Dan was basically the best example of "infectious enthusiasm" combined with being really smart and interested in a lot of stuff. He was one of the first "security people" who got interested in bitcoin as a network, plus all his DNS stuff, and a lot of other things. He's going to be missed by a lot of people around the world for a long time.
Dan Kaminsky has died
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Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#92Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#93I met him at Defcon 21 and ran across him again when I was running a developer hardware access project in my last job just a couple years back. He struck me as incredibly curious (as a hacker must be!) and was a pleasure to work with. The friends who introduced me to him at Defcon are devastated for a reason... rest in peace.
Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#94Earlier quoted context omitted.
You may have misread the situation. I have known him for decades, and I have never seen him take advantage of another person. Not ever. Not even once. If he said he forgot to bring money, then he probably did. Let us raise a cup to his name. A kind soul and an inspiration to us all.
For what it’s worth, he had left his wallet elsewhere at a large dinner where a friend ended up paying for the group anyway. They didn’t expect him to pay and yet he paid them back fairly promptly and actually gave a few cents more than he technically owed - which he claimed was interest at the prevailing rate. I certainly don’t see him “hacking” his way to a free dinner on a(n) (un)suspecting victim.
Agreed. I've eaten and had many drinks with Dan. He was generous. Never cared about throwing a few bucks down to help someone else eat or drink. We often had very large group dinners at conferences and Dan typically threw in a few extra to cover those who weren't as well off. (Standard practice for these things.) Definitely feels like a misread.
Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#95Could we respect the wish of those close to the deceased to keep speculation as to the cause of death private?
no. right to know.
Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#96;( @dang can we get a black bar please?
+1
Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#97Seeing him present his work on stage at DC was one of those things I'll never forget: the technical excellence, the dazzling visualizations, his comfortable and confident style, and whether you agreed with it or not -- his own point of view, not a thinly veiled corporate / gov / academic shill.
Dan: streams a tv show over DNS
Crowd: goes wild
He was one of the ones who I aspire to be: to show others they can do .*
Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#98Apart from the DNS cache poisoning attack, Dan did some vital followup work on the Sony CD rootkit discovered by Mark Russinovich. Sony's early defence was that it wouldn't affect the Internet. Dan showed using DNS caches that it had already affected over half a million networks on the Internet: https://web.archive.org/web/20080423212131/http://www.wired.... A smart man and a nice man. RIP.
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Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#99I first met Dan on Slashdot over 20 years ago. Over a decade after I first met him on Slashdot I got into information security and had the opportunity to share a few meals and hangout with Dan now and again. His natural curiosity about all technology is what I always will remember about Dan. He was such a good technologist. RIP.
Edit: plus watching him and tqbf argue on Twitter about stuff was always fun.
Re: Dan Kaminsky has died
#100I met Dan at FooCamp in 2004. I was a college kid at the time and a weekend event of people like Larry Wall or Ester Dyson was super intimidating.
I was feeling a little isolated and lonely when I saw this guy in a black 2600 tshirt over by the “FooBar” bar and thought “finally someone I can talk to!” He was so welcoming and engaging it broke the ice and made the whole weekend worth it. We started talking about tunneling various protocols over DNS and ended up doing a midnight stroll with Fyodor all around Sevastopol looking for “interesting” things.
That’s the kind of guy Dan was. Everyone felt his warmth.
Dan was a rare mix of genius with an over the top personality. Seeing what crazy RFC-bending project Dan was doing was one of the best things about going out to Blackhat, DEFCON, or RSA. He is easily one of the best presenters I’ve ever seen: a perfect blend of compelling story, esoteric tech details, and those classic Dan mischievous grins.
I will miss you dearly Dan