So when I scan a server and 666 happens to be open. Nmap will now report “doom” under the “Service” header?
Most people will get a chuckle, but I suspect laymen and even Christian zealots will throw a fit.
Like when a normal person gets an error on their screen and it prints “process closed: child killed by parent”. It will probably raise an eyebrow at the very least, lol.
As a devout Christian who enjoys games like Diablo and Doom, I wanted to offer a different perspective. All of my Christian developer friends (small pool but still large, at around 15 people), including myself, have no issues with tech terms like daemons, master/slave, or killing processes (esp. child processes). Many of us understand the context and humor in technical jargon. In my experience, it's often non-technical people rather than Christians who find these references odd. But then again, what non-technical people run nmap?
> but I suspect laymen and even Christian zealots will throw a fit.
No doubt.
I was once, back at university so two and a half decades ago, helping someone with accessing stuff on a Unix server (he was not much computer literate at all). He was ahem rather enthusiastically Christian, and unsettled by seeing 666, thinking we'd set it up and were having a jab at him (which, in fairness to his paranoia, some of us might have done).
Those files were on a shared resource so shouldn't have been world writable, or even group writable for that matter, so we did report it (the directory wasn't writeable to me, so I couldn't fix it for them), but not because of the concerns our devout compatriot had!
I think it’s easy to overestimate how thinly skinned most people really are because an exceptional complaint (that’s not easily dismissible) commands attention. (This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, insofar as it’s indicative of sympathy and sensitivity.)
If you're interested in getting WAY more detail on all of the aspects of that lawsuit, there was a truly amaazing and groundbreaking legal blog at the time called "Groklaw," run by a paralegal who was really great at breaking down every tiny move in the trial and contextualizing it to the larger battle. Was probably the start of my interest in following legal proceedings. She was so good at it that at one point SCO tried to depose her, believing that she was actually a front for IBM. The blog was sadly shut down in 2013 over privacy concerns, but it's still there, archived, although it probably isn't nearly as fun if you know the ending.
I forgot about this entirely. I remember it being a big fear, but I don't recall all the issues. I think there were even Distros that had versions accounting for what they didn't need from SCO.
The idea of globally assigning ports to specific things feels so retro. Back when the world was a lot smaller.
Today it still makes abundant sense for more generic concepts like where you do HTTP or SSH but to register them to specific companies is amusing and nostalgic.
In my RnD testing, when I just need an arbitrary port, 666 is my go to.
(a) It's almost never used by anything else and (b) <3 Doom
Unfortunately, I showed some software in a sprint demo once, using 666 as an arbitrary port. I was very clear that this port can be anything, because the software was made to be configurable by the user, and of course the project manager wrote it down and put it in the "official" and released documentation that the customer must use port 666. facepalm.
I wonder how many protocols/servers that are "officially registered" there are by now completely out of use (as in, truly not actively used by anyone on the planet).
And how many of the listed email addresses still work.
Well, it does about as much as say, when Congress names an Aircraft Carrier, or ISO some day publishes C++ 23 (probably later this year).
Concretely your Linux systems probably have a file named /etc/services which maps the string "doom" to port number 666, much as it maps "ssh" to 22 or "http" to 80.
"BTW, if you see your mom this weekend, be sure and tell her digital sataaaan!"[0] When this was first released, I wonder how digital it was back in 1990.
Why not also include the IANA link: https://www.iana.org/assignments/service-names-port-numbers/...
https://www.iana.org/assignments/service-names-port-numbers/...
mdqs 666 tcp
mdqs 666 udp
doom 666 tcp doom Id Software [ddt] [ddt]
doom 666 udp doom Id Software [ddt] [ddt]
That _is_ a much better link.
So when I scan a server and 666 happens to be open. Nmap will now report “doom” under the “Service” header?
Most people will get a chuckle, but I suspect laymen and even Christian zealots will throw a fit.
Like when a normal person gets an error on their screen and it prints “process closed: child killed by parent”. It will probably raise an eyebrow at the very least, lol.
As a devout Christian who enjoys games like Diablo and Doom, I wanted to offer a different perspective. All of my Christian developer friends (small pool but still large, at around 15 people), including myself, have no issues with tech terms like daemons, master/slave, or killing processes (esp. child processes). Many of us understand the context and humor in technical jargon. In my experience, it's often non-technical people rather than Christians who find these references odd. But then again, what non-technical people run nmap?
Just my .02c :^)
Edit: casing
4 replies →
> but I suspect laymen and even Christian zealots will throw a fit.
No doubt.
I was once, back at university so two and a half decades ago, helping someone with accessing stuff on a Unix server (he was not much computer literate at all). He was ahem rather enthusiastically Christian, and unsettled by seeing 666, thinking we'd set it up and were having a jab at him (which, in fairness to his paranoia, some of us might have done).
