The Cuckoo's Egg Quotes

“Of course. NSA is rumored to tape record every transatlantic telephone conversation. Maybe they’d recorded this session.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“The word “hacker” has two very different meanings. The people I knew who called themselves hackers were software wizards who managed to creatively program themselves out of tight corners. They knew all the nooks and crannies of the operating system. Not dull software engineers who put in forty hours a week, but creative programmers who can’t leave the computer until the machine’s satisfied. A hacker identifies with the computer, knowing it like a friend.”
― Cliff Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg : Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage

“Cliff, I’d like to take over, but our charter prevents it. NSA can’t engage in domestic monitoring, even if we’re asked. That’s prison term stuff.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Our software is fragile as well — if people built houses the way we write programs, the first woodpecker would wipe out civilization.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage

“By analyzing public data with the help of computers, people can uncover secrets without ever seeing a classified database.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“The hacker didn't succeed through sophistication. Rather he poked at obvious places, trying to enter through unlock doors. Persistence, not wizardry, let him through.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage

“Life was full: no hacker is worth missing a Dead concert for.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage

“So what? Somebody’s always had control over information, and others have always tried to steal it. Read Machiavelli. As technology changes, sneakiness finds new expressions.” Martha”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“And there’s no way to reconstruct the avocado from that guacamole.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Our software is fragile as well—if people built houses the way we write programs, the first woodpecker would wipe out civilization.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Its programs aren’t labeled, “Danger—medical computer. Do not tamper”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Astronomers saw me that way. “Cliff, he’s not much of an astronomer, but what a computer hacker!” (The computer folks, of course, had a different view: “Cliff’s not much of a programmer, but what an astronomer!” At best, graduate school had taught me to keep both sides fooled.)”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Not often—with six-letter passwords a hacker had a better chance of winning the lottery than randomly guessing a particular password. Since the computer hangs up after a few log-in failures, the attacker would need all night to try even a few hundred possible passwords. No, a hacker couldn’t magically enter my system. He’d need to know at least one password.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“it’s a part of the Internet, a computer network that cross-links a hundred other networks.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Richard Stallman, a free-lance computer programmer, loudly proclaimed that information should be free.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“VI was predecessor to hundreds of word processing systems. By now, Unix folks see it as a bit stodgy—it hasn’t the versatility of Gnu-Emacs, nor the friendliness of more modern editors. Despite that, VI shows up on every Unix system.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Over the past decade Stallman created a powerful editing program called Gnu-Emacs. But Gnu’s much more than just a text editor. It’s easy to customize to your personal preferences. It’s a foundation upon which other programs can be built. It even has its own mail facility built in. Naturally, our physicists demanded Gnu; with an eye to selling more computing cycles, we installed it happily.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg

“Ich langte in meine Tasche nach einem Milky Way - was sonst für einen Astronomen - und machte es mir bequem, um den Hacker auf meinem grünen Monitor zu beobachten.”
― Clifford Stoll, The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage