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Why you don't steal from a hacker.

infosec20.blogspot.com

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Re: Why you don't steal from a hacker.

#81

Post by dasil003 »

icebraining wrote: post #61
dasil003 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I'm saddened by all the responses here making the basic logical fallacy of affirming the consequent. It seemed perfectly clear to me that you meant that a hacker is going to have some means of finding his stolen laptop rather than that using Prey makes you some kind of hacker. And to the criticism that you are running a product, that's ridiculous as well. Do we all solder our own motherboards? Devout Not-Invente…

>And to the criticism that you are running a product, that's ridiculous as well. Personally, it's not so much using a product, but 1) giving access to a third-party (the Prey server admins) to his laptop and 2) being limited instead of having complete control. Prey just seems a poor solution if you know what you're doing. For non-computer geeks is excellent, though.

That's a value judgement. As a hacker you can't do everything.

Prey is a polished product that you can trust to work. If you are into this sort of thing, certainly you can achieve more functionality and better security by rolling your own, but I don't consider it a prerequisite to hackerdom anymore than soldering your own motherboards. How often do you expect your laptop to be stolen anyway?

Re: Why you don't steal from a hacker.

#82

Post by xd »

This article seems to imply this "hacker" used some actual skill set to retrieve their stolen goods. Installing tracking software on a mac and then bragging about it when stolen and then found doesn't fit with what I'd call being a hacker.

Nice story though. And I'm happy another rioting / looting is going to court to answer for there actions.

Re: Why you don't steal from a hacker.

#83

Post by CapitalistCartr »

jcfrei wrote: post #79
CapitalistCartr wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think about it. Why do we put far more money into law enforcement than the cost of the crime? Because it's not just about that one laptop. If we don't get the point across to the criminal, he'll do far more damage to all of us. Most burglary is the result of a small number of people. Because few police departments treat that crime seriously, a single burglar gets away with hundreds of crimes before getting caught. As…

I don't think he surrendered his privacy voluntarily . exposing his picture and info has nothing to do with law enforcement - that's just self-administered justice. a well functioning state of law / rule of law (I dunno how you call it in english) works by sentencing criminals to prison according to the scale of their crime. not by punishing them overtly and excessively as a warning to other criminals (that's just ba…

All that happened is that the World knows that he is a criminal. His right to privacy doesn't mean the right to conceal his misdeeds from the rest of us, nor the right for us to keep silent about it.

Re: Why you don't steal from a hacker.

#84

Post by randlet »

jcfrei wrote: post #67

Am I the only one who feels that it's wrong to put someone's personal information and picture on the internet just because he stole a laptop? Of course you get your personal information stolen as well, but in my opinion that doesn't justify spreading his image and name all over the internet. that kind of intrusion into privacy (of the thief) is a much bigger crime in my eyes than the loss of some laptop.

If a person breaks into/trashes/takes things from my personal space they are certainly giving up their right to anonymity in my eyes.

Why should I respect his privacy when he has absolutely abused mine?

Re: Why you don't steal from a hacker.

#85

Post by icebraining »

dasil003 wrote: post #81
icebraining wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>And to the criticism that you are running a product, that's ridiculous as well. Personally, it's not so much using a product, but 1) giving access to a third-party (the Prey server admins) to his laptop and 2) being limited instead of having complete control. Prey just seems a poor solution if you know what you're doing. For non-computer geeks is excellent, though.

That's a value judgement. As a hacker you can't do everything . Prey is a polished product that you can trust to work. If you are into this sort of thing, certainly you can achieve more functionality and better security by rolling your own, but I don't consider it a prerequisite to hackerdom anymore than soldering your own motherboards. How often do you expect your laptop to be stolen anyway?

The thing is: rolling my own takes less time than installing Prey. Of course, it won't have bells and whistles, but it'll be much less limited.

Re: Why you don't steal from a hacker.

#87

Post by icebraining »

aw3c2 wrote: post #76
icebraining wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why I have a two line shell script that creates an SSH tunnel to my server if I put a file called 'reversessh' on my webserver. I mean, basically doing what Prey does, but without relying on a third-party service and having much more control over the machine.

Would you share that script?

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2878415

Re: Why you don't steal from a hacker.

#88

Post by xd »

xd wrote: post #82

This article seems to imply this "hacker" used some actual skill set to retrieve their stolen goods. Installing tracking software on a mac and then bragging about it when stolen and then found doesn't fit with what I'd call being a hacker. Nice story though. And I'm happy another rioting / looting is going to court to answer for there actions.

The down votes seem to imply that I'm wrong. Please could someone enlighten me as to why I'm out of line here. Yeah, sure this guy calls himself a "Security Evangelist" but this has absolutely nothing to do with his skill set