“Non-Russian hackers” from the sandbox
It seems that along with vodka, bears and balalaika, “Novichok” and the so-called “Russian hackers” have joined the image of Russia in the West. The nature of the latter neoplasm has not yet been fully investigated, but we can confidently say that in addition to Russia, several more countries can be safely added to hacker geography. I suggest looking at the most interesting representatives of this craft.
Jonathan James (nickname – c0mrade) is an American hacker who became widely known for being the first minor sent to prison for “hacking” in the United States. He was 15 years old at the time of the first violation and 16 years old on the day of the sentencing.
James tried to hack into serious organizations, including NASA and the NSA. In the 2000s, he repeatedly managed to gain access to usernames and passwords, as well as the ability to view confidential information. James was able to freely roam the web and steal several files, including the source code for the International Space Station (ISS) software.
According to NASA, the cost of software stolen by James was estimated at $ 1.7 million. James was caught quickly enough, as NASA did everything to stop him, and he was not really hiding.
The boy’s fate is more than sad. In 2007, several well-known companies fell victim to computer attacks. Although James denied any involvement in these incidents, he was under suspicion and was under investigation. In 2008, he committed suicide, believing that he would be convicted of crimes that he did not commit.
Kevin Poulsen (nickname – Dark Dante) – American phone line hacker from the 90s of the last century. Among his most famous cases is hacking the telephone lines of the popular Los Angeles radio station KIIS-FM, thanks to which Poulsen “won” a Porsche 944S.
Once he entered the FBI database, gaining access to classified information about the wiretap. The American authorities did not like this, and Kevin Poulsen was caught and sentenced to 5 years.
After serving a prison sentence, Kevin Poulsen got a job as a journalist for Wired News. He was soon promoted to the position of editor-in-chief, which he still holds today. By the way, in 2006, he even helped law enforcement to identify 744 sex maniacs on MySpace.
“I think that in any country where there are enough programmers, there may be hackers. These are specialists who deeply study protection mechanisms and bypass them. I think there are many more Chinese hackers than Russians. Bright labels are always used in the media, because it draws people’s attention to the topic more“, – comments Nikolay Dobrovolsky, Senior Vice President of Parallels…
Adrian Lamo – being a young homeless American self-taught genius, the boy managed to hack the networks of such monsters as AOL, Yahoo, Microsoft, AT&T Telecom, MCI WorldCom, Intel, Bank of America, CityBank, Cisco, Google.
It is noteworthy that Adrian carried out all his attacks only through public hotspots, in Internet cafes, bars and other free wireless Internet places, of which there are bulk in America.
This guy can generally be considered the Robin Hood of the hacker world. With childlike spontaneity, he has repeatedly publicly demonstrated the facets of his criminal skill.
So, in 2002, Adrian Lamo was invited to the NBC evening show Nightly News, so that he, as an invited expert, would comment on someone else’s hacking of a major site in prime time. Then no one imagined how it would all end. Since Lamo, despite his young age, was then already a recognized expert in information security, the interviewer did not fail to ask him, by the way, if he could hack the network of their television channel, NBC.