Hacking for Human Rights? http://web.archive.org/web/20000824051110/www.wired.com/news/...

Hacking for Human Rights?

by Arik Hesseldahl

9:15 a.m. Jul. 14, 1998 PDT

The reclusive leader of a Chinese hacking group that last year claimed to have temporarily disabled a Chinese
satellite is now forming a new global hacking organization to protest Western investment in the country.

In an interview with the Boston-based hacking collective, the Cult of the Dead Cow, the hacker, who calls
himself Blondie Wong, said the new group is forming in the US, Canada, and in Europe to take up the cause
of fighting human rights abuses in China.

Wong, a dissident astrophysicist living in Toronto, said that the new group -- known as the Yellow Pages --
plans to target companies doing business with China, and possibly attack their computer networks.

"Many of these companies have computer networks and there are a lot of members in the Yellow Pages who
have excellent hacking skills," Wong said.

The interview was conducted by a former United Nations consultant known only as Oxblood Ruffin. The
group provided Wired News with an advance copy of the interview.

In the interview, Wong seemed unconcerned about any damage or monetary losses that might result from a
network attack carried out by the Yellow Pages.

"Human rights is an international issue, so I don't have a problem with businesses that profit from our
suffering paying part of the bill," he told Oxblood.

As leader of the Hong Kong Blondes hacking group, Wong has the credentials to back up his threats. With
members operating inside and outside of China, the Hong Kong Blondes claim to have found significant
security holes within Chinese government computer networks, particularly systems related to satellite
communications.

The group claims it first announced itself to the government in Beijing last year by temporarily disabling a
Chinese communications satellite -- an incident never confirmed by the Chinese government.

Since then, the group has threatened to cripple certain Chinese military and security networks if human
rights issues in China reach what they decide is a critical point.

Members of the Cult of the Dead Cow said that the organization began advising the Blondes on strong
encryption and network intrusion at the annual "Beyond Hope" hacker conference held in New York last
August.

In the interview, Wong details how he saw his father stoned to death by members of the Chinese Red Guard
during the Cultural Revolution, the period of political chaos that engulfed China during the 1960s and '70s.

Later, as a student attending an unspecified university in the Great Britain where he was studying to
become a teacher, Wong describes watching televised images of the 1989 massacre at Tiananmen Square.

"When the tanks went into the square and began shooting and running over people, it was like I was a little
boy again, watching my father being killed," he told Oxblood.

Wong claimed that the Hong Kong Blondes has doubled in size, with 42 active members operating in China
and other countries. Many of the group's newest members are Chinese government employees, whom Wong
describes as "technical people."

One member, a female hacker known as Lemon Li, was detained earlier this year and has since been moved
to Paris with the help of a group Blondie described only as "a group of people even more outside the law than
we are." The same group provides Wong with an armed escort wherever he goes.

The interviewer, Oxblood, said he knows little about the origin or membership of the Yellow Pages, other than

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Hacking for Human Rights? http://web.archive.org/web/20000824051110/www.wired.com/news/...

that the organization was founded recently by students at Cal Tech.

"Blondie wants anyone who agrees with the strategy of attacking American companies doing business in
China to get involved," Oxblood said. "So starting new chapters is really up to whoever gets inspired, making
membership open to anyone."

Sun Microsystems, Lucent, Motorola, Yahoo, and Excite are among a growing number of American
companies active in China.

As for any current or future activities of the Hong Kong Blondes, Oxblood said the group has been patiently
watching and waiting.

"They have gotten to the point where they can pretty much hack everything that is up and running. [Wong]
is pretty tight-lipped about what he's got planned. I would say though, that the Blondes have the capacity
to snap the backbone of the Chinese end of the Net."

Related Wired Links:

China's Internet Explosion

13.Jul.98

US Urges China Net Freedom

30.Jun.98

US Firms Ink Big China Pacts

23.Jun.98

Excite Follows Yahoo into China

2.Jun.98

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