t's late at night in Boston's industrial district and from the darkened windows lining a warehouse loft, an eerie glow emanates. On the street below, a hooded figure struggles to open a door, his arms cradling a large object. Using his elbow, he buzzes the only bell on the roster without a name. A voice asks for the password. The visitor complies. He's in. Leaving his real-world identity at the door, he enters the brightly lit room and puts the object down. Like bees to honey, the others swarm around.As one of the alias-dubbed seven at the LOpht, Space Rogue is taking part in what has become a nearly nightly ritual -- trading high-tech booty scrounged from dumpsters to build everything from laser eavesdropping devices to high-security computer networks. Computer professionals by day and LOphters by night, these hackers look at security loopholes the way others view crossword puzzles. "It's a challenge," says Mudge. "We call it `knocking on doors' or `turning the knob.' Whenever the LOphters find cracks in a system, they notify the system managers. "We'll send the company an email and most of the time, they'll thank us and promise to patch it up," says Mudge. Does the company ever offer to pay these merry pranksters to fix the problem? "What? Take money for it?" Mudge asks. "Hey, we're just in it for the fun."
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