Ideas of Fancy

[Scramby]

File Copier v2.0
==============
Allows you to highlight multiple files and then copy all of them in a batch copy to your HDD.

Password Difficulty
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The password cracker is not all that realistic.  With the exception to a Windows based system, most places, especially those that allow outside-external connections give you three chances to get the password correct then drop the connection.  Making it more difficult to bypass the password or crack the password would make the game a little more realistic.

Storage Shell Accounts
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A place to upload critical and sensitive material as well as software so that if you have to blow the system, you can download it again without having to pay for it or hack systems again.

Passive Trace Detector
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A three step process that requires you to implant three seperate systems with a program that detects the IP's of a person bouncing or logging into the systems.  If the person shows up in sequence with the systems the Passive Detector is on, IE: following your trail, you can then detect the fact that there is possibly a person tracing you.  It's not a guarantee, but neither is the Motion Detector.  IE: it goes off when you upgrade the gateway.

IP Shield
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This could be a cloaking system that could have a multitude of versions.

V1.0 - Zeroer - Reports your ip as 0.0.0.0 to every system you log into or bounce through.
V2.0 - Cycler - Each system gets a different IP that you log into or bounce through.
v3.0 - Null - No ip is recorded

Obviously extremely expensive software, but it's available IRL, why not on Uplink?

IP Software
========
To only have access to an individuals IP address through missions sucks.  Having a scanner that just pings IP address would be cool and allow you to frame people outside of missions would be handy plus more realistic.

User List
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Everyone who logs on the internet or uses a system has to have a Username, Password and IP address.  Having these on mainframes, at least, is realistic.

Internet User List
=============
Similar to the last two.  A real-time updating list of people who are online and software to figure out their locations and their ip addresses.  This would also coincide with having IP shields.. making it difficult to track certain people.

Realistic Active Memberlist
===================
If you hack the Criminal Database and have the admin of a company arrested, then call his house phone.. he answers the phone.  ???????  Have the memberlist be active.  If he's arrested, then he can't answer the phone.  Also, if a mission asks you to destroy someones life via "Computer Crime" and you have him simply arrest for it.. should be enough.  Having to "frame" him via Passive Trace for a computer crime doesn't seem necassary.  Yeah, hacking the GCD and authorizing the arrest that way may be cheap and wussy... but hackers do things the easiest way possible with the least amount of possible loss and detection.

Realistic News Server Reporting
=====================
I hacked the ARC Mainframe and ran Revelation shutting down it's whole operation.  I ran Revelation on their Internal Machines too.  Shouldn't this in some way slow the progress if not hault it completely?  If I crash a system or destroy a system, companies go bankrupt.. innocent people get blamed.. etc.  They don't just pick up and start like nothing happened a few hours earlier.  Also, have a little more complex things take place.  If I hack the GCD and say he's been convicted of Man-slaughter.. then say that.. make it more in-depth.. complex.. and have follow-ups.. if he's cleared of the charges.. or convicted...... OOOOORR!!!!! .. executed via Gas Chamber for his crimes.  Be ultra devious then.

Multiple Media Bounces
================
People don't just us land computers to bounce signals.  Some people use satellites.  Radio signal.  Etc.

Other Government Facilities (Expanded)
====================
So far you have social security, academic and criminal.  What about medical?  Remember the movie "The Net" .. lie to someone about a terminal illness.. or having aids... (cause a suicide) .. or be pregnant (cause a relationship breakup) .. expand on the exisiting areas with changes.  Academic... change grades.. have them expelled from school.  Social Security.. discontinue benefiets check.  What about having payroll at some of these computer places?  Terminate employment?  Change payroll?  

Increase Difficulty
=============
Once you have the three bypassers and the password cracker.. nothing is a challenge anymore.  Bypass monitor, bypass proxy, bypass firewall, Voice-Id faked, Cypher decypher, password cracked... and you're in.. takes all of like ten seconds.  What about having some systems that just don't respond to bypasses.. or crackers that you have to do by hand.  Use a more primitive coding program to figure it out?  

Bouncing Difficulty
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Ever tried bouncing through random shell accounts and telnet accounts?  Not that simple.  You have to usually at least setup some sort of guest account.  Have certain systems deny bouncing?

Realistic Active Trace
===============
Not every system in the known world has active trace built in.  Those that don't are dumb, but they do exist.  And most places require a living person to initiate the trace.  And even then, they don't necessarily do it right away.  They have to notice something has gone wrong.  They don't see the Password Cracker running and usually don't know you're running it.  What usually tips them off is high bandwidth use, so maybe if they notice that that'll cause an active trace.  And just cause you log in as an Admin shouldn't necessarily be suspicious.

Realistic Admin Functions
==================
Admins have all the control.  And hacking an admin account should reflect that.  Any admin usually has the ability to add users.  Admins should be able to add a user with a specific security level to avoid trace/detection which would also allow you to then setup bounce points.  This also goes for the GCD... adding people who aren't in it.. most hackers aren't in the GCD .. and also deleting people from it.  

Terrorist/Aggressive Hacker Programs
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Nukes - Have the ability to Nuke other hackers, systems.. etc.  Cause them to shut down.  Buy yourself a little time to cover your tracks.  Also, if you "shutdown" a computer system, doesn't that terminate their internet connection THUS discontinuing an active trace?  Or at least requiring them to continue via passive trace when they reboot.

Trojans - Allowing you to implant trojans to allow for backdoor access into systems that may restrict external admin functions .. ie: add users.. so that we can still use them as bounce points and gain instant access that is difficult to detect.

Virus's - Destroy hacker computers.  Wipe the GCD or systems computers files.

Worms - Installing a worm into a bank that consistantly transfers money to your accounts undetected?

======================================

Okay.. well... hmmm....

Those are just a few ideas I've had.  Maybe realsitic, maybe just fantasy.  I dunno...

[Scramby]

Oh.. One last thing before I go..

FBI/CIA/"Feds" Website
=================
The "feds" that sieze your gateway must be informed someway of your hacking.  Being able to hack their database and delete the information.. ie an unread email of the report.. or the data/evidence that is being built against you.. would be cool too.

[Darksun]

Good ideas, some of them have already been made

- FBI database (although different to how you discribed it)
- Realistic Active Memberlist (feature of the FBI mod)
- Expanded databases (Rkiver's Central Database mod)

[codename2]

yea but thats only three scamby had like 30 up there
keep submiting ideas becouse im learning c++ and ordering the dev cd so keep up the good ideas i might use some

[Stormchild]

Storage Shell Accounts - Been there, done that, have the code to prove it

Increase Difficulty - I have servers that increase their security if they get hacked. The more times they get hacked, the more likely they are to improve.

Realistic Admin Functions - I did, at some point, enable user to change account passwords off the admin menu, if I find that code then altering it to add a new account shouldn't be too tough.

Realistic Active Memberlist - As noted above, there is code around that prevents dead/arrested people from answering phones, and also allows you to release people who get arrested.

Terrorist/Aggressive Hacker Programs - I wrote a DoS program once, it was fun but a nightmare to debug. This the kind of thing you are talking about?

All the rest - Some good ideas I think your ideas about the government servers look very interesting, I might look into that at some point in the near future

[Coldfire26]

a Medical DB mod has been made by Rkiver, I believe the mod that stops ppl from answering their phone whilst dead or in prison is the FBi mod.

A couple of ideas:

Servers that disconnect in certain times, and can be only accesed in a specific time.

Servers that have a proxy the serrounds the entire company (or a large batch of computers) and to access it you have to deactivate the Security feature from a diffrent computer, offen leading to LANS, and other difficult to crack servers.

Servers that require a large number of random passwords, the way they are determined can be found using certain pieces of software.

An uplink MMORPG! (just kidding...)

Make bounces more difficult: to bounce you have to hack the server you bounce through. so it will be impossible to bounce through 50 servers.

turn off that stupid "Password revoked", instead make it so only after a couple of hours the user will be deleted.

stop putting "admin" on all the users, instead put something like a password.

[edd8990]

Very good ideas, Scramby, even if some have been done before.

Just a freindly word of advise, don't double post,, use the edit button. People round here will flame you for it otherwise.

[Scramby]

INCREASED GATEWAY SECURITY
=======================
How about having a special door that leads into your gateway that requires a password to enter or that can be remotely disabled/enabled.  That way you have an even earlier warning of a FED raid?  If you have Uplink do upgrades you can remotely disable this and then enable when they've finished.. and also have a "montior" system on the door that lets you know if the feds are trying to hack the doors password?

[Maniak]

A new Gateway security device. This could lead to:

• You may only have this feature with a Gateway inside a room (e.g. High Security Platform from regular game has a use for the door)
• You could have multiple doors
• More security on the doors(e.g. crack an Elliptic Curve Cypher)

These are very good ideas, Scramby.

[Scramby]

Internal Maintenance Access
====================
IE: "Hackers"

Being able to set off a sprinkler system or at least a fire alarm in a building .. causes the Lan Admin to leave his workstation prolonging him from tracing you or noticing you're performing "suspicious" activities.

TV Stations
========
IE: "Hackers" or "Johnny Mnemonic"

Being able to hack tv stations for brief moments to broadcast the doings of ARC or other bad corporations and/or hackers.  This could ad a lot of game twists and also may be cool to incorporate some video .. upgrade this MUD style game a little .. graphic wise.

Gateway Power Supplies
==================
Adding things like extra HDD's, and especially Motion detectors, will cause a power drain on your system.  Having to upgrade your power supplies/add more, would seem more realisitic.

Hardware Brand Names
=================
IRL, you have a choice of brand names to choose from.  And incorporating this into the game would be cool.  Also, having a "failure" rate or percentage.. if you buy the cheap version, the possible failure rate or burn-out rate would obviously be higher.  

Black Market
=============
Have uplink only provide some very basic software and hardware.  Have "black market"s that sell the other stuff.  As you progress in missions.. different black markets appear and also their software list changes.. that way you have to continually upgrade your software rather then holding out for v5 of everything.  Also.. have certain Blackmarkets be crooked.  IE.. Fed run trying to nab hackers. And have competing blackmarkets, each selling the same stuff.. just some stuff is cheaper depending on which one you go to.

That's it for now.

[Maniak]

The maintenance system is one of the features in the FBI mod. All of the other ideas are also great.

We've gotten "part-way" to the "parts" suggestion, different themes give different parts used. I've noticed simple "color-based" themes(like Gold and Green) only change the color of the part, but advanced skins(like TechNIK or Gingatheme) change the parts much more.

[DiscoFever]

Storage Shell Accounts
================
A place to upload critical and sensitive material as well as software so that if you have to blow the system, you can download it again without having to pay for it or hack systems again.

You can kind of do this one already, find a server, delete all files on it, then just upload. And when you log back into it, they're still there. Don't know if it has a limit on it or what.

But it's a cool idea, paying for another gateway, that you can just log into, without hacking into.

(Edited by DiscoFever at 10:39 am on Dec. 2, 2003)

[Scramby]

Misc. Transportation Facilities
=====================
Being able to hack the DMV, Airport, Greyhound to change/delete/update tickets.  The DMV could work somewhat seperately from the GCD .. you could post DUI's and unpaid fines.  The airport could be similar to Die Hard 2 or The Net.  Hack their nav controls and make themselves crash into the ground.

Finding Software
============
Howabout all the crap that's on these company's file servers actually have some purpose.  Have some programs that you can actually benefiet from.  IE: software you can't buy on any black market.  Misc. software like "Pong" or "Tic-tac-toe" .. and what about finding music files that you can download and install that will update the in-game music?

[Malkariss]

I think that those are all great ideas, exspecially the one about setting off sprinkler systems and fire alarms.

[Darksun]

Scramby, some good ideas

I was working on a Vehicle database, I have some unfinished code somewhere. The airport idea was suggested in the Introversion server

Someone's made a tic-tac-toe mod, and there is also an MP3 player mod that will allow you to play your own ingame music

Edit: Pfff, don't bump old topics when I'm too tired to check the dates of posts

(Edited by Darksun at 11:02 am on Feb. 4, 2004)