Once upon a time long ago, I was sitting alone in the UCLA ARPANET site #1
I posted this thread of spooky NSA networking stories, supporting links, and old emails a few years ago to the &quot;30 spies dead after Iran cracked CIA comms network&quot; discussion:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=18376750" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=18376750</a><p>At the University of Maryland, our network access was through the NSA&#x27;s &quot;secret&quot; MILNET IMP 57 at Fort Mead. It was pretty obvious that UMD got their network access via NSA, because mimsy.umd.edu had a similar &quot;*.57&quot; IP address as dockmaster, tycho and coins.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;emaillab.jp&#x2F;dns&#x2F;hosts&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;emaillab.jp&#x2F;dns&#x2F;hosts&#x2F;</a><p><pre><code>    HOST : 26.0.0.57 : TYCHO : PDP-11&#x2F;70 : UNIX : TCP&#x2F;TELNET,TCP&#x2F;SMTP,TCP&#x2F;FTP :
    HOST : 26.0.0.57 : DOCKMASTER.NCSC.MIL,DOCKMASTER.DCA.MIL, DOCKMASTER.ARPA : HONEYWELL-DPS-8&#x2F;70 : MULTICS : TCP&#x2F;TELNET,TCP&#x2F;FTP,TCP&#x2F;SMTP,TCP&#x2F;ECHO,TCP&#x2F;DISCARD,ICMP :
    HOST : 26.1.0.57 : COINS-GATEWAY,COINS : PLURIBUS : PLI ::
    HOST : 26.2.0.57, 128.8.0.8 : MARYLAND,MIMSY,UMD-CSD,UMD8,UMCP-CS : VAX-11&#x2F;780 : UNIX : TCP&#x2F;TELNET,TCP&#x2F;FTP,TCP&#x2F;SMTP,UDP,TCP&#x2F;ECHO,TCP&#x2F;FINGER,ICMP :
</code></pre>
<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;multicians.org&#x2F;site-dockmaster.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;multicians.org&#x2F;site-dockmaster.html</a><p>Whenever the network went down (which was often), we had to call up a machine room at Fort Mead and ask them to please press the reset button on the box labeled &quot;IMP 57&quot;. Sometimes the helpful person who answered the phone had no idea which box I meant, so I had describe to him which box to reset over the phone. (&quot;Nope, that didn&#x27;t work. Try the other one!&quot; ;) They were even generous enough to issue us (CS department systems staff and undergrad students) our own MILNET TACACS card.<p>On mimsy, you could get a list of NSA employees by typing &quot;grep contact &#x2F;etc&#x2F;passwd&quot;, because each of their courtesy accounts had &quot;network contact&quot; in the gecos field.<p>Before they rolled out TACACS cards, anyone could dial up an IMP and log in without a password, and connect to any host they wanted to, without even having to murder anyone like on TV:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0</a>