how is this possible , some organization hacked me through my cable modem

[bloodybunny]

incase you want to skip the story , just scroll down to the questions i asked.
if not then..
okay here's the brief info.
i got 5Mbit cable internet and 2 days ago it began to be slugish and the modem kept unsyncing from the cable all the time. the after a few minutes it synced back in , but the speed was terrificly low , that went cycling all day long, sync then unsync then sync and etc etc..
i called the cable company and asked if there is some issue with the cables in my region and they said they will check , 5 minutes later the support guy gets back to me and says that there is some weird issue with the computers and my cable modem IP and that they gonna send a technician to replace my priveous Terayon TJ 715 Cable Modem. 10 minutes ago the techinian came and replaced the modem and he told me something that made my jaw drop to the floor. he said that somebody hacked my modem from another city aperanetly because they see my IP from two different modems, one is my modem , and the other is from another city , now i wont get into details but i was investigated about beeing a part in some hacking activity by a police that is located in the same city as the IP came from. i asked him if they know the region in that city and he said the exact same region as the police's HQ located. that kinda freaked me out allot , how can they monitor me without me knowing.. well i guess the questions i want to ask are simple.

1 : how could they hack my modem and what information you think they could get.

2 : how can i protect myself and prevent them from hacking and monitoring my internet activity.

 

[RealBlackStuff]

Quite simply put: if they want, you can't!
Assuming you are innocent (until proven guilty that is) and the fuzz are after you for whatever reason, they have experts that can hack even your toaster!
If you don't do anything illegal, you're fine.

Since 1984, Big Brother is Watching You!

 

[Spike]

A dedicated hardware firewall is about the most extreme measure you can take short of running away, never to look at the internet again. However, even with a hardware firewall, as RBS has said, BB is still watching you, and there'll always be someone who can do whever they want, if they are dedicated enough to doing it.

 

[bloodybunny]

thank you for the info but the thing is, let's just asume i'm not innocent in all this , let's asume that i was caught doing stuff i'm not suposed to do , as well as admited doing them. however let's say the investigation was finished and suposely im suposed to wait a year till i know if they will decide to take this matter to the court or let it go. after all that , if i find out by "accident" that they are monitoring me directly, can i do something about it?
i mean asuming they are secretly monitoring my activity on the net , which they do.. after i found that out , can i demand them to stop , or file a complaint about it? is it even legal without proper papers? ofcorse if they are doing it in a stealth way , then they won't just show me the papers , but in case i already know they are doing that, can i demand the papers from the judge to see their clearance?

about the hardware firewall, i'll concider that.
the thing is that i really don't understand how can they monitor my exact activity over the net without my cable provider beeing a part of it.
and even so, how much information you think they can get through my cable modem access. obvious to me they can get only the information that is beeing submited exactly. such as , websites i surf. but can they capture the exact text i input and send over email or msn/irc etc.. ?
even if they would try to inplant a keylogger or a trojan it would be impossible because they cannot execute anything on my pc via the modem besides docsis's configuration files that the modem should download for its updates, and that also only via the cable company.
or am i wrong?

 

[Per Hansson]

There are services available that makes tracking impossible, round robin routing of data that is encrypted...

I can't remember the link but do some searches on google and you might be able to find it, I think it was even the IEEE or FCC that endorse it...

 

[bloodybunny]

thank you , but i don't live in the states my friend , i'm residing in Israel atm,
does it apply aswell?

 

[Per Hansson]

Still applies yes, the only requirement for the service is that you also run an encryption server on your own connection, costing you some of your upstream bandwidth but the service is otherwise free

I.e. you get to route some encrypted data over your own connection, for that "service" you get to use the system for free, that is how it is supposed to work atleast, I have never tried it...

 

[bloodybunny]

that's great news for me thank you very much,
thou , isn't that kind of illegal to route encrypted data through my own connection intentionaly? thou it doesn't really matter to me anymore ,
could you please give me some information that would help me find the service you refer to ?

Thank you

 

[Spike]

whether it's illegal or not depends on the laws of your particular country/province.

Here in the UK, it's perfectly acceptable to transmit and recieve encrypted data over your internet connection, as I imagine it would be in most countries.

 

[bloodybunny]

i checked and found out that it is indeed legal to allow encrypted data to be transfered through my internet connection.
thank you Spike

so how do i find that program round robin data route or however it is called?

