Conference noted::hackers_v1

146.0. "The Other Type of WORM Program" by VAXUUM::DYER () Mon Aug 05 1985 18:43

	Note #142 refers to a WORM program.  Here's a discussion from another
note file about a different type of WORM program.
		<_Jym_>

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		        VAXWRK""::SYS$NOTES:VMSNOTES.NOT;1
 ORION::ALEX                  VAX/VMS and more...             2-JUL-1985 08:26
 Note 1113.0                         WORM??                        7 responses
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Hi there,

I'm wondering if this is actually the right place to ask this question.

I'm writing to inquire if anybody knows about a program called "the worm"
or "WORM".

What this program is suppose to do is to be able to cause great havoc to
an Operating System by removing areas of the O.S. without leaving a trace
of it being there.

As I am new in the area of Internals, I am most interested in uncovering
how it is done, as a matter of interest.

I would be most grateful if anyone is willing to direct me to the right
person or persons who might be able to help.

Thanks,
Alex

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 SPNAKR::RDF                  VAX/VMS and more...             2-JUL-1985 09:47
 Note 1113.1                         WORM??                             1 of 7
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Hmmmm.  Haven't heard of "worm", but rumors and legends of software like
this have been around for years. 

The best one (I thought) was the infamous "cookie monster" which supposedly 
propogated  itself around the engineering net.  At some unexpected moment the
 prompt "cookie?" would appear on your terminal and if you didn't type in 
"cookie" it would delete loads of files in your directory.

I wonder if any of these hacker horror stories are true?

Rick        

** As far as being able to wreck great havoc on the OS and not leave a trace...
   Anyone with privs can destroy this O/S, and it doesn't take that much
   in the way of smarts to do it in a subtle manner.  The hows are probably
   best not mentioned here.  You might want to talk to the people developing
   the VMS security kernel in LTN, they could give you specifics.

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 SUMMIT::GRIFFIN              VAX/VMS and more...             2-JUL-1985 10:21
 Note 1113.2                         WORM??                             2 of 7
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There was a less destructive program called Worm at Xerox PARC a number
of years back.   It was more of an experiment in distributed computing
than a prank.  It did, however, seek computing resources on a network
and attempt to consume them (or apply them - I forget).

I don't recall who the author was.

- dave

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 SMAUG::PORTER                VAX/VMS and more...             2-JUL-1985 16:44
 Note 1113.3                         WORM??                             3 of 7
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Hi there,

I'd like to know how to make highly dangerous and destructive weapons.
Purely for my own interest, of course.  Anyone care to tell me how?

dave

:-)

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 UTRTSC::LUBBERS              VAX/VMS and more...             3-JUL-1985 08:04
 Note 1113.4                         WORM??                             4 of 7
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RE .3

This should NOT be discussed in the NOTES.


But if you really want to know, ask around in Lebanon.

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 ELMER::HILDUM                VAX/VMS and more...             3-JUL-1985 08:56
 Note 1113.5                         WORM??                             5 of 7
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Scientific American some months back had an article in the mathematical section
on programs such as this (right now the title escapes me, but it is the section 
Gardener used to write).  Be warned, one location (a school) was able to remove 
one of these programs only by bulk erasing every disk they had.  (This might 
prove rather painful here.)

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 SPEEDY::BRETT                VAX/VMS and more...             3-JUL-1985 08:19
 Note 1113.6                         WORM??                             6 of 7
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Lets see,

	a "trojan horse" is a program that looks good to run

		(eg: GREAT_GAME.EXE)

	but does something special (as well as being a great game) when
	run by somebody with privileges.


	I believe a "worm" is a program that is an iterative "trojan horse".
	When run, it looks for somewhere even more privileged to put itself,
	and puts itself there.  The idea is that this slowly silently works
	its way up the privilege scale until it gets what it wants.

	There is PLENTY of literature available on this - including our own
	VMS System Security Manual, sitting up there on your shelf.  Read
	section 5.4.3.3!

/Bevin

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 FAMOUS::KITTELL              VAX/VMS and more...             7-JUL-1985 14:20
 Note 1113.7                         WORM??                             7 of 7
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The "worm" you seek was indeed an exercise in applied distributed 
computation at PARC. It was designed to do no harm, but simply attempted to 
put to use every idle CPU cycle within a network. Unfortunately, it was 
able to uncover some pathological interactions between operating systems and 
the network services. The worm was able to do actual work, from test 
programs to a real-time animation system.

See the "Communications of the ACM", March 1982, Vol 25, Number 3 for a 
report by Shoch and Hupp of PARC.

The report credits John Brunner with developing the notion in his novel "The 
Shockwave Rider". The fictional worm described there sounds more insidious 
than the real one at PARC, and is probably the one you've heard about. Let's 
hope it stays fictitious.

