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Hacker, Hackee, Hacked
By Seth11 for CVN
To future hackers of Cybertown,
A few weeks ago, I got a puzzling message in my e-mail inbox with the subject "You chose the wrong time". When I opened the message, the text was "to hack Cybertown", and had three Federal Cybercrime links in it. I, of course, was quite startled, and thought it was one of my friends playing a joke.
I replied stating that I did not know of any hacking occurrence, let alone causing one. I told him to check the e-mail address and that he was forgiven for accusing me.
Then came the shock: He replied that there was no mistake if my user name on Cybertown was Seth_11, which it is. He said that on record, Seth_11 had deleted all the blocks and posted offensive messages on Colony Hood Message boards. This was truly mysterious to me, since I had not had my computer for about three weeks due to upgrades, and that there must have been a mistake. I thought it was hopeless. FBI Cyber Crime branch agents were tracking me down to persecute me with a multi hundred thousand dollar fine AND with 3-5 years in jail. All physical evidence pointed to me as the hacker.
But these guys are better than that. I told them my story, explaining how it was impossible for me to have done the crime. They dug deeper. They went through IP addresses, previous IP addresses, Internet Service Providers, everything they know and could think of researching.
Anything a single person does on the Internet can be tracked, and point to that person! The person truly responsible for this crime had thought they had it won. They used my account to pull of this profitless crime. Even though precautions were followed, Federal Officials and our trusty Cybertown defenders had little trouble tracking down who really did the damage. He was permanently banned.
The moral to this story is quite straightforward. Anything that you can think of doing, any access that you may acquire, any damage that you can do, isn't worth it. No matter how careful you are, you will be caught.
If you can hack, you are probably pretty smart. Hopefully smart enough to understand that you stand no chance of getting away with any sort of Cyber Crime, Cybertown related or not. IT IS NOT A GAME! IT IS A CRIME!
Even if you think you've got it completely covered, you will be hunted down, and possibly prosecuted. Imagine how difficult it would be to get a job at Microsoft or any desirable employer with a criminal record for hacking. Deleting a colony or taking down Cybertown for an hour simply isn't worth ruining the rest of your life.
A personal message to citizens:
To best ensure that you cannot be attacked from any website or from just being connected to the Internet, take necessary precautions. Learn about computer protection! Update your firewalls and virus scan programs regularly. Turn your machine off when you're not using it if at all possible. Remember, in a world as advanced as our own, on the Internet, it is the paranoid that survive.
-Seth_11
Good Day J