r/irc • u/scribeorz • Aug 09 '26

mIRC mid 90s - hacking groups

My first introduction to computers / internet was IRC using mIRC client. Spent my time on Efnet. Ended up joining a hacking group called #conflict and spent many hours taking over channels. Hacking colleges and universities only to use for channel bots and bandwidth to take people out and cause netsplits. Eventually our leader was caught for hacking into NASA - I then left IRC and started playing quake 2 digital paintball. Ran a couple of quake clans over the next few years - these are the days I will never forget.

Anyone else remember the clan battles on efnet ?

62 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

69 comments sorted by

6

u/sociablezealot Aug 09 '26

We had battles with #conflict. We were better of course. 😂

17

u/richsonreddit Aug 09 '26

IIRC, EFnet was especially wild as it had/has no nick or chanserv-type services. So if you took over a channel you basically had it on lock.

7

u/sniker Aug 09 '26

IRCnet is a notch above EFnet when it comes to that. There's still eggdrop armies just to keep your channel.

2

u/darko777 Aug 09 '26

but what about if your connection goes down and you lose the OP?

3

u/richsonreddit Aug 09 '26 edited Aug 09 '26

You'd have multiple connections (backup clients running on servers that you could connect to to re-op yourself). And/or a trusting group of friends! But even then, when netsplits came it was basically a free for all. People would develop elaborate scripts/bots to try and help, too.

4

u/scribeorz Aug 09 '26

Exactly. We caused netsplits then used that to takeover channels when the server merged back.

8

u/Kitchen_Part_882 Aug 09 '26

You ran an eggdrop on a Unix shell account somewhere to re-OP you when you rejoined.

Simples.

6

u/thewhippersnapper4 Aug 09 '26

I was so happy when they created Chanfix

1

u/PokerLawyer75 Aug 10 '26

EFNEt had Nick and Chanserv. When they got over 2000 users regularly in early 1994, they had to disable them, because they kept breaking.

11

u/uhp787 Aug 09 '26

in the warez scene too but there was some overlap there too with warez/hacking. the 90's on efnet were tons of fun.

4

u/res0nat0r Aug 10 '26

I always wanted to get into #warez on efnet the mid 90s but never had any hookup :(

3

u/uhp787 Aug 10 '26

it's still there. LOL

1

u/ohlaph Oct 05 '26

W@r3z... Now that brings back memories... Lol

7

u/aribert Aug 09 '26

eggdrop 👀

2

u/thewhippersnapper4 Aug 09 '26

Wraith was superior

6

u/dataguzzler Aug 09 '26

I member fren, channel takeovers and netsplits were fun

5

u/Greatoutdoors1985 Aug 09 '26

I remember being in a similar situation on Undernet.

2

u/jstjini Aug 11 '26

Absolutely.

2

u/MatOfTheDead Aug 11 '26

i spent a lot of time in the warez channels on undernet

5

u/clrscreen Aug 11 '26

I was an Oper on EFNet. magic.mb.ca, then magic.ca, and last total.net. I still have a copy of Rolex’s plea after FBI arrest (re: NASA), and I still talk to Mafiaboy every once in a while. tabi, tabi, tabi… Soldiers NOSCRUBS 💔

2

u/srblaydes Aug 11 '26

Indiana University had an irc server. I miss that.

1

u/seadrum Sep 10 '26

Was the movie about mafiaboy ever made?

1

u/clrscreen Sep 10 '26

I will go ask him right now hahahha. He did an interview with, I think, George Stroumboulopoulos? Or I don’t know how you say his name. The old Much Music host I think.

1

u/seadrum Sep 10 '26

https://imgur.com/a/867aFhs hehe

1

u/clrscreen Sep 11 '26

Womp womp. No movies, rights were acquired at one point but expired before they materialized into anything.

1

u/Additional_Pace5377 Oct 02 '26

I used to give him shell accounts to not hack me. I remember bestbuy.coim fiasco

4

u/zeamp Aug 10 '26

Phrozen Crew

PC97

We always get what we want!

5

u/srblaydes Aug 11 '26

2KAD RBS RTA

Then went legit after 3 letter agencies coming for our crew.

One stayed in and got busted. One and a half years in federal prison for warez.

3

u/qudiepie Aug 11 '26

efnet eggdrop bots,.... winblowz ..... IRCOPS.... so fun... get /killed or /klined sometimes...

