News since 29A#1 컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴�> Mister Sandman/29A In a whole year it's obvious to say that many things happened. And it would be a real fuck to try to sum them all up in this article, so we'll only try to write a brief report about the most important events which took place in all this time. In fact there's nothing too interesting here, just some kind of curious news which may seem funny or at least not boring to you. For us, they were great and amazing experiences we hope we'll go thru again. First of all, after the release of 29A#1, was the discovery of some bugs in the article browser and some errors in a few articles. Our first e-zine was just a test and i think it was a pretty good first step. And it meant a big help for us in order to get some experience about magazine releasing. There was as well kind of a "lack of fame", what forced us to be lame in some as- pects of the magazine (in the esthetic side) such as the sucking ANSI i had to draw myself in less than 30 minutes before releasing the zine. Many long conversations about this and other aspects of 29A took place, while our ho- lidays (the VX ones) finished and we had to restart writing viruses. It was nice however to have received tons of e-mails from almost every part of the world congratulating us for the work we did in 29A#1. We kept on working on our viruses/articles, and by the same time we started thinking about the idea on developing the so-called "29A Labs", our website located in http://29A.islatortuga.com. Also we stopped connecting to EFnet, and, instead, we started visiting the recently founded spanish IRC network, where we eventually settled after having created our own virus channel. And these changes were not only affecting the group externally, but also inter- nally, as by this time there were as well a lot of new members joining, and other members becoming collaborators. And you may be wondering now what the fuck a collaborator is... well, this is another feature we have implemented in 29A. Now the organization is formed both by members and collaborators. Members are those who have the compromise to write a certain number of ar- ticles and/or viruses per an also certain period of time, they are 29A, the virus writing group itself. Collaborators are external VXers who don't have any compromise with us, who write articles or viruses when they feel like that, and who send them to us in order to collaborate with the group. It is important to say that many ex-members due to their inactivity or because of their lack of time were "reclassified" and put as collaborators, instead of members. So, that's the way the group is formed. The official list of mem- bers and collaborators follows, including the last-hour additions :) IMPORTANT!!! if any of the e-mail addresses below does not work, try to use cryogen.com instead of islatortuga.com, or vice-versa. It is also important to note that we are probably moving in the next months to 29A.org, so these addresses may become obsolete soon, albeit they'll still exist, and we will keep on checking them from time to time. -29A MEMBERS- (the VX dream-team) ;) Member name Origin IRC nick E-mail 컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴� Mister Sandman......... Spain....... MrSandman....... mrsandman@cryogen.com Darkman................ Denmark..... _darkman_....... _darkman_@cryogen.com GriYo.................. Spain....... GriYo............... griyo@cryogen.com Jacky Qwerty........... Peru........ jqwerty........... jqwerty@cryogen.com Rajaat................. UK.......... Rajaat....... rajaat@itookmyprozac.com Reptile................ Canada...... Reptile-... reptile./.29A.fuck@usa.net Super.................. Spain....... Superx.......... super_29A@cryogen.com Tcp.................... Spain....... Tcp................... tcp@cryogen.com Vecna.................. Brazil...... Vecna............ vecna@antisocial.com Wintermute............. Spain....... Winter..... wintermute@islatortuga.com -COLLABORATORS- Collaborator name Origin IRC nick E-mail 컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴컴� An죃al Lecter.......... Spain....... _Anibal_.......................... n/a AVV.................... Spain....... avv................... avv@cryogen.com Heuristic.............. Denmark..... n/a............................... n/a Leugim San............. Spain....... LeugimSan...... leugim_san@cryogen.com Lord Julus............. Romania..... LordJulus..... lordjulus@geocities.com Mr. White.............. Spain....... W666.......... mrwhite@islatortuga.com "Q" the Misanthrope ... USA......... n/a...... q_the_misanthrop@hotmail.com Spanska................ France...... El_Gato........ el_gato@rocketmail.com SSR.................... Russia...... ssr............................... n/a The Slug............... Spain....... the_slug......... the_slug@cryogen.com VirusBuster............ Spain....... VirusBust.......... darknode@oninet.es Ypsilon................ Spain....... Ypsilon........... ypsilon@cryogen.com Z0MBiE................. Russia...... Z0MBiE............................ n/a Now that these important news have been told, it is time to start reporting the trivial events. I would first mention our appearances in the media. The first one was in PC Revue (?), a slovakian paper-printed magazine, where we could read a brief comment about my AntiCARO virus. After this, we received via Internet an e-mail from a guy called Javier Guerrero, who heads a virus oriented section in a spanish paper-printed magazine called PCman죂. We had some chats about what we (29A+him) exactly wanted, and after that short pe- riod of time, a full-color, four-page article about the virus scene and 29A appeared in PCman죂, which is one of the most popular computer magazines in Spain. In the next month, he dedicated another -even longer- article to the analysis of my virus Torero, and two months ago we were mentioned in an ar- ticle dedicated to virus payloads, as before last summer we had talked with him about the idea of writing such an article, and provided him with some of the most known virus payloads. Besides, we have been interviewed by many other media, and we're waiting right now for more public appearances. These plans include our probable presence in a TV program!, plus the already con- firmed announcement of the release of 29A#2 in PCman죂, and some article(s) in another spanish paper-printed computer magazine (the best sold i think), called PC-Actual. But this all is a surprise we would not like to unveal by now... just keep on visiting the 29A Labs! ;) These are, btw, some excerpts of the article about us in PCman죂: - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ->8 On cover: "Exclusive interview to spanish virus creators" Index : "[...] we offer to you a very interesting interview with two mem- bers of a spanish group of virus creators, called 29A. In an in- formal chat, our guests describe their methods, their history, and their future plans, as well as their opinions about the na- tional and international virus scene". Page 141: "Nowadays, 29A is, internationally, the most important virus cre- ating group, as well as the first and unique one from Spain". Page 142: "Writing viruses the way we do in 29A is to code for art and ent- ertainment, not for effectiveness and destruction (Mr.Sandman)". - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ->8 The whole article has been converted also into a webpage, so everybody own- ing a browser may check it out at the official website of PCman죂, together with other articles 29A was mentioned in: (*) http://www.canaldinamic.es/PCMANIA/PC057/VI/pc057vivirus0000.html (*) http://www.canaldinamic.es/PCMANIA/PC058/VI/pc058vivirus0000.html (*) http://www.canaldinamic.es/PCMANIA/PC061/VI/pc061vivirus0000.html Other funny event took place last summer, in Madrid. We celebrated the very first european VX meeting, albeit it was initially supposed to be a meeting only for 29Aers. However that's what it eventually became, as most of those VXers who were supposed to come finally couldn't, because of several diffe- rent reasons. For instance, Rajaat planned to go by car from UK till Luxem- bourg, where he'd meet CoKe and then come to Spain. A completely unfortuna- te last-hour crash the same day he was leaving the UK messed every plan and made impossible to meet them... driving while being stoned... you know ;) The only foreigner we could meet was Spanska, from France. After having met everybody we went to a restaurant and had our meal. Then we went for a walk to a cybercaf� where we connected to IRC and had some fun on-line, and that is when we decided to split for meeting later in order to go party. Some of us went to the most famous square in Madrid, Plaza Mayor, were we could sit in a bar and try to write a virus together, it was a pretty funny thing al- beit we couldn't finish it (too much heat) :) Other people such as GriYo or Spanska decided to go their way in order to have a rest, so they could have their energies on top when going party. However, this was the last time any of us saw Spanska, he felt asleep in his car until the next day :) We remet at 22:00h or so in a McDonald's, and then went to some pubs and night bars, including GriYo's... and our party stopped around 5:30h or so, with some of us (especially GriYo and i) a little bit drunk :) It was a great experience we'll repeat this summer, first in Madrid and la- ter -hopefully- in Amsterdam. But this time things will be much more diffe- rent, and besides we already know for sure right now that b0z0, Darkman, Reptile, Rajaat, and Spanska are coming, so we are sure it'll be impossible to stop laughing and having fun for an only minute. And there are also some rumors, btw, about the possibility of organizing a ganja-smoking contest so we may know at last who the fuck is the king, god or whatever of ganja ;) And last but not least, like every year, the SIMO convention (an enterprise based computer exposition, with stands and so on) took place in Madrid, and 29A couldn't miss it ;) This time it was GriYo, Wintermute, Mr. White (col- laborator), and i who represented the group. It was nice to meet personally the developers of Panda, the most important spanish AV product. They were in every moment very kind and proved that it is possible to have a good re- lationship with "the other side". In this case, it was VX and AV who shared a funny and friendly chat, for some minutes. We could also visit the stands of other AV products, such as F-Prot, AVP, TBAV, Scan, etc, but it was good enough to stop at them and have some laughs... there were only salesmen, so it would have been a loss of time to try to speak with them :P When they saw us laughing at them they became completely astonished :) And this is all, more or less... there's another event about to come, which deals with the cellebration of the release of 29A#2, but i guess the report of this party will be part of 29A#3, so... wait until then! Mister Sandman, bring me a dream.