Ghost in the Wires_ My Adventures as the World's Most Wanted Hacker - Kevin Mitnick [78]
Bummer. I asked, “Who do you call when you’re having a technical problem with an SAS unit?”
Another example of how willing people are to help out somebody they have reason to believe is a fellow employee: the guy gave me the phone number of a Pacific Bell office in the San Fernando Valley. Most people are sooo willing to be helpful.
I called there, got a manager on the line, and told him, “I’m from Engineering in San Ramon,” the location of the major Pacific Bell engineering facility in Northern California. “We’re putting the SAS dial-up numbers into a database, so we need to borrow a complete listing of all the numbers. Who has a copy of that?”
“I do,” he said, swallowing my story without hesitation, because he was a guy buried deep within the Pacific Bell internal organization who wouldn’t think an outsider would have any way of finding him.
“Is it too long to fax?”
“About a hundred pages.”
“Well, I’d like to pick up a copy for a few days. I’ll either come by for it myself or have somebody pick it up for me. That okay?”
He told me where to find his office.
Again Alex was excited about being a front for me. Dressed in a business suit, he drove over to the Pacific Bell facility in the San Fernando Valley. But the man didn’t just hand him the package, as we expected. Instead he pressed Alex about why he needed the information.
It was an awkward moment. This was in the spring, in Southern California. It was warm outside. And Alex was wearing gloves.
When the guy saw Alex’s gloved hands, he looked at him and said, “Can I see your ID?”
Another uncomfortable moment.
Few things in life are more valuable than being able to think on your feet in a situation that would be flop-sweat time for most people.
Alex nonchalantly said, “I’m not with Pacific Bell. I’m a sales associate on the way to a Pacific Bell meeting downtown. They asked me, as a favor, if I would swing by and pick this up.”
The man looked at him for a moment.
Alex said, “It’s okay—if it’s a problem, it’s no big deal,” and he turned as if he were going to start walking away.
The guy said, “Oh, no, no—here,” and held the package out to Alex.
Alex was wearing an “I did it!” grin when he presented me with the binder containing all the dial-up numbers for the SAS units at every central office in Southern California.
After we had copied the pages, Alex went to a public Pacific Bell customer billing office and convinced a secretary to put the package into intracompany mail to be returned to the man who’d let him borrow it—covering our tracks by avoiding having any questions raised about a missing binder that could lead to a discovery SAS had been compromised, while at the same time leaving Alex untraceable.
One day, I had a gut feeling that Lewis could also be the target of an investigation. Checking just as a precaution, I discovered intercepts on all the phone lines at the company where Lewis worked, Impac Corporation. Why? Could Eric have anything to do with this? Lewis and I decided to phone Eric and see if we could trap him into revealing anything about it.
Lewis handled the call, with me listening and prompting.
Eric mostly responded with a noncommittal Hmm sound. Finally he said, “Sounds like you guys got some problems.” Well, thanks. That wasn’t any help.
Eric asked, “What’s one of the monitor numbers? I’d like to call in and see what I get.” Lewis gave him the monitor number that was in use for intercepting one of the Impac lines: 310 608-1064.
Lewis told him, “Another strange thing—I now have an intercept on the phone in my apartment as well.”
“Pretty weird,” Eric replied.
Lewis said, “What do you think is going on, Eric? Kevin keeps asking me these questions.