There is a hacker afoot...

Taranis · Post by **Taranis** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 10:34 pm

(I thought I would post about this just out of curiosity, to see what anyone might know about it)

Lately, I've been beseiged while playing tron with hacks and impostors, all of whom I suspect to be the same person under different names, and all of them on the same server, DD racing. I'm not the only one, either; several other top players there, as well as a few noobs, have been subjected to hacking and impersonation. I have a question about one particular bizarre hack, as all of the other problems have been pretty much solved.

That hack involved the hacker making other people say things through their names. I'll explain more specifically: in my own case, text would appear like this on the page: "Taranis: you suck" even though I myself never typed <you suck>. (One of the other victims said that they saw the hacker typing into their chat line as they themselves attempted to say something, but that didn't happen to me.)

Does anyone have any idea how this hack was done? For instance, is there a console command mods or admins can use to say things through other people (and it would be a strange ability to have, for sure)? I'm really getting sick of the blatant attempts to discredit me and a few other people, and I'd be interested in any advice anyone might have for stopping this hacker, who must have no life, from continuing to bother us.

Website · Post by **Z-Man** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 10:50 pm

What version are you using, and could you post a screenshot? Previous versions had a problem with console formatting that resulted in things like that being easily possible by exploiting line breaks.

About impostering: if that just means playing under your usual name, big deal, get over it. Screen names are generally not reserved.

And if you see your own chat getting altered as you type it, your whole PC has been hacked and is being remote controlled.

sinewav · Post by **sinewav** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 11:22 pm

Taranis wrote:That hack involved the hacker making other people say things through their names.

It's not a hack, just some clever use of chat. I'm reluctant to explain how ti works because every noob/troll who reads this will abuse it. The solution is to have the server admin set the spam level to disallow mutiple color codes in chat. Problem solved. (I've already said too much)

And several people I've seen already know how to do this "chat trick" and practice it regularly. You should just ignore it. If you're really a good-natured tronner, people will know. Stay positive.

Taranis · Post by **Taranis** » Tue Dec 30, 2008 11:35 pm

Thanks for the info. If it is just a chat trick (and I don't blame you for not explaining how it works) then I guess I can't do anything about it beyond talking to the server admins. (That will be hard, though, because the admins are almost never on.

)

Z-Man: I'm using version 0.2.8.2; if the problem happens again, I'll try to get a screenshot. Also, I did not see my own type getting altered as I typed it (I would be really worried in that case); chat simply appeared on screen as though I had said it, when I hadn't.

BTW: the impersonation wasn't so much a problem for me as it was for certain other players who don't use authentication on that server.

Edit: I'm honestly not too fussed personally about the whole thing, but since the problems haven't been restricted to me, I'm trying to fix it for the sake of the whole server.

Post by **Lucifer** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:25 am

It's just a chat trick.

I've seen it, too. Basically, you make an instant chat, and put enough spaces in it to make it wrap to the next line, then put someone's name there formatted just like in chat.

You can see it when the purpose impersonates someone who's dead. You won't get the *DEAD* string before their name. Also, there's always a particular line right above the impersonated line, that's in the instant chat.

It mostly goes away in the trunk, where chat is wrapped differently than in 0.2.8.

I think server admins can disable color codes in chat, which makes the problem go away, mostly.

Website · Post by **Z-Man** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:29 am

Taranis wrote:Z-Man: I'm using version 0.2.8.2; if the problem happens again, I'll try to get a screenshot. Also, I did not see my own type getting altered as I typed it (I would be really worried in that case); chat simply appeared on screen as though I had said it, when I hadn't.

I just checked and the fix that makes fake and real chat distinguishable came only in in the alpha versions after 0.2.8.2.

DDMJ · Post by **DDMJ** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:42 am

or if this person has admin powers he can just use console_message and match your color code to make it look like you're talking when you're not

Taranis · Post by **Taranis** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:57 am

I just had a thought: The strangest part of the "hack" was the fact that the "hacker" could rapidly switch from person to person, perfectly matching the color codes in their names. Sorry I didn't mention that before, but it seems like it would be hard for the chat trick you described to be able to do that.

Taranis · Post by **Taranis** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 12:58 am

DDMJ, does that include mods, or only admins?

Post by **Lucifer** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 1:09 am

Taranis wrote:I just had a thought: The strangest part of the "hack" was the fact that the "hacker" could rapidly switch from person to person, perfectly matching the color codes in their names. Sorry I didn't mention that before, but it seems like it would be hard for the chat trick you described to be able to do that.

It's not that hard to match color codes quickly. KColorPicker, on Linux, will let you find out the color codes for any pixel on the screen just by clicking on it. It's really not that hard.

It's just a childish prank, nothing more.

Taranis · Post by **Taranis** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 1:21 am

I tried that console command on DD racing; apparently the function isn't restricted to admins or mods on that server, so anyone could use it. Case closed

DDMJ · Post by **DDMJ** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 4:37 am

Taranis wrote:I tried that console command on DD racing; apparently the function isn't restricted to admins or mods on that server, so anyone could use it. Case closed

What you probably did only showed up on your screen since you weren't logged in as an admin/mod.

Corn1 · Post by **Corn1** » Wed Dec 31, 2008 5:05 am

Lucifer wrote: You won't get the *DEAD* string before their name.

I don't think *DEAD* shows up on the non alpha of 2.8 so he wouldn't be able to tell. Though i could be wrong.

Taranis · Post by **Taranis** » Sat Jan 03, 2009 4:34 pm

DDMJ:

I checked with other people to determine if they could see the text as well, and they could.

Desolate · Post by **Desolate** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:05 am

I've seen the exact thing used by mods in high rubber/df servers, it's a simple trick.

Edit:

or if this person has admin powers he can just use console_message and match your color code to make it look like you're talking when you're not

Yup that's what I was thinking.

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