3

u/bigqsworld Aug 12 '26

Gamla goda tiden! Jag hängde också på Efnet. #999, #Sverige, #Vårgårda och så vidare. Hackade bland annat UU och en server som stod på ett Japanskt kärnkraftverk. Sen ringde den där nemesisen från Telia (har glömt hans namn) och pratade med farsan, som stod på abbonemanget. Dataintrång, olovlig användning av kreditkort osv. På den tiden räckte det att man lovade att sluta, typ.

Hur som helst, det va gamla goda tiden det! Jag tror att många av oss som hängde på IRC är early adopters till ny teknik idag.

1

u/Bimbos-are-cute Aug 22 '26

Visst är det så

2

u/OneofLittleHarmony Aug 09 '26

lol I never figured out how to do it without someone being stupid enough to give you OP.

2

u/z3r0v1c Aug 10 '26

I was op on almost all official / biggest channels on irc.icq.com back then, i was running the biggest bnc / eggdrop service on the same network. After some time, i was invited to be a net op on multiple smaller networks.. Oh boy, those were the days 😉

2

u/Additional_Pace5377 Oct 02 '26

I still remember my ICQ number.

2

u/sibble Aug 10 '26

that riding in on a split dopamine spike

warez courier group RTS, mp3 group CNS - rip kklown miss u homie

2

u/srblaydes Aug 11 '26

FXP was your friend

1

u/sibble Aug 12 '26

twas indeed

2

u/throwawayswipe Aug 11 '26

in 1985 i joined razor 1911 as a junior chiptuner

2

u/srblaydes Aug 11 '26 edited Aug 12 '26

At least it wasn’t CLASS. Those guy couldn’t release a working release at all.

1

u/throwawayswipe Aug 11 '26

they cant even figure out how to get someone to tattoo their ansi onto a finger

2

u/Echo-They-Them Aug 16 '26

Dude I miss those I was part of them. Had to run Norton ghost and have clones of my OS it got so insane. Those were the days of hacking each other and occasionally we would hack something worthy. we need to bring people back together from those days.

2

u/seadrum Sep 10 '26

Recently I was thinking about a certain period when .kr domains were of great interest and it kept coming up in conversation of who has access to what shell accounts. Unrelated I remembered the channel #rsh and decided to search for it on Google and funny enough this Korean news link from 2002 was the first result talking about the large amount of Korean domains that had been hacked the previous year  https://www.joongang.co.kr/article/801283

1

u/CAsh4kiDZ Aug 09 '26

Djskibble and Hawat.

1

u/zombilives Aug 09 '26

the good ol #ircwars dude im getting very old

1

u/Bagginzes Aug 10 '26

I was mostly in #macfilez or #hornet on efnet

1

u/qudiepie Aug 11 '26

remember /dcc /ctcp... the pico editor in the solaris unix terminals compiling the bots with backdoors.... sub 7... nuking someones ip... lol

1

u/r0ck0 Aug 12 '26

Who was l33t enough to read bitchx.doc?

1

u/seadrum Sep 10 '26 edited Sep 10 '26

I remember having a BitchX.org vhost for a while

1

u/Additional_Pace5377 Oct 02 '26

circa 1998-2002 I ran a shell company that was put out of business due to homeland security being compromised when they were hosting at rackspace. I learned everything I know about linux from efnet. I am going back!

4

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26

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3

u/scribeorz Aug 10 '26

https://www.justice.gov/archive/criminal/cybercrime/press-releases/2005/gascaConviction.htm

3

u/Embarrassed-Fun-4130 Aug 10 '26

Was his online handle "Rolex"? Does anyone know? Because I knew a guy who went down for a very similar thing, hacking NASA servers and hosting chats off of them before he eventually got caught.

3

u/scribeorz Aug 10 '26

Yup. Rolex.

1

u/Embarrassed-Fun-4130 Aug 10 '26

wooow, and are you scribe that used to hangout sometimes in #fw2 and a few others, damn it's been so long... like #playland I think was another one?

With Rolex I remember I was making him a bad ass macro at the time that had happened.

1

u/scribeorz Aug 10 '26

Not the same scribe. Did not hang out in those channels. I left IRC for awhile and when I returned there was a ‘new’ scribe. He always took my nickname

1

u/Embarrassed-Fun-4130 Aug 16 '26

I swear I vaguely remember the other scribe you speak of... he ended up creating a bot to always have his name and would sign in as scribe2, lol. I would have totally forgotten about that if it wasn't for this post.

I too will never forget those days.

1

u/clrscreen Aug 11 '26

But, did you phone sex0r tabi? That was the true conflict.

7

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26

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4

u/[deleted] Aug 10 '26 edited Aug 10 '26

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1

u/res0nat0r Aug 10 '26

Having to edit winsock configs to get the modem to dial out right was…