A hackint node at 28c3 is up and running! It is called reacher.hackint.eu and can be used with and without SSL.
This node is primarily intended for users attending the 28c3. You can use this node even if the connectivity to the rest of the worls goes down, as this hackint node is located directly at 28c3 noc.
reacher.hackint.eu has a certificate signed by the hackint ca.
Some hints on how to successfully join hackint using tor:
First, you need tor. Obviously. :) Then, you need to do your DNS requests via tor. This is essential, as the hackint hidden service domain, w4a6ssearu46yphm.onion, does not exist on "normal" DNS servers. Also, the IP behind it needs to be mapped by tor, so it needs to see the DNS request first.
Next, the ports you can use with tor are 6697 and 9999. This means your IRC client will have to support SSL! If it doesn't, choose one that does.
If your IRC client does not support socks, and you're using some unix, install socat and do:
socat tcp-listen:6697 socks4a:127.0.0.1:w4a6ssearu46yphm.onion:6697,socksport=9050
Next, do as root:
echo 127.0.0.1 irc.hackint.eu >> /etc/hosts
Now, while socks is running, point your irc client to irc.hackint.eu, port 6697, and tell it to use SSL. Enjoy anonymous irc.
Also, make sure in your torrc config file that tor listens for socks connections on port 9050.
Hackint's just gotten a new Certificate Authority, the hackint CA. To use it, visit our website, http://www.hackint.org/, and fetch the root certificate from there. It is going to be gpg-signed by more and more hackint admins.
More and more hackint servers' certificates are being signed with hackint's ca; at the moment, the following ones are:
To verify the certificate with irssi, place the root certificate somewhere, for example in /var/certs/hackint-ca.pem. Then issue in irssi:
/server -ssl -ssl_verify -ssl_cafile /var/certs/hackint-ca.pem $(SERVERNAME)
Please note that only once all of hackint's servers' certificates are signed can you reliably connect to the rotations irc.hackint.org or irc.hackint.eu with ssl verification enabled. Until then, you'll have to connect to an individual server whose certificate is already signed by the hackint ca, or verification will fail from time to time (every time the rotation hits a server whose certificate is not yet signed by hackint's ca)
In case of questions or problems, please join #hackint and ask!
This is harder than it might sound, at least if you are using hybrid ircd, which we do.
We have just applied a patch to our services, which means that in the future, you will not have to reidentify with nickserv after netsplits (provided your own connection to the server was not cut).
If you are interested in IRC internals, you can read more about that patch.
We check your IP against some blacklists to prevent abuse. Unfortunately, often times, abuse is done from a TOR exit node. Hence, many TOR exit nodes were blocked, preventing legitimate hackint users from using the network in an easy manner (cycling through different exit nodes usually helped).
We have now resolved the situation in a radical manner: all connections from TOR exit nodes are allowed, no matter how often they were blacklisted. Let's see how it works out :)
Note: should you get KLINED when connecting from an exit node - do not hesitate to complain to us using the email address given in the KLINE message! (You see the kline message when trying to reconnect).
We have upgraded our services package, atheme, to version 5.2.1. Atheme provides our NickServ and ChanServ facilities. 5.2.1 is the new stable version.
A little patching was necessary, as we use a combination of hybrid ircd and ratbox ircd. We believe these patches to be stable. :)
We have also - finally - added support for the +S chanmode to ChanServ's MLOCK command. If you do not know what mlock is, /msg chanserv help set mlock might enlighten you.
As always, ask in #hackint if anything is unclear to you.
Due to a blackout at TU Darmstadt earlier this weekend, one of hackint's servers, lechuck.hackint.eu, will be offline until late monday afternoon. Services are not affected by this. Please use the irc.hackint.eu rotation to make sure you always get a working server.
We've had the pleasure of some spammers lately, and you do have to admire their humour:
18:13 < spamremoval> to get your irc server and channel removed from our spam list, please visit this page: http://bit.ly/dqkvHa
We've decided to fight the spamming problem by checking all users against some blacklists. There's BOPM, but it requires a configuration for each irc server, which is hard to maintain.
Our stats code has been extended; a plugin infrastructure has been added, and the first usable plugin is the security greasel, a creature that checks all users connecting to a hackint irc server against blacklists and issues a kline if the IP is blacklisted.
If you find bugs in the code, or have written a patch, let us know. :}
We generate stats to see which hackint server is used by how many users and how many total users we have at any time.
The old version was buggy, and so we've decided to reimplement it. The current version is written in Erlang, and we already had to use the hot code swapping feature once. The code is available on the commercial platform github.
It's tradition to have a hackint server at the easterhegg. The idea behind this is that if the (usually unstable) easterhegg internet connection fails for any reason, IRC still works.
This year's easterhegg hackint server will be available during the event (probably not before Friday late evening) at easterhegg.hackint.eu.
