Badge of Fandom, Mark of Mischief
Forty-four years ago, I almost got thrown off my degree course. It was March 1980, I’d just turned 19, and I was in my first year at Wolverhampton Polytechnic. The previous summer, I hadn’t got the required A-level grades to go to any of the Universities that had given me offers, nor where they good enough to get on the ‘insurance policy’ Computer Science degree course at Wolves, but they’d offered me a place on their Combined Studies course instead, which I’d accepted.
Wolves Polytechnic had a pretty advanced computer environment for the time, with distributed groups of terminals spread around their multiple campuses, all linked back to their minicomputer setup. These were relatively new at the time, and let’s just say that their security systems hadn’t been locked down. For anyone taking any Computer Science classes, we were obliged to buy a system manual, which actually detailed all of the default passwords in an appendix.
At that time, I was a huge fan of The Jam, and I’d decided that their new single going straight to #1 in the UK charts should not go unnoticed. I had the bright idea of hacking the sign-on message, so that whenever anyone signed onto the network, instead of getting the regular message detailing system availability, they’d instead get to hear about The Jam’s most recent accomplishment.
It probably took me all of 15 minutes to find my way into the system, find the file that had the standard message, edit it, and then sit back to enjoy the fruit of my labors. It felt good. That wasn’t to last for a long, as within about another 15 minutes, the senior lecturer in charge of the data network burst into the room. He’s been able to track down the changes to that bank of six terminals, but he didn’t know which particular one had been used to make the changes.
There were only two of the terminals in use at the time, and the other student had only just arrived, and was in the process of signing on himself. The irate lecturer asked us both if we knew anything about the changes that had been made earlier. I very quickly echoed the other student, in declaring that I’d only just got there, and the lecturer scowled and left the room.
I was convinced that I’d got away with it, but that didn’t last long. Within two minutes, he burst back into the room, pointed his finger at me, and said “come with me”. I collected my belongings, and sheepishly followed him to his office. He didn’t bother trying to get me to confess to my actions. Instead, he went straight into describing what my punishment was going to be. I was to lose all computer privileges for the rest of the year, which meant that I’d be unable to complete required assignments, which would mean that I would fail the course. He added that while he couldn’t just throw me off, he could remove me in other ways.
As the stupidity of my actions and their unintended consequences hit me hard, I apologized and asked him to reconsider. He softened at that, and pondered for a while, which seemed like an eternity to me. At last, he spoke again, in a kinder, softer voice. “I suppose that I should be grateful that you can point out the system weaknesses”, he said, asking me to explain how I ‘d done it. Satisfied with my answer, he told me that I was free to go, but that if he caught me hacking into the system again, there would be no second chances. I nodded, and thanked him.
As I was about to walk out the door, he asked me one last question. Did I want to know how he’d known it was me? Taking my silence as ‘Yes’, he pointed to my bag, saying “that thing!” and then he smiled. I looked down at my bag, realizing that not only had I carefully recreated The Jam’s logo on the cover of it, but that it was also festooned with some of their badges (pins).