Show Notes

COLD OPEN

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A quick note before we get started: This is a special bonus episode of Modem Mischief. Starting next month, we’ll be releasing regular bonus episodes on the first Friday of every month to our subscribers on Patreon. For as little as $5 a month, you’ll not only be supporting the production of the program but you’ll also receive these bonus episodes. Goto patreon.com/modemmischief to subscribe. And now, on with the show...

(BEAT)

Adam Gorman went to his freezer and grabbed a fresh Bud Light a little before 9 pm on November 22nd, 1987. Just in time to tune into the Bear’s football highlights.

He changed the channel from ABC’s Nightline to Channel 9’s Nine O’Clock News, where the local Chicago sportscaster, Dan Roan, was already narrating the start of the highlight footage.

Future Hall of Fame running back Walter Payton got the ball and ran toward the end zone. He was 20 yards from a touchdown when he spun around a Detroit defenseman. Adam sipped his beer. 10 yards to go… then 5 yards… Payton was steps from the endzone when the TV cut to black.

The room fell eerily silent, and Adam sat forward in his recliner. What the fuck? He muttered. His lights were still on, so it couldn’t be the power. Urghhhhh, Adam groaned. It was that old TV again. He told his kids not to mess with it. Maybe unplugging it and plugging it back in would fix it?

Adam hurried to the end of the couch, but before he could get up, the screen went fuzzy but there was no sound. The screen twisted, and a figure came into focus. It was a man… no, a man wearing a rubber mask and… sunglasses? The silent figure sent chills up Adams body.

The diagonal striped black and white background twisted and turned out of focus. The image made Adam nauseous and sent a chill up his spine. 

Adam blinked, and the television screen showed Dan Roan again. Instead of talking about football, his face looked as frozen as Adam felt. What the hell was that? Was he hallucinating?

Well, if you’re wondering what’s happened, Dan Roan laughed, shifting uncomfortably in his chair, so am I.

On this episode, bare asses, signal hijacking and one hell of an unsolved mystery. I’m Keith Korneluk and you’re listening to a very special bonus episode of Modem Mischief.

ACT 1

Channel 9, hosted by the WGN Network, experienced a Chicago-wide signal interference. The station spiraled into chaos the second the screens went dark.

While the disruption only lasted 30 seconds, viewers were left perplexed and upset. Who had interrupted their service? Should they be concerned about the strange man on their screens?

Clued-in channel 9 viewers that night recognized the plastic face and bold background since it wasn’t the first time a similar image commanded their screens. The figure from the hijack bared a strange resemblance to the fictitious early 80s TV Host, Max Headroom.

The show titled Max Headroom starred Matt Frewer and was a parody of reporters in the 1980s. Headroom was a character who was part man, part prosthetic, and part digital enhancement. The result was a Joker-meets-Ken-doll figure that delivered news from a dystopian future. Something only the 1980’s could have conjured up.

Just as its second season was set to air, however, the show was canceled. Despite its short stint, the sarcastic, square-jawed profile was well-known to cult TV viewers of the late 80s.

As half of Chicago was reeling from the Max Headroom hijack, hours ticked by, and the airwaves were silent.

It was 11:15 pm by the time Marie Scharff was getting into the plot of the newest Dr. Who episode airing on PBS.

Marie popped a piece of popcorn in her mouth and let it melt as the Doctor consulted Leela about where to land the TARDIS.

The show's color got dimmer and dimmer until it was almost imperceptibly dark. Marie squinted, wondering if it was a part of the episode. Then, white and black lines flashed across the screen in a dizzying spiral.

The sound was like nails screeching on a chalkboard before the audio gave way to an eerie static that made Marie's skin crawl. A masked face that looked like something close to a Batman villain appeared on the screen in front of a jumpy background.

He's a frickin nerd, the television spewed. The voice was reminiscent of a distorted cartoon. The audio became a garbled drone and made the hair on Marie’s neck stand up. 

The image distorted like it was being flushed down a toilet, and the audio was nothing but a static moan. The air around Maire felt charged as she stared at the masked man moving manically across the television screen. 

The camera cut to a wider, lower angle of the man bent over. His face was off-screen, and his bare ass was front and center. They're coming to get me! He screamed.

As he did, a hand— a woman's hand— came out of the side of the screen and swatted the bare bottom like it was a petulant child.

Marie’s hand shot to her face, covering her open jaw. What the in the name of—

Come get me bitch! The masked man yelled. His screams and shrieks faded into a distorted, symphonic laugh.

Then, just as quickly as he arrived, the signal cut back to the Dr. Who episode.

Marie couldn't comprehend what she just saw.

