NARK (1) Someone who turns people in to law enforcement. (2) The act of turning in someone to law enforcement NATIONAL INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE [NII] see NII [National Information Infrastructure] NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY [NSA] see NSA [National Security Agency] NECRON 99 see URVILE NEIDORF, CRAIG see KNIGHT LIGHTNING NEON KNIGHTS see METAL COMMUNICATIONS NERD Derogatory term for a computer geek; has been adopted as a badge of honor for some. Reminds that no matter how cool the stuff we do with computers is, we’re still geeks, so get over it. :( [I just looked up the etymology of the word "nerd" in the dictionary, and my main conclusion was that etymologists must have a lot of spare time on their hands, because apparently there’s this huge controversy over where this word came from, and the earliest reference is in a Dr. Seuss book, and then it became a slang term in the 1950s, and some people say it’s a coincidence and others say there’s some complicated relation, and all I can say is that it’s just not that important, but these etymologists have enough time to learn UNIX security, and if they’d just read some books on TCP/IP, they could probably be really good hackers. Suggestion-- if any evil foreign governments out there want to hire some people to train to be hackers, get etymologists. They have tolerance for the tremendously boring. That is all. End rant.] _THE NET_ Sandra Bullock’s 1995 cyberthriller, in which she tries to escape from evil hackers. Can be recommended because it has Sandra Bullock in a bikini NETCOM I believe Netcom is the largest Internet access provider in the world. As a result, it has users of all types. [From "Net" (short for Internet) and "commercial."] THE NETHERLANDS [Kingdom of the Netherlands] Country code ".nl," European nation, population 14.6 million, currently known for its libertarian laws regarding drugs, nudity, prostitution and notably computer hacking (which, until recently, was totally legal.) Home of _Hack-tic_. ("Do you know what they call a quarter pounder with cheese in Holland?" "They don’t call it a quarter pounder with cheese?"...) THE NEUROMANCER see THE MENTOR NII National Information Infrastructure. Hard to say. (I mean, literally, "en-aye-aye"? Really not phonetically friendly.) 1984 A mystical year for computers. LOD was formed; _Neuromancer_ was published; _2600_ was first published; _The Whole Earth Software Review_ was created, which led to the WELL; the Chaos Computer Club was formed; and the Macintosh computer was released. Also, George Orwell’s 1949 SF novel was titled this, and some would say it's becoming true NODE A big, fast, huge thing on a network; sort of a BBS on steroids (NO SUCH AGENCY) [NSA] see NSA [National Security Agency] NSA [National Security Agency] Also known as (No Such Agency). The federal agency in charge of spying on the citizens of the US, as well as an international branch. ["Y’know, I could have joined the NSA. But they found out my parents were married." --Martin Bishop, _Sneakers_.] N6NHG Ham radio handle of Kevin Mitnick; last three letters supposedly stand for Nation’s Hacker Great NUPROMETHEUS LEAGUE Group (or maybe just one guy) that liberated part of the source code to Color QuickDraw and set disks containing to prominent members of the computer community. They were never caught (well, at least not caught and publically tried. Maybe Apple had them shot and dumped in unmarked graves in Philadelphia.) [From the Greek demigod Prometheus, who ILFed fire from Zeus.] NUSSBAUM, LEE see MITNICK, KEVIN DAVID