From: Hans "Unicorn" Van de Looy <hvdl@sequent.com>
Date: Thu, 29 Aug 1996 02:38:42 +0800
To: anonymous-remailer@shell.portal.com
Subject: Re: Real or Not ?
In-Reply-To: <199608281157.EAA04520@jobe.shell.portal.com>
Message-ID: <9608281505.AA10933@amsqnt.nl.sequent.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


The one-and-only anonymous-remailer@shell.portal.com once stated:
! I snagged this off a news group this AM.. comments??

[ Part of previous message deleted ]

!  It took the agency more to modify GNU C, but eventually they did it.
! The Free Software Foundation was threatened with "an IRS investigation",
! in other words, with being forced out of business, unless they complied. The
! result is that all versions of GCC on the FTP sites and all versions above 
! 2.2.3, contain code to modify PGP and insert the trapdoor. Recompiling GCC
! with itself will not help; the code is inserted by the compiler into
! itself. Recompiling with another compiler may help, as long as the compiler
! is older than from 1992.

I vote for Bogus,  since it resembles too much a  story from the ancient
days of UNIX.

This story  stated that Ken  Thompson modified  the UNIX CC  compiler to
include  a trapdoor  in  each version  of  (I think  it  was) the  login
program, thus ensuring the placement of a trapdoor enabling him to enter
each  and every  system.   After  that (since  all  compiler passes  are
written in C)  he modified the compiler to include  this code (to modify
the login  program) into the  compiler and compiled the  compiler, after
which he destroyed the original sources.

Hope this story will not become the next "Good Time Virus" story or some
similar hoax...

-- 

GreetZ,
Unicorn.

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