Penn Student and “Botmaster” Friend Hack School Server, Take Over World with Robots, etc.

by Maureen O'Connor | December 4, 2007 at 12:57 pm

Penn Student and "Botmaster" Friend Hack School Server, Take Over World with Robots, etc.In case you’ve been living under a rock (say, Princeton NJ or Hanover NH) Penn’s had some crime problems lately.

The latest installment in Penn’s naughty-student soap opera is a worldwide computer hacking scheme, allegedly anchored in the Engineering School’s server and orchestrated by bioengineer Ryan Goldstein ‘09. The FBI indicted Goldstein for computer fraud conspiracy based on a hack that organized 50,000 computers to attack other computers, or maybe to kill people and robots and tiny baby kitties, for all I know. It’s all Matrix to me. Goldstein, who goes by “Digerati” when consorting with his cyber-criminal friends, reached out to the famed hacker AKILL. AKILL leads a “small but elite” ring of hackers known for perpetrating some 1.3 million security breaches worldwide and wreaking digital damages valued at tens of millions of dollars. In real life, AKILL is an eighteen-year-old boy in New Zealand. Not even kidding.

So how did some pimply teenager down under get mixed up with a Penn engineer, take down an Ivy League university’s server, and attract the attention of an FBI sting called “Operation Bot Roast II”? (again, not even kidding) Read on.

Having been banned from his fav chatroom, Digerati begged AKILL to exact cyber-social veangeance by taking down the room’s server with “bots” because AKILL is a “botmaster.” But first, Digerati needed cyber-capital for bartering. Using a fellow engineer’s login data, Goldstein broke into the Penn server, then gave the hacked data to The Botmaster who spread the data worldwide for jazillions of sinister purposes we can’t even imagine (a side effect was the February 2006 shutdown of Penn’s engineering server). The DP has a neat-o flash animation explaining how the series of tubes known as the internet connected Penn to New Zealand, and then to dozens of third world nations where warehouses of slave laborers are sifting through your personal e-mail or something right now.

Long story short, Penn enacted a handful of security updates and Goldstein is out on a $10,000 bond, which is really nothing, considering that the Penn Panty-Sniffer had to choke up $200,000 and all he ever did was swipe some undies and purses. If convicted, Goldstein faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. In the meantime he is welcome to go about his business on campus, and last we heard, he was still attending class. So if you see him, say “Hey” and see if he’ll pose for a quickie cellphone pic or two. Also, if he freelances, we could really use a server update and redesign. G-chat us, Digerati?

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12 Responses to “Penn Student and “Botmaster” Friend Hack School Server, Take Over World with Robots, etc.”

  1. Comments penn '10 Says:
    December 4th, 2007 at 4:05 pm

    Penn BE. Represent!

  2. Comments Cornell '06, Harvard '08 Says:
    December 4th, 2007 at 5:54 pm

    Terrible crime or brilliant honors thesis?

  3. Comments Cornell '06, Harvard '08 Says:
    December 4th, 2007 at 6:00 pm

    For their next trick, perhaps ‘Digerati’ and ‘AKILL’ can figure out how to make IvyGate’s servers accept comment posts properly on the first try…

  4. Comments Cornell '11 Says:
    December 5th, 2007 at 2:22 am

    For it’s next trick, Cornell will graduate people who can use a web browser properly.

  5. Comments y10 Says:
    December 5th, 2007 at 2:25 am

    …or at least ones who can use apostrophes correctly.

  6. Comments y10 Says:
    December 5th, 2007 at 11:18 am

    …or at least ones who can use apostrophes correctly.

  7. Comments Stickler for Grammar Says:
    December 5th, 2007 at 12:14 pm

    @y10: Technically, there are no apostrophes in the comment from Cornell ‘06 Harvard ‘08. The ASCII characters for apostrophes and single quotation marks are the same, making the rendered text ambiguous at first. In context, however, those characters are not used to truncate words or to show ownership. Therefore, all four of them are clearly single quotation marks. The apostrophes in his or her name, on the other hand, are used correctly; all our information points to an aptitude for proper apostrophe use. Your comment should actually have read, “…do not confuse the usage of single and double quotation marks.”

  8. Comments Another Stickler for Grammar Says:
    December 5th, 2007 at 12:24 pm

    @Stickler for Grammar: I believe y10 was referring to Cornell ’11’s post. Any true stickler for grammar would be able to pick out “it’s” from “its.”

  9. Comments Stickler for Grammar Says:
    December 5th, 2007 at 12:28 pm

    Perhaps some day Yale will graduate people who know the contextual difference between apostrophes and quotation marks.

  10. Comments Stickler for Grammar Says:
    December 5th, 2007 at 12:35 pm

    Touche. In that case, however, y10 should have said “…use contractions correctly.” The apostrophe in “it’s” is correctly placed; the grammar is what errs here.

  11. Comments Nerd Alert Says:
    December 6th, 2007 at 11:22 pm

    You must be quite popular at parties with all that sexy grammar knowledge

  12. Comments yall are fags Says:
    April 2nd, 2008 at 8:16 am

    notice i didn’t use the correct punctuation in my user name. who cares its a message board not a fuking thesis. this is why going to an ivy school is a status symbol for many. they get carried off the real topic of the hacker and move on to a totally irrelevant topic. nerd alert is the smartest thing going on right here

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