Of course, if it doesn't and the Easynet is beset with killer worms, we know 
who was asking about them...

Richard

	Hasn't there been both legend and science fiction about such things
for years?  I remember hearing about a book on this subject.  This particular
worm was called "P1" and infested OS/360 by getting onto a distribution
tape.

	A few years back, some friends wrote a "cookie" program that exploited
a mis-feature of Unix.  Once you have write access to a terminal, you
have write access to it as long as the file is opened for writing, even
after you log out.  Writing to someone's terminal can be obnoxious, 
but you aren't doing real damage.  Writing to the terminal is not the
same as writing to standard input (aka SYS$INPUT).   We had a port
selector gizmo that randomly associated terminal across campus with
terminal lines.  Therefore, you could start up cookie on your local
terminal, log off, and someone else would get the messages.   What caused
the most trouble was when some computing center administrative type
logged in and saw "I want a cookie" appearing occasionally.  This
administrative type didn't realize the technical triviality of the 
hack, and really hit the ceiling.  He thought someone had "broken
security".  [I always have had a certain amount of contempt for
people who don't know the limits of their understanding.  If this
administrative type had simply wandered into his Unix guru's office,
he would have found out in 2 seconds what was happening.]

	Now that I think of it, I'm not sure why I took this 
opportunity to flame a bit.  Ah well.

	Cheers!
	KC

Seems that I remember a little command file on the Enet a few years
ago that brought down a large portion of the net.  It wasn't intended
to be harmful, but a bug in the (VMS) command procedure and some of
the systems not having a diskquota on the DECnet account let it fill
the system disk to capacity.

If I remember correctly, it took turning off many circuits to kill it
off.

/s/ Chuck

    No person knows the limits of his or her understanding.

    Dave

There are just those who THINK they know the limits of thier understanding.
Those are the dangerous ones.
						- Bluejay Adametz, CFII

(no charge for philosophy)

And, of course, those that think they know the limits of other people's 
understanding. These are usually called managers and are usually wrong.

Q

Ok, ok.  I had forgotten that the limits of ones understanding is
a famous point of departure for philosophers.  What I really meant
was that this system administrator got bent out of shape becuase
he assumed someone had "broken security" on the system, when in fact
it was just some ordinary vanilla user program.

Think we can find a better notesfile to discuss the limits of ones
understanding? :-)

	KC

    Sure.

    I guess I should have indicated this before >>>   :-)

    Dave

	Reply #0 continued . . .
		<_Jym_>

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                       VAXWRK::WRKD$:[NOTES]VMSNOTES.NOT;1
 BEANO::WELSH                 VAX/VMS and more...             2-SEP-1985 18:13
 Note 1113.8                         WORM??                            8 of 10
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John Brunner's network was several decades in the future and literally
controlled every aspect of human life. That meant that through the network
you could do anything at all, provided you could get privilege. The trick,
having obtained some privilege, was to capitalise on that to get still
more privileges in other parts of the net, and to cover your tracks as you
went.

In the case of the worm, the program would propagate itself around the net
and actually tidy itself up behind (remove all traces of itself in the nodes
it had previously inhabited). This behaviour was precisley analogous to a
grazing animal moving on... at a potential speed of many nodes per second!
Starting in New York at time t, the worm might next be in Tokyo, Alaska,
Argentina and the Congo, * but not in New York any more *, at time t + say
10 seconds (one day the network will be FASTER :-).

Further, it would actually fight back. If the authorities attempted to
destroy the worm's files and images, they would propagate new images which
would destroy the attacking ones and also attempt to outflank the attackers
and do massive damage to the databases of the authorities in question.

In such a way the "tapeworm" would become more and more like a living creature.
It may or may not convince you, but it certainly lends a lot of interest to
the study of networks!

--Tom

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                       VAXWRK::WRKD$:[NOTES]VMSNOTES.NOT;1
 MORGAN::SCHMIDT              VAX/VMS and more...             3-SEP-1985 17:27
 Note 1113.9                         WORM??                            9 of 10
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Another (fictional) worm:

  THE ADOLESCENCE OF P1 ---- Softcover science fiction,
                             now out of print


  <Unremembered TV title> -- An adaptation of 'P1' done
                             by public television as part
                             of an on-going kid-series


The Scientific American column:

  COMPUTER RECREATIONS ----- Highly enjoyable monthly reading.


                                    Atlant

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                       VAXWRK::WRKD$:[NOTES]VMSNOTES.NOT;1
 RANI::LEICHTERJ              VAX/VMS and more...             3-SEP-1985 21:28
 Note 1113.10                        WORM??                           10 of 10
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The Adolescence of P1 is back in print, I guess as the result of the recent
wave of interest in hacking.  A fun book if you were an OS/360 hacker; not much 
to be said for it, otherwise - mediocre writing, clearly the one book the
auther just HAD to write.
							-- Jerry