About

The History of System7

In a nutshell:  The hoarder + The Mobsters > static html System7 > dynamic System7 CMS

The beginning….

System7 started from an extremely large private collection of information security files including applications, documents, source code, and more.  The enormous collection of information security resources were largely under the GPL and free to the public – the problem was locating these resources.  The Mob decided it was in the public’s best interest to release this collection by making the resources available free of charge on an advertisement-free website. System7.Org was originally released in March of 1999 after 4 months of work consisting of hard coded html. This was a long and monotonous task. Thousands of files that had to be indexed in html in order to easily navigate the site. All files were tested to make sure they did as promised, provide a description, and to make sure nothing was malicious.

There’s always a better way…

It was realized there were better ways to manage this amount of data besides static html.  System7 was re-launched with a brand new homegrown PHP/MySQL content management system.  The new system provided features never seen before.  System7 v2 had the ability for users to make a profile and interact with others on the message boards, posts reviews on S7 content, and invited everyone to help contribute to the web’s largest internet repository of HPVCA material.

Even Rome fell…

Eventually the nature of the information security community changed.  Zero days became prevalent, bugtraq became a closed list, script kiddies turned into cyber criminals, vulnerability researchers were being sued and harassed, and people wanted to charge for exploits.  Users declined, new additions became few and far between, and eventually the S7 content became stale and obsolete.

After the site was offline for some time, it was resurrected in its current form.  System7 now strives to gather the infosec news that matters most and rebuke the snake oil stories.  The original System7 files can still be found as well.

System7.org v3 coming soon…

Thanks to past (defunct) sponsors including:

Asswipe.net

Mobsters.net

SpaceCom5