textfiles/computers/mactricks.txt

From mclstr@pipeline.com
Date: Tue, 28 Feb 1995 03:08:54 -0500
From: "Steve J. McAllister" <mclstr@pipeline.com>
To: phruwt-l@netcom.com
Subject: Mac tricks for novices

As I am an older person, with sort of a career, I don t have time to follow
everything in Phruwt.  
I thought I would list some of my favorite Mac apps and some ideas on how
to use them.  
A lot of these have probably been mentioned before, but I hadn't seen
anything and maybe someone would post more beginner tricks to improve upon
this list. I purposely left out the apps that you have at yer sight, the
dialers, tone generators, etc... as I believe you ve probably discussed
this stuff. These tricks have helped me look like some kind of computer
expert to my associates. None of these require any language skills. 
 
This is my list of prank programs for idiots. You must use you're
imagination with these; 
 
ResEdit - The standard. Read as much as you can on this. Lots of good text
floating about this. Good once you have access to someones computer. Make
disk formatting, keyboard recorders and other nasty programs appear to be
something else. 
 
DiskTop - Good when you need to make files invisible etc...quickly, like
when that certain someone leaves the room to powder the nose etc.... Other
programs have more features, but none are so quick and 99% of Mac users don
t know about invisible files. 
 
CanOpener - Opens almost anything so you can read text view pictures etc...
Great for finding passwords etc... on someones computer. Good for fast
searches. I have found passwords with this. 
 
Macro Programs (QuicKeys, Tempo etc...) Great for making bombs. I was doin
this before I ever heard about ANSI bombs. A bombs is sort of like a virus,
but undetectable by virus software. The first SUCCESSFUL use of this was on
a friend who spent money on virus detecting programs. I told him that those
programs were bullshit and that I could prove it. Now being he was a male
and macho and of course he was the computer expert, I had to fuck with him.
About a month later he turned on his computer to find a bunch of his files
renamed and a note from me via teach text on his computer. He knew that he
got it off of one of my floppies that he had checked with his stupid virus
program, the one that wastes your time while it reads your drives and shit.
I never told him how I did it, but  after a few days of him sweating I
removed the invisibles and promised it wouldn t happen again. 
Hint: Put macro program on a floppy with other nasties. Leave the floppy
somewhere and title it in such a way that a certain operator will be
compelled to install it on the target computer. Include a TeachText file
that says  READ ME FIRST  telling them how to install the inits. Then
instructions telling them that they have to reboot and later hit a certain
key combination to get help on how to use the software/game or in my
favorite version make a list of key commands that appear to be the commands
to open my private diary, love letters, nude picts. etc.... Now of course
the key commands will kick in the macro that can do a variety of tricks
such as make important files invisible, turn on and hide a keystroke
recorder(I haven t done this yet as I haven t found a keystroke recorder
for the Mac that works invisibly yet, any ideas).  
You could in theory format the hard drive if they worked off a floppy with
a modified utility(now that would be a nasty thing to do). 
  
The fancy Macro programs have lots of options such as make a newer Mac turn
on at 5:30AM and then do the dirty work when no one is around no keystroke
needed. The new Macs can be made to turn on when no one is around. Also
recently I ve been experimenting with the new Macintalk and sound file
shit. Set up a macro to play a sound or mysteriously type and read text.
This freaks people out more than if yer tricks were fucking the files up. I
have a birthday bomb that I put on peoples powerbooks that sings happy
birthday with my voice, on their b day starting at 5:00 in the morning and
repeating every two hours. The computer would wake up sing happy birthday
and then go back to sleep. Most of the people never figure out how I did
it. It s just QuicKeys and my voice recorded with that microphone that
comes with the Mac. You then remove the sound file from the system, make it
invisible and put it with the macro program.  
 
 
Utility Programs such as Norton, Mac Tools etc... Many uses. The most
useful in my opinion is recovering deleted files. If used on the right
computer/user with other programs, you ll receive tons of info thats
supposed to be confidential (Password hints etc...). 
 
Data fork editors such as Macsnoop, Snooper(I think) etc... For modifying
copy protection, passwords etc... 
 
Any kind of programming shit is good if you understand the basics.
Debuggers etc... 
Look around the programmers sights and download. Steal a copy from a
friend. 
 
And most important social engineering. I won t go into details here. Most
of my friends think this is how I get my tricks, but I actually don t have
that many and I learned them by myself. 
 
WARNING!!!  All of these programs/methods will most likely fuck shit up, so
make sure you only work on back-ups. Even the Macro programs can fuck up
files or crash when you start getting really tricky. Always test thoroughly
before going with it. 
 
Now I know any kind of ELITE HACKER wouldn t stoop to this shit. But these
tricks are a kick for the beginner Mac types.  
The Mac or Windows OS s has a lot more back doors than those old text base
OS s that yer parents used. People tend to only see the obvious, making
things a lot easier for the people who can escape DOS, UNIX etc...There are
a lot more non programming tricks out there, but these are the ones I use. 
 
Death to false Metal 
say10  C/O mclstr@pipeline.com 
P.S. Please post any email to me with "say10" in the subject field, as this
isn't my account.