New Delhi, Aug. 24 -- A LITTLE AFTER 9am on May 19th 1998, seven hackers from a group called L0pht walked into a Senate office building in Washington, DC. Granted pseudonymity, "Mudge", "Space Rogue", "Kingpin" and four others came in ill-fitting suits to warn the Committee on Governmental Affairs that any one of them could make the internet unusable in 30 minutes. Fourteen years later Leon Panetta, then America's defence secretary, warned of a "cyber Pearl Harbour".

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