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Devilishcode
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hacking

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Apollo threatens to throw baby Hermes into the depths of Tartarus if he does
not give him his cattle back, but Hermes does not relent to Apollo. Since
neither would concede, Hermes declares that Zeus must judge who is right.
So Apollo drags Hermes up to Olympus to plead his case before their father,
telling Zeus of all the cunning details of Hermes' theft that he discovered.
For a third time, Hermes proclaims, "I am just a baby. How could I possibly
have stolen those cattle?" Zeus is amused at the audacity of the theft and
the steadfastness of Hermes' denial, even when caught. So, Zeus begins to
laugh. Surely, this is the son of Zeus. Rather than punishment, Zeus
orders Hermes to make amends with his brother and show him where the cattle
are hidden, revealing his tricks. On their way to the hiding spot, Hermes
begins to play the lyre (which he also invented using the shell of a
tortoise he killed while on the way to steal the cattle), and Apollo becomes
enchanted by its sound, never hearing music before. When they finally reach
the missing cattle, Hermes gives the lyre to Apollo as a gift. In return,
Apollo gives the cattle to Hermes and a whip to symbolize his now legitimate
ownership of them, and the two become friends from that point forward.
Hermes is a god of paradoxes, for he is a paradox as well. How is it that
Hermes could be the illegitimate son of Zeus, the king of the gods? How
could the most legitimate of all the gods produce anything illegitimate?
Just by existing, Hermes is a challenge to the order of Olympus, causing
trouble on his first day being born. So he lies by saying, "I am just a
little baby," but it is a lie that forces others to acknowledge the truth
that he is more than just a little baby. He begins to unwind his own
paradox. He lures others into engaging with it. If he was just a baby, then
he could not have stolen those cattle. If he was something more, then they
must admit that he should be elevated, deserving of praise instead of shame.
Somehow, through initially stealing those fifty head of cattle, Hermes
became recognized as being their rightful owner. Coincidentally, he also
ended up on Olympus in the presence of his now delighted father, a place he
was never meant to be. An illegitimate act set into motion the process of
being recognized as legitimate.
Things worked out for Hermes, but one does not always receive honors, even
if the things of gods are successfully stolen. Sometimes, the gods are not
amused. Sometimes, you are thrown into Tartarus.
--> 03: Tartarus From My First Major Hack
When I was fifteen, I learned through my biology teacher about a website
that offered weekly prizes of up to $500 in gift certificates for winning
trivia quizzes. After about two hours of repetition for each quiz, I became
fast enough to win by recognizing the questions and their answers by the
shape of the text and the first few words. The purpose of the website was
to promote learning, but the quizzes ended up becoming just a reflex test.
I had to answer each question in a second or two, far below the amount of
time to even fully read the question. Regardless, I was able to win through
the intended means. I could do what I was supposed to do. However, it
wasn't sustainable because my vision would go blurry after a few hours of
intently staring at my CRT screen flickering at 60 Hz. There had to be a
better way that didn't end with me going blind.
As I was lying in bed one evening, a thought came to me: Maybe I could
modify the cache file that contained the answers by overwriting the
individual characters within the file without changing the overall size of
the file. I regularly went through the Temporary Internet Files folder
that held the cache for Internet Explorer, so I already discovered the file
that contained the answers. Still, I was never able to successfully run
modified cache files before. I wondered if there might be some internal
validation that checked if the file was the same size as when it was
initially downloaded before it ran in Offline Mode to ensure the file had
not been corrupted. So, I got out of bed to give it a try, and this time
it finally worked! I now had the ability to change websites (at least
how they interacted with me) in any way I saw fit, giving me something I
was never meant to have.
I would clear my cache, run the quiz once online to download the necessary
files, switch to Offline Mode, modify the cache file so that the answers
would always show up in the same location instead of a randomized one,
retake the quiz, and click on "Yes" when my browser would ask if I wanted to
leave Offline Mode when it tried to submit my scores back to the server.
This technique worked perfectly, except when I would replace a character
with a line return, so I just avoided using them when I modified my files.
I would use the same technique later on to spoof file requests to sites that
blocked ones from outside of the domain (especially useful for downloading
multipart RAR files when paired with a download manager). I found that I
could reorder things meant to be difficult to be easier for me so that
I no longer needed to sacrifice myself in the process to get them.
There was a leaderboard on the site, so I saw that there was one other
student who figured out the same trick as me because we were far faster
than anyone else. Curiously, my first major hack was the only time I
spotted another hacker in the wild. The moment I found myself, I also found
another like me, and it was the two of us competing against each other.
The rest of the world just fell away. We formed a new game while everyone
else blissfully imagined that they were still participating in something
that no longer existed.
Unfortunately, my downfall began the moment the gift certificates began to
arrive. It was real, and I couldn't contain my excitement. I imagine that
it was the same feeling as when a child first discovers that he can count to
100, overflowing with pride. I had this new ability that brought tangible
rewards, and I began to share the news with my family. However, the
response was not what I expected it to be. Instead of being met with
amazement and congratulations, I was met with disappointment. I was told
that what I was doing was wrong and that I should stop immediately.
So, I quit and hid my newly discovered talent in shame. I suppose that such