security.
- kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 5y ago
  > Now why would a school put their grades database on a publicly facing telephone number and hope it doesn't get hacked? Same folks who built David Lightman's school system, apparently.
- goalieca 5y ago
  My high school had the attendance computer in main office and it could be found on the network from any other machine. Everyone knew the password to it since was used and shared for all other admin and IT tasks.
pjmlp 5y ago
Here are modems for Timex 2068, https://www.timexsinclair.com/products/hardware/rs232-serial-interfaces/ https://www.timexsinclair.com/products/hardware/rs232-serial...
kmeisthax 5y ago
This concept is a little weird to think about today, but the Internet used to be accessed through regular voice phone lines. You'd plug your computer into the phone network with a little thing called a modem. In the really early days you actually had to use an acoustic coupler for regulatory reasons. Then you dialed the phone number of the computer you wanted to connect to - most of which were not running the Internet Protocol! Typical computer systems you would dial into would include... 1. Proprietary data services (AOL, Compuserve, etc) 2. BBS systems - typically individual computers running services that let you send messages or files to other users who could then dial in to receive them. Some BBSes were even networked to one another, the largest of such systems being Fidonet 3. Remotely-managed IT equipment - the sort of thing depicted in the movie. 4. Mainframes - universities and large businesses would often have remote access that you'd dial into. This is roughly equivalent to SSHing into an Internet-connected machine today. 5. The Internet - originally only through remote access to mainframes (#4). Later on, data services (#1) started offering open Internet access. (notoriously, AOL utterly demolished USENET's existing cultural norms by doing this) Then companies started just selling dial-in Internet access without other services and this became the dominant use case for modems. This concept was inverted starting in the late 90s. First, phone companies started offering "digital subscriber lines" (DSL) that provided way more bandwidth to connect to an ISP with. Then, (at least in North America, thanks to various Sega Genesis related reasons) cable companies got in on this and started offering "broadband Internet", too. With the greater bandwidth of these services, it suddenly made sense to send Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) instead of Internet Protocol over Voice. So dedicated landline channels became very outdated very quickly, and today we think of voice as just something you send over a multitude of Internet apps.
- bluedino 5y ago
  Don't forget about your dialing into your office computer to work from home, using something like LapLink or PC Anywhere
CountDrewku 5y ago
Watch War Games and that'll give you a general overview of how you'd access a system back in the 80s. They were still networked and accessible remotely, just not the way they are today.
- ASalazarMX 5y ago
  It's unfair to expect someone to watch a movie instead of explaining that computers connected through telephone lines using modems to code bits as sound. You called a phone number (your modem could do this for you), the target modem answered the call, and they negotiated the maximum (but still ridiculously low) speed. If the target computer needed concurrent connections, you added more phone lines with modems. But watch the movie anyway, it's a cult classic.
  - CountDrewku 5y ago
    Unfair? I think someone can deduce what's going on while he's calling in to the computers. It's not genius level stuff. From there they can research more if they're interested instead of asking random people on hackernews what's going on. >You called a phone number (your modem could do this for you), the target modem answered the call, and they negotiated the maximum (but still ridiculously low) speed. Yes exactly what it shows in the movie... and I think he even explains some of that.
    - ASalazarMX 5y ago
      You're assuming too much, there's people who have never used a landline, and would not know what an acoustic coupler, like the one in the movie, is used for. Even more confusing because the WOPR uses text-to-speech and natural language processing, which seem anachronistic for the 80s. Answering a simple question with "see X movie" is the same as answering with "read Y book", and borderline like "do some research" or "google it".
bluedino 5y ago
Early 90's, but our computer system (some sort of minicomputer) had a modem bank so that teachers could do grades and such from home. I worked in the office because I had an open hour, I earned a credit and I also got to see the guidance counselors view students records and such. It would have been very, very easy to change grades. Also, many schools had internet connections back then. I know our school had a T1, it might have also had a leased line to the state education system for some reason, I would guess the security was very lax back then.

mad_ned 5y ago

possible, maybe not likely. our school for instance had a modem line you could dial into, that let you access this one program that was for career counseling, it was like a buzzfeed quiz that asked you questions, and then recommended a career for you. I think I got plumber. we tried to hack past this to get at the general OS, but no luck. I suppose someone could set something like that up for the school record access, but would they? (like I claim in the article, it was the 80s so maybe)

kgwxd 5y ago

He learned a lot while hacking the WOPR.

dave_sullivan 5y ago

I had a project one time for a school district and had access to all of that. Made me think of the "changing grades remotely" trope and had a pretty good chuckle. Wouldn't have been possible when I was a kid but it is now I guess.

dragontamer 5y ago

> Not only was there no internet, but how did he connect to the network? Most "networks" were over phone lines those days. You call in with a modem, and that connects you into a particular computer (or in the general case: a network). BBS for example was just a shared computer on a modem on a well-known publicly posted telephone number that many people called every now and then to check for message. If you knew the correct telephone numbers and the proper parameters to connect (baud rate, modem type, etc. etc.), you could even get a printer (aka: Fax Machine), a UNIX login prompt, or other equipment inside of an office (and presumably a school). ---- Now why would a school put their grades database on a publicly facing telephone number and hope it doesn't get hacked? Well, that's a good question. But then again, ATM machines in tiny liquor stores are still largely on this telephone-line / modem technology (I dunno if its still like this today, but even just 10 years ago, a surprising number of ATM machines were still accessible over dial up). So why don't you ask the ATM machine engineers why they think that this practice is safe. After all, if its safe enough for ATMs, its probably safe enough for a school network. If this thought process is horrifying to you, then welcome to the 80s / 90s era of computer security.

kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 5y ago
> Now why would a school put their grades database on a publicly facing telephone number and hope it doesn't get hacked? Same folks who built David Lightman's school system, apparently.
goalieca 5y ago
My high school had the attendance computer in main office and it could be found on the network from any other machine. Everyone knew the password to it since was used and shared for all other admin and IT tasks.

pjmlp 5y ago

Here are modems for Timex 2068, https://www.timexsinclair.com/products/hardware/rs232-serial-interfaces/ https://www.timexsinclair.com/products/hardware/rs232-serial...

kmeisthax 5y ago

This concept is a little weird to think about today, but the Internet used to be accessed through regular voice phone lines. You'd plug your computer into the phone network with a little thing called a modem. In the really early days you actually had to use an acoustic coupler for regulatory reasons. Then you dialed the phone number of the computer you wanted to connect to - most of which were not running the Internet Protocol! Typical computer systems you would dial into would include... 1. Proprietary data services (AOL, Compuserve, etc) 2. BBS systems - typically individual computers running services that let you send messages or files to other users who could then dial in to receive them. Some BBSes were even networked to one another, the largest of such systems being Fidonet 3. Remotely-managed IT equipment - the sort of thing depicted in the movie. 4. Mainframes - universities and large businesses would often have remote access that you'd dial into. This is roughly equivalent to SSHing into an Internet-connected machine today. 5. The Internet - originally only through remote access to mainframes (#4). Later on, data services (#1) started offering open Internet access. (notoriously, AOL utterly demolished USENET's existing cultural norms by doing this) Then companies started just selling dial-in Internet access without other services and this became the dominant use case for modems. This concept was inverted starting in the late 90s. First, phone companies started offering "digital subscriber lines" (DSL) that provided way more bandwidth to connect to an ISP with. Then, (at least in North America, thanks to various Sega Genesis related reasons) cable companies got in on this and started offering "broadband Internet", too. With the greater bandwidth of these services, it suddenly made sense to send Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) instead of Internet Protocol over Voice. So dedicated landline channels became very outdated very quickly, and today we think of voice as just something you send over a multitude of Internet apps.

bluedino 5y ago
Don't forget about your dialing into your office computer to work from home, using something like LapLink or PC Anywhere

CountDrewku 5y ago

Watch War Games and that'll give you a general overview of how you'd access a system back in the 80s. They were still networked and accessible remotely, just not the way they are today.

ASalazarMX 5y ago
It's unfair to expect someone to watch a movie instead of explaining that computers connected through telephone lines using modems to code bits as sound. You called a phone number (your modem could do this for you), the target modem answered the call, and they negotiated the maximum (but still ridiculously low) speed. If the target computer needed concurrent connections, you added more phone lines with modems. But watch the movie anyway, it's a cult classic.
- CountDrewku 5y ago
  Unfair? I think someone can deduce what's going on while he's calling in to the computers. It's not genius level stuff. From there they can research more if they're interested instead of asking random people on hackernews what's going on. >You called a phone number (your modem could do this for you), the target modem answered the call, and they negotiated the maximum (but still ridiculously low) speed. Yes exactly what it shows in the movie... and I think he even explains some of that.
  - ASalazarMX 5y ago
    You're assuming too much, there's people who have never used a landline, and would not know what an acoustic coupler, like the one in the movie, is used for. Even more confusing because the WOPR uses text-to-speech and natural language processing, which seem anachronistic for the 80s. Answering a simple question with "see X movie" is the same as answering with "read Y book", and borderline like "do some research" or "google it".

bluedino 5y ago

Early 90's, but our computer system (some sort of minicomputer) had a modem bank so that teachers could do grades and such from home. I worked in the office because I had an open hour, I earned a credit and I also got to see the guidance counselors view students records and such. It would have been very, very easy to change grades. Also, many schools had internet connections back then. I know our school had a T1, it might have also had a leased line to the state education system for some reason, I would guess the security was very lax back then.