Date: 13 Oct 92 18:11:11 From: mcmullen@well.sf.ca.us Subject: File 3--News Reports Of 911 Attacks NEW YORK, NEW YORK, U.S.A., 1992 OCT 12(NB) -- United Press International and the Toronto Sun have reported arrests related to alleged "hacker" attacks on 911 systems. The law enforcement personnel quoted in the stories were not available for comment due to the observance of Columbus Day and the Canadian Thanksgiving, respectively. The UPI story reports the arrest of a 23 year-old Newark, New Jersey individual, identified only as "Maverick" for allegedly attempting to cause havoc through the disruption of 911 service. The story also said that arrests were expected to be forthcoming in two Maryland locations. The Toronto story, written by Kevin Hann, described the arrest of a 15 year old high school student accused of misdirecting emergency services crews and reporting false medical emergencies. He, according to quotes attributed to Toronto police officials, used a home computer to route calls through the United States back to Toronto in an attempt to confuse security systems. The New Jersey man arrested was said to be part of a loose network of computer "hackers" known as the Legion of Doom (LOD) which, according to the story, engages in telephone fraud by using corporate Private Branch Exchanges (PBX) systems to illegally place their calls It was alleged that the group made caused over $100,000 of charges to be incurred by a Minnesota company within a single month. The name Legion of Doom has been used repeatedly in recent years by both law enforcement personnel and others in the last few years. Robert Riggs, Adam Grant and Franklin Darden, convicted in 1990 for intrusion in to BellSouth's computer systems were identified by law enforcement officials as members of the Legion of Doom as was Len Rose, sentenced in 1991 for "receiving misappropriated UNIX source code." Additionally, other persons have identified themselves as members or ex-members of the Legion of Doom. In June 1991, Chris Goggans, Scott Chasin and Ken Shulman, announcing the formation of ComSec, a computer security firm, identified themselves as former LOD-ers "Erik Bloodaxe", "Doc Holiday", and "Malefactor" (the firm has since gone out of business). In January 1992, announcing the commercial bulletin board system Phantom Access, the system owners, Patrick Kroupa and Bruce Fancher, described themselves as "two former East-Coast Legion of Doom members" ("Lord Digital" and "Dead Lord"). Fancher told Newsbytes "The Legion of Doom is not and never was an organization with criminal intent. Any criminal activity that might have happened was the result of inadvertent actions while exploring. I never head of Maverick and doubt that he was a member of the group known as the Legion of Doom. I also doubt that anyone that I knew in the group would have considered malicious acts involving 911 systems." (Barbara E. McMullen & John F. McMullen/19921012) Downloaded From P-80 International Information Systems 304-744-2253