Student hacker uncovers exams, brags about skill
By Li Qian |
December 29, 2012, Saturday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
A COMPUTER wizard studying at Nanjing University may be punished for using a social networking website to flaunt how he hacked the school's e-mail account and found the final exam papers, local media reported.
The 21-year-old bragged on Wednesday on popular social networking website renren.com that he hacked into the academic dean's e-mail account, the Yangtze Evening News reported yesterday.
In his post, Liu said he found out that teachers sent the electronic exam sheets to the dean by e-mail, so he sent an e-mail and soon received a reply. He also received a "session cookie," a unique string that contains the path of an automatic login generated when a user logs into his account.
He then used the stolen cookie to log onto the dean's account without providing a user name or password.
"I searched 13 exam sheets but I didn't click any one," Liu said, adding that he just found the bug and wanted to test it. He also said students could use the same method to change bad scores.
His post was widely circulated on the Internet and many students asked him to teach them. But he deleted it on Thursday morning at the order of his instructor.
His father also received a call from the school, saying his son might be expelled, the paper reported. But the school told the newspaper that it hasn't decided how to punish the student.
Liu has apologized, saying he was sorry for posing negative influences, but he insisted the school should improve its computer system.
The 21-year-old bragged on Wednesday on popular social networking website renren.com that he hacked into the academic dean's e-mail account, the Yangtze Evening News reported yesterday.
In his post, Liu said he found out that teachers sent the electronic exam sheets to the dean by e-mail, so he sent an e-mail and soon received a reply. He also received a "session cookie," a unique string that contains the path of an automatic login generated when a user logs into his account.
He then used the stolen cookie to log onto the dean's account without providing a user name or password.
"I searched 13 exam sheets but I didn't click any one," Liu said, adding that he just found the bug and wanted to test it. He also said students could use the same method to change bad scores.
His post was widely circulated on the Internet and many students asked him to teach them. But he deleted it on Thursday morning at the order of his instructor.
His father also received a call from the school, saying his son might be expelled, the paper reported. But the school told the newspaper that it hasn't decided how to punish the student.
Liu has apologized, saying he was sorry for posing negative influences, but he insisted the school should improve its computer system.
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