Those files were on a shared resource so shouldn't have been world writable, or even group writable for that matter, so we did report it (the directory wasn't writeable to me, so I couldn't fix it for them), but not because of the concerns our devout compatriot had!
Superstitious people have been known to throw fits upon seeing the FreeBSD beastie logo: <https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-chat/2011-Novemb...>
See also: <https://web.archive.org/web/20040821031811/http://monster-is...> (that one is from 1999)
"now"? It's been registered that way since the 90s.
>but I suspect laymen
How many laymen are doing port scans, but also don't know to Google "port 666 doom" when they have a question?
I suspect the number is pretty small. Small enough to not really be a concern.
I think it’s easy to overestimate how thinly skinned most people really are because an exceptional complaint (that’s not easily dismissible) commands attention. (This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, insofar as it’s indicative of sympathy and sensitivity.)
They threw a fit over Doom then got over it almost 30 years ago ;)
616, the "other" number of the beast, was officially registered to SCO. Maybe also fitting in hindsight.
For young'uns who weren't enjoying The Register's constant string of snarky headlines at the time...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCO%E2%80%93Linux_disputes
If you're interested in getting WAY more detail on all of the aspects of that lawsuit, there was a truly amaazing and groundbreaking legal blog at the time called "Groklaw," run by a paralegal who was really great at breaking down every tiny move in the trial and contextualizing it to the larger battle. Was probably the start of my interest in following legal proceedings. She was so good at it that at one point SCO tried to depose her, believing that she was actually a front for IBM. The blog was sadly shut down in 2013 over privacy concerns, but it's still there, archived, although it probably isn't nearly as fun if you know the ending.
1 reply →
I forgot about this entirely. I remember it being a big fear, but I don't recall all the issues. I think there were even Distros that had versions accounting for what they didn't need from SCO.
> was dismissed with prejudice; SCO filed an appeal later that month.
Doesn't "with prejudice" mean no appeal?
3 replies →
Classic Id gang having fun where they could. The address of the office at their original building location was suite no.666.
It has been assigned to Doom for a very long time. A decade at least (maybe decades?).
The associated email address, ddt@idcube.idsoftware.com, was for Dave Taylor who worked at id from 93-96. So about 3 decades.
3 decades later, they've been bought up by ZeniMax and then Activision Blizzard. I guess Hell has frozen over.
2 replies →
Decades at least
The idea of globally assigning ports to specific things feels so retro. Back when the world was a lot smaller.
Today it still makes abundant sense for more generic concepts like where you do HTTP or SSH but to register them to specific companies is amusing and nostalgic.
In my RnD testing, when I just need an arbitrary port, 666 is my go to.
(a) It's almost never used by anything else and (b) <3 Doom
Unfortunately, I showed some software in a sprint demo once, using 666 as an arbitrary port. I was very clear that this port can be anything, because the software was made to be configurable by the user, and of course the project manager wrote it down and put it in the "official" and released documentation that the customer must use port 666. facepalm.
This is how cults begin.
Doom should have had that done decades ago.
Off-topic: It is nice to see my name amongst the register ports.
I wonder how many protocols/servers that are "officially registered" there are by now completely out of use (as in, truly not actively used by anyone on the planet).
And how many of the listed email addresses still work.
Most of the registered ports are for long forgotten services. This is compounded by the fact that many such services used multiple ports.
It's also shared by mdqs. What's that?
Best guess from Duckin' is an old military proposal called "Multiple Device Queuing System" https://ftp.arl.army.mil/~mike/papers/82usenix-mdqs/usenix.h...
Do Doom multiplayer servers still use that port?
Maybe, 9,000+ port 666 opened.
https://www.shodan.io/search/report?query=666
Does 'officially' do anything?
Yes, it means that you can reliably expect most UNIX/Linux systems (possibly even most OSs with IP stacks) to resolve the port "doom" to 666.
Well, it does about as much as say, when Congress names an Aircraft Carrier, or ISO some day publishes C++ 23 (probably later this year).
Concretely your Linux systems probably have a file named /etc/services which maps the string "doom" to port number 666, much as it maps "ssh" to 22 or "http" to 80.
None of mine do, but now I'm going to add this.
Shouldn't that be pruned at this point...
Based
[flagged]
"BTW, if you see your mom this weekend, be sure and tell her digital sataaaan!"[0] When this was first released, I wonder how digital it was back in 1990.
[0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFjKPLc5qD0
Note: that whole intro is sampled from Butthole Surfers - Sweat Loaf [0]
[0] https://youtu.be/akhuHYih8Mo?si=eYCyrjvRcdpkJg27
1 reply →
How have I never heard this?! What a tune, thanks for the link!
2 replies →