 

[Per Hansson]

It was not really that hard to find; remember, google is your friend, use it or the other kids will laugh at you

http://tor.eff.org/

 

[bloodybunny]

knowledge is power, google is ignorance.. and ignorance is bliss
thank you plenty hehe.

 

[Per Hansson]

Yes, of course this encryption will only work if there is not already some sort of spy software already on your computer...

 

[kirock]

Well apparently my comments weren't appreciated but they were made with some humour.

All I'm suggesting is if you had a momentary lapse of good judgement in the pass and things are now all good and on the up and up, then let the police have a good look. Let them be satsified that all is good etc and they'll drop it. This will work in your favour. But IMO (and it's only that) if you try to circumvent their "spying" this will look suspicous (if I were a cop it would to me I think) and then they just might take futher action.


Take care.

 

[Spike]

Nah - I deleted them Kirock.

I saw that there may have been some humour in them, but the humour was misunderstood, and wasn't appreciated, resulting in a not very nice, but understandable reply. Obviously, I deleted the reply too

I have to say though, it was a bit close to the mark

 

[bloodybunny]

first of all thanks for deleting the comments , heh sorry but i really didn't see the humor in what was said before, doesn't matter. every person and their own jokes..

the funny thing is that i called the cable provider , and explained the discovery i made , they on their hand ofcorse denied it. which was very professionaly explained to me over the phone (the tech guy that replaced your modem , whatever he may have told you , was comming of his own opinion and thus not represent the companies views, we checked into that matter and found nothing sucpicious". lol i didn't even argued there, that's where i knew something was wrong. i called my lawyer that done some digging , 2 hours ago the CEO of my ISP called my lawyer and asked him not to make a public deal out of it, after which i was explained by my lawyer that the police placed a tap on my modem activity , which was legal.. BUT expired almost a month ago by the judge that had given the aprove.. the funny thing is that the two officers that were investigating me didn't bother to call the ISP company and request the tap to be removed. aperanetly the cable company was to blame , since they are the ones that are responcible for blocking all possible access from one modem to another , thus stealing the IP and monitoring all packets of data , transmited over my connection.
now that i got full coperation and tomorrow i'll get the full logs of the whole process of the monitoring that was done from the date that the aproval was expired and till 2 days ago when i replaced my modem, ill be holding all the cards..

heh like one smart person once said..

We explore... and you call us criminals. We seek after knowledge... and you call us criminals. We exist without skin color, without nationality, without religious bias... and you call us criminals. You build atomic bombs, you wage wars, you murder, cheat, and lie to us and try to make us believe it's for our own good, yet we're the criminals.

 

[paranoid guy]

the funny thing is that i called the cable provider , and explained the discovery i made , they on their hand ofcorse denied it. which was very professionaly explained to me over the phone (the tech guy that replaced your modem , whatever he may have told you , was comming of his own opinion and thus not represent the companies views, we checked into that matter and found nothing sucpicious". lol i didn't even argued there, that's where i knew something was wrong. i called my lawyer that done some digging , 2 hours ago the CEO of my ISP called my lawyer and asked him not to make a public deal out of it, after which i was explained by my lawyer that the police placed a tap on my modem activity , which was legal.. BUT expired almost a month ago by the judge that had given the aprove.. the funny thing is that the two officers that were investigating me didn't bother to call the ISP company and request the tap to be removed. aperanetly the cable company was to blame , since they are the ones that are responcible for blocking all possible access from one modem to another , thus stealing the IP and monitoring all packets of data , transmited over my connection.
now that i got full coperation and tomorrow i'll get the full logs of the whole process of the monitoring that was done from the date that the aproval was expired and till 2 days ago when i replaced my modem, ill be holding all the cards..

Now I'm not so sure I believe you. Look below.

 

[RealBlackStuff]

You think you are smart?
Think again: what is inside that new modem you got? Ouch....

To me that whole story sounds like a load of bull...
Nobody in his/her right mind would discuss crap like that openly on a public forum!
Grow up and/or act your age!

 

[Tedster]

anyone with detailed hardware knowledge of your particular system will know enough to crack through most of your barriers. It is unlikely a cable company rep would do such a thing. First they deal with thousands of customers and stealing from a private consumer is not worth the theft to benefit ratio. They would be better stealing from a business or a bank.

Second, I think most would value their job. Considering many are overpaid union workers, it's not worth it again.

Third , there are many trojan horse/ keyloggers/ viri out there that can steal your info. This is the most likely explanation is that you didn't have a firewall like a router and your system was unprotected when installed. Therefore anyone in the net can see your stuff if they know what they're looking for.