Across town at WTTW, the network that hosted PBS in Chicago, the phones rang off the hook from alarmed and outraged viewers. The noise grew into a cacophony of chimes, setting Wade Sykes' teeth on edge.

Sykes was the station director for WTTW and in the middle of fielding concerned phone calls and apologizing feverously. There had never been a signal hack like this before, and no one knew what to do about the signal interruption— including Wade. 

But Wade wasn’t the type to wait around to take action and he couldn't be idle while his ratings tanked. He needed to catch the little punk that did it.

Mr. Sykes, an IT tech, hovering near Wade's open door.

What? Sykes barked.

We think the disruption came from inside the studio, the tech mumbled.

Inside? Wade repeated. It made sense. To hack the service, the masked man had to be inside the building. The hair on Wade's neck stood up at the thought.  

Fuck that. No one got to show their bare ass on Wade's network, in his studio. Not even Wade himself.  

Wade pressed the button for the studio’s speaker system. Security, please report to all exits. The station has been hijacked. Wade said into the microphone. WTTW is in lockdown. Stay in your current location until further notice. 

Wade pointed to the IT tech. You're coming with me.

Me-me? The tech stuttered. Why?

If the hijacker is in this building, Wade said with a maniacal grin, he's not going to make it out. 

ACT 2

Two security officers locked down the WTTW Studio, and Wade spent nearly three hours combing the building with his nameless IT tech. As the men reached the end of the employee list, there was no sign of their perpetrator.

It was nearing 3 am, and Wade had no answers about the breach. The phones were still ringing off the hook with disgruntled viewers, and he was sure the station’s owner would be livid once he found out. Wade needed to call him. But before he did that, he had another phone call to make. It was time for Wade to call the police.

Wade called the Chicago Police, who had already heard about the hijack from WGN station. They quickly interviewed the employees at both stations and broadcasting offices, but no one knew anything about the intrusion. The police quickly realized that they needed help, and within hours, the FBI and Federal Communication Commission arrived to aid the investigation.

At the time of the Headroom hack, broadcast signal intrusions were a rare phenomenon with attacks limited to small stations. Carrying out the hijack would require special knowledge and tons of expensive equipment. 

Unlike disruptions attempted in the past, the Headroom intrusion had no apparent motive, method, or culprits. Even the federal bodies struggled with where to begin.

Leading the probe was Agent Marcus from the FBI and Sargent Perry from the Chicago PD, and they were assisted by Phil Bradford from the FCC. After Marcus read over all the interview notes from the Chicago PD, he didn’t have a lot of fresh ideas.

Bradford suggested that the police look to the other known hackers to try and generate some leads.

Marcus and Perry looked at the man from the FCC like he was speaking Chinese. Other hackers? The idea, quite simply, never crossed either of their minds. Neither Perry nor Marcus had known that other hackers existed at the time, but Bradford pulled out the two flimsy case files to show them.

The first known television signal disruption had happened almost a year earlier, on April 27th, 1986.

HBO was airing The Falcon and the Snowman, a movie released the previous year. Around 12:30 am, the screen flickered into color bars, with a message superimposed on top that read:

GOOD EVENING HBO

FROM CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT

$12.95/A MONTH?

“NO WAY ! 

[SHOWTIME/MOVIE CHANNEL BEWARE!]

The 4-minute intrusion was the first recorded broadcast hack, and HBO stayed hush around the incident. The FCC was quietly ushered in to consult on the case.

Whoever instigated the hack had used an uncommon text generator to program the display screen during the signal interruption. Only a handful of satellite companies used the text generator, leading the FCC to a Florida satellite company called Central Florida Teleport. The federal investigative team narrowed down on a suspect, John MacDougall, who promptly admitted to the hack.

When the recent Task Force tracked down McDougall, he was freshly released from his jail sentence and wasn’t too keen on going back. Without a job, he also lacked the equipment needed to carry out the hack. Police moved on from MacDougall as a suspect.

The next hacker the Task Force wanted to chat with was from a hack that transpired in September 1987. A hacker infiltrated Playboy TV and posted a flurry of messages instructing viewers to repent for their sins and find Jesus.

The hacker was quickly identified as Thomas Haynie, a technician for Christian Broadcasting Network. Haynie was caught and sentenced to one-year probation.

The team visited Haynie and determined that he wasn’t their man either. Haynie was kept on strict house arrest and wasn’t allowed to have access to technology from his home. He didn’t know anything about the hack and passed a polygraph test to prove it.

Bradford was upset that neither of his leads panned out and now, two weeks since the first hack had taken place, the case was cold.

Just as the task force was running out of leads, an anonymous source popped up out of the ether that would lead the investigation in a surprising new direction.

ACT 3

The story of the Headroom hijack made its way from mainstream news to the message boards on Chicago underground bulletin board systems, a dial-up system resembling a less sophisticated Reddit. From there, news spread across the United States hacker boards.

Groups of hackers and phreakers reacted to the signal intrusion with curiosity, awe, and hacker pride.

Phreakers are techies who use the art and science of manipulating telephone networks to access the systems which live on them. AKA, they’re both a precursor to modern-day computer hacking.

Two days after the news hit the online bulletin, a person with the anonymous handle Bpoag seemed to know more about the hack than most since, well, the hack was all he posted about.

From his immature rattling’s, police discerned that Bpoag was a Chicago native who was part of a phreaker group in a Chicago suburb. The phreaker group was supposedly led by two brothers in their early 30s called J and K.

Bpoag claimed that the brothers planned to do something “big” a week before the Headroom hack. They even told Bpoag to tune into channel 11 on the evening of November 22nd.

The Task Force was instantly interested. Investigators wanted to learn more about the brothers and messaged Bpoag about meeting. They wanted to talk to the phreaker before J and K found out he was posting about their hijack.

When the Task Force asked Bpoag to meet, the hacker didn’t respond.

Bradford suggested that the FCC use its resources to identify the IP address and, thus, location of the postings. Internet in the late 80s was mostly text-based and revolved around online forums like USENET. 

Computer accessed the internet and forums from a specific IP address that could be used to lead police to the location from which a user was sending and receiving data, aka posting on the message boards. 

When the FCC located the IP for Bpoag, they were led to coordinates in the Chicago suburb of La Grange. On December 20th, Agent Marcus and Officer Perry made their way to the suspected home and rang the doorbell.

A moment later, a woman opened the door. When they asked if she had been posting on the online message boards, she laughed at the absurdity.

Gosh, no. That would probably be my son, Brian. Her face sobered up. Why? Is he in trouble?

Perry assured her that her son wasn’t in any trouble, but the meeting was urgent.

The woman retrieved her son and she sat fidgeting as investigators spoke with Bpoag, known better as 13-year-old Brian Hume.

Brian would meet up with the brothers and other phreakers at Longshot Arcade, but he only knew the leaders by their initials. A sketch artist came and drew profiles of J and K based on Brian’s description.

Investigators rushed the sketches to Longshot Arcade where the manager immediately recognized the pictures. He knew the men as Tommy and Mark— not J and K. He also told police the brothers lived around the corner on 8th St and Central.

We’ve got you now, Marcus said, running after Perry to the squad car. We’ve got you now. 

ACT 4

Investigators felt the adrenaline building as they sped to the house. Marcus called for backup as Perry stopped the car with squealing tires.

Investigators ran to the home on 8th and Central and Perry immediately started banging and shouting. Police! Open up!

No answer.

At work? Marcus offered.

Maybe, Perry said. Or… he twisted the doorknob and it opened… they’re getting rid of evidence.

In that case, Marcus said, we should head inside to be sure.

With backup on the way, Marcus stretched out a hand and pushed the front door wide open. The investigators stepped inside and felt all the air leave their lungs.

The house was completely empty, and the brothers had vanished.

Investigators tracked down the deed of the home and found that it belonged to a woman named Tammy Sharp. She was listed as having children, but none by the names Tommy or Mark and none with the initials of J or K.

After the uneventful bust on the La Grange home, the investigators had no other suspects; the case officially went cold and has remained that way in 1987.

The investigating Task Force remembers the Headroom hackers as “the ones that got away” while the rest of Chicago remains disturbed by the chilling events of that November night.

As a result, the tale of the haunting hijack of Max Headroom will never truly die. 

I’m Keith Korneluk and this is Modem Mischief.

Credits

Thanks for listening to this special bonus episode of Modem Mischief. Don’t forget to hit the subscribe or follow button in your favorite podcast app right now so you don’t miss an episode. This show is an independent production and is wholly supported by you, our listeners and the best way to support the show is to share it. Tell your friends, your enemies, tell the pope. And if you like these bonus episodes and want more of them, support us is on Patreon or a paid subscription on Apple Podcasts. For as little as $5 a month you’ll receive an ad-free version of the show plus monthly bonus episodes exclusive to subscribers. Modem Mischief is brought to you by Mad Dragon Productions and is created, produced and hosted by me: Keith Korneluk. This episode is written and researched by Lauren Minkoff. Mixed and mastered by David Swope aka Mighty Mixmaster D-Money. The theme song “You Are Digital” is composed by Computerbandit. Sources for this episode are available on our website at modemmischief.com. And don’t forget to follow us on social media at @modemmischief. Thanks for listening!