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07/05/2004 Archived Entry: "fun with google"

This site reveals some of Google's untapped power. Here, he shows how Google can dig up passwords and authentication if you know the right words to search for. Here's another breakdown of using Google to find passwords. And more general Googledorks playing around.
I really like the idea of the hidden Web, the one search engines can barely reach, or can reach only if you know how to prod them a bit like the site above does. A few years ago, someone showed me Hotline and that freaked me out at the time. It was the dark side of the Web, a place where people were hiding all kinds of stuff: pornography, games, full programs, music, online books, movies etc. But you could only get there with Hotline's interface. And you could only get to the various sites by a mix of luck and secret codes hidden on porn sites (the porn site click throughs allow the owners of the sites where stuff is stored to make a few bucks).
I was also doing a review at that time for Kairos on Race in Cyberspace, and I remember thinking how bad Internet theory really is. While everyone fusses over access and how does gender and race play out online (Hey it's the same! People are still racist online! Who would have thunk it?), all kinds of weird activities were going on under the radar. Skimming through a Hotline interface trying to find a connection is a bizarre experience. Who are these people out there? Why are they spending so much time trading in bits of odd information? Who are we that we want to join in? How do these little, private worlds get created in cyberspace and how many more of them are out there? In Gibson’s world, Case jacks in and enters Molly’s body. Yeah, that’s weird. But go on Hotline and whose bodies are you entering when you explore their fantasies, indulgences, capitalist hording, and other online expressions?