Goodbye Phrack 20yrs was a long run

[Slappie 9]

Phrack Magazine, a staple of the hacking community for two decades, has announced that it is shutting down.

As much manifesto as hacking handbook, the magazine was hugely influential in the early days of hacker culture.

As hackers moved from dial-up bulletin boards on to the net, the magazine kept its place as a knowledgeable, and often scurrilous, source of security information.

Back in 1985 when the first issue of Phrack appeared, the magazine was largely dedicated to phone phreaking -- the internet was still strictly for military, governmental, and academic research use. As computer use and complexity evolved, so did Phrack's focus.

Publishing a hacker magazine for 20 years wasn't always easy.

The magazine got caught up in the series of raids on hackers and hacker groups that took place in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Phrack editor Knight Lightning, aka Craig Neidorf, was arrested, charged with fraud and tried before a grand jury for reprinting most of a confidential document, known as the E911 document, stolen from the Bell South telephone company. Bell South claimed that the confidential E911 document contained sensitive information and put its value at $80,000.

The case became a cause celebre for the digital underground and Mr Neidorf's defence was organised by the fledgling Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The very last issue of Phrack will be a special hardback edition available at Defcon 13 and WhatTheHack 2005.

The editorial staff has stated on the Phrack website that their decision to end publication will be fully explained in the final issue of the magazine.

As someone who read issues of Phrack in the 90s, I will be sad to see it go.

"Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them."

[diablopilot 2]

I still have my early issues of Phrack....starting in 86' I think. Bummer.....

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