A Basic History of l337 Sp3aK
Back in the days when the BBS(Bullitin Board System) was the primary interconnection medium for most computer users, a large portion of systems were for the soul purpose of downloading and uploading software. Some of these systems specilised in illegal software (Warez), others discouraged it, some provided a mixture. That was, when you were on the BBS for long enough, and proved yourself a real user your account was given a higher status giving you access to more chat-rooms, more file libraries, and more services. These users were called the Elite, and it is from them that the phrase “l33t speak” came.
Once you got onto the more open BBS systems, it became more dangerous to share warez. For those systems where trading was discouraged, you wanted to keep your conversations private. Some BBS software allowed a SYSOP(System Operator) to scan all conversation for keywords, allowing them to spy on any illegal sharing that went on. Even on the systems where warez was commonplace, users were paranoid of govermental robots sitting scanning all conversations for Warez talk.
The solution to this was to not talk in any way that would trip the sensors. Sensors were looking for words (Warez, Software, Zero Day, The titles of the latest games, etc.) and for talk of the mythical higher level (Elite) that would allow you access to the Cracker Cream, all the warez your phone bill could take.
Some ascii glyphs look like other ones, esspecially when combined. 3 could be misread as E in context, 7 has the same basic shape as T, @ contains a, 1 is nearly I anyway, O is almost exactly 0. So you go from “Elite” which might trip the sensors, to “31ite”, which won’t. And because this is a text-based chat medium, like IRC and SMS would do in the future, words got shorter to save time. Elite becomes leet becomes l33t. Once you get into typing and reading it, glyphs can become multiple characters. For the true cream of the leet, common programming and mathmatical operators can subsitute chunks of text (“2b||!2b” or “To Be or Not To Be” would be the question. Nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outragous ascii). The glyph “e”, for example, could be rendered “e”, “E”, “3”, “(-“, “<-", "[-", "
I h4x0r3d j00.
Good summary btw.
This is spooky but I just came over to get your email to see where I can find out more about just this.
Odd, but I’ve been online for years, but have never been much for the BBS — I feel like I’ve missed a whole underground movement.
l33tsp34k still has a use; Non-dictionary, memorable passwords.
Not that I recommend it.
One thing’s wrong.
real 1337 has NEVER been used to make words shorter!
SMS-language and 1337 got some things in common, but they’re still two totally different languages.
the last lines are something about d00d talk and then it says “and there the dark side lies” … i think
t3h l33t sp3ak is easy , medium and hard ! So i thing 90% will learn easy l33t , in 2-3 days !
l33t – easy
l337 – medium
l33-|- – hard
So that depends on u` … what l33t sp3ak u wanna` use
Some examples of l33t sp3ak !
\/\/|-|3r3 t3h P|-||_|c|{ a3r j00 ?
\/\/|-|3[\] | \/\/4s P|-|o|_|r y35rs 0l|) i h4x0r3d nasa.gov
All caps talk leads to biff talk.
Biff talk leads to wareztalk.
Wareztalk leads to eleet warez dood talk,
aliD (7|3|23: your guess is as good as mine) the dark side ues.
Is that close? Dunno… I stumbled across this in my search for history on l337 $p34k. Great article!
The last line is “And there the dark side lies”.
ALL CAPS TALK LEADS TO B1FF T4LK.
B1FF T4LK LE4D$ 2 W4r37_t4LK.
W4r3Z t/|_k L34d$ 2 31337
///|237_ |>0o|) 7/|_|<,
4|||) 7|
Ive seen multiple stories on how 1337speak originated, but I cant tell which one is the truth and which one is fake. For all i know, 1337speak is just a product of people on online games who discovered that they could talk like that using different keyboard characters. Could someone tell me whether this is te REALY history of 1337speak?
This is where l337 orginated. the form used in
games nowa days is a bastardised form of the orginal.
I was using BBS’s when memory was measured in K and only the most popular boards had a 1200 BPS line. l337 was not just for warez, but also for hackers. The two where never far apart. Not that I participated in any of that ;).
It’s not really much of an improvement on a dictionary word, though, since any decent password cracker will try “l33t-style” variants of dictionary words.
hey-
1 agree completly, as an optomist myself i look forward to hearing more from you.
sarah
aka: L33764m3/2
There are enough variations on most letters that it’s pretty unlikely it’ll find it, though.
Especially if you spell the words wrong too.
isn’t it actually faster to just type normally. leet is so much easier than 1337
3/3//7u411y u g37 u$3d 70 i7
! @6|)33 |/|!7|{ |/|@|)7!||!
Once you learn L337 it is really easy to write it and translate it. I know several different forms of it myself. I mean that the kind I used above is called ‘hardcore L337′ and it’s surprisingly easy to learn. In ‘hardcore L337′ ALL of the letters are replaced by signs or figures and there are no regular letters what so ever. Some say that if you put the message far enough away from you that you’d be able to figure out what the message says but I doubt it.
i tried looking at that from about 3 or 4 feet away and didn’t see anything but a couple blurry dots (forgot my glasses… whoops!)
anywho, once my glasses were on, i still didn’t understand quite what it said. translation?
I prefer a coder dialect.
`/ ! ; |=1|\||) 4 |)1(710|\|4|2`/
Why not go find a dictionary?
Not deliberately, really, but by it’s method it has. People have been using “2” for to and “b4″ for before since /way/ before the txtspkfls got their grubby little mitts on our culture
//|_||2|) |-|0/v|3
Where the f*ck are you?
When I was four I hacked the nasa website
^ The top one System lyrix? =P
P33c3 nu85
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Word Homie… dude… not kewl
Translation 4 teh ubre nubs, you know you love me even if I call ya a nub =p
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