"TPC?" Questioned Scott.
"The Phone Company," Waldo chuckled.
"I don't see how you can do the entire country that way, 10,000 calls at a shot. In New York there must be ten million phones."
"Yes," agreed Waldo, "it is a never ending job. Phone numbers change, computers come and go, security gets better. But you have to remember, there are a lot of other people out there doing the same thing, and we all pool our information. You could ask for the number to almost any computer in the world, and someone in our group, somewhere, will have the number and likely the passwords."
"Jesus . . ."
"I run my program at night, every night, when I sleep. On a good night, if the calls are connected quickly enough, I can go through about a thousand phone numbers. I figure roughly a month per prefix."
"I am amazed, simply amazed. Truly impressed," said Scott. "You know, you always kind of imagine these things are possible, but until it stares you in the face it's black magic."
"You wanna know the best part?" Waldo said teasingly. "I get paid for it, too." Waldo crouched over and spoke to Scott secre- tively. "Not everyone here approves, but, I sell lists to junk fax mail-order houses. They want the fax lists. On a good night I can clear a couple hundred while my modem does the dialing."
The underground culture of Scott's day, demonstrating against the war, getting gassed while marching by George Washington Universi- ty, getting thrown out of a Nixon rally at Madison Square Garden seemed so innocent in comparison. He continued to be in awe of the possible applications for a technology not as benign as its creators had intended.
Scott met other hackers; they were proud of the term even with the current negative connotations it carried. He saw how system- ic attacks against the front door to computers were the single biggest challenge to hackers; the proverbial chase before the catch, the romance to many.