My first test run was on my closest friend, because I knew he could figure out what I was doing, and hoped he could give me a thumbs up or down; a more in depth analysis of whether it worked or not. I fired the first test shot away and sure enough, it worked. It made him suspicious at first, but he figured it out after a few minutes. He got a good laugh out of it and gave me the thumbs up, and I decided to go through with my second test.
My second test was on another close friend, who sits by me in my programming class. I figured I could get a reaction out of him and make sure it worked correctly. I sent the e-mail, and sure enough, it made him wonder how I somehow got his password (when in reality, I never did). After a little explaining, he understood most of what I did. It was time for my third and final test – the reaction test.
I decided to use a friend who did not have much computer experience at all, and who I knew would not know what I was doing. I fired off the test, and sent her a “You’ve got mail!” message over AIM, without saying anything else. She checked her mail, and to her surprise, she had an e-mail from herself. She demanded to know how I got her password and how I had managed to hack her system (which I never did). I explained to her that I wasn’t hacking anything, just testing a new server. She, reluctantly said ok, and calmed down a bit.
All three tests went well, so I decided it was time for the real thing.
For the real joke, I needed someone with enough creativity and knowledge about what I was doing to handle the situation to help me out. I needed someone from out of the area, someone who the girl I was playing the joke on wouldn’t know. After looking around for a bit, I asked for the services of a good friend who works in the IT industry far away from the Land of Oz – and luckily, he was up for a good joke.
Around 6 PM, I sent the email to her, and this time I had my accomplice send her the “You’ve got mail” message on AIM. Of course, she was extremely surprised (with lack of a better adjective), not only because she didn’t know why someone she didn’t know was telling her she had mail, but because in the inbox, she had an E-Mail from herself. She immediately asked over AIM if I knew who he was, and I said, “No.” without much delay. She asked him who he was, and his reply: “[Your Name]” (names are edited for the privacy of those involved). This surprised her, and her head started to spin. She was freaking out and sent me a few messages on AIM: “Oh my gosh! Tyler!!! Someone hacked my hotmail account!!!!!!!”
She called me about five minutes later, scared and nervous, screaming into her phone receiver “TYLER!!!!! HELP ME! SOMEONE GOT MY PASSWORD!!!!”
I was laughing pretty hard, so I had to take a deep breath and sound as serious as I could; saying “Merry Early April Fools! I was just testing out a new mail server.”
“That was you?! I hate you! CLICK”
Disclaimer, extended: Please, do not try this at home. The story is told to demonstrate how easily it can be done. I am an experienced webmaster and have worked with the technology before; I do not recommend others attempting it – it could get you in lots of trouble, and your ISP is almost 100% sure to have the SMTP port blocked. Also, I’d like to thank the person I played the joke on for being a good sport about it afterwards (after she slapped me, of course).
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“War Games” & “Hackers: The Movie” sure did motivate a few kids to become internet security specialists. Groups formed on mIRC and it became pretty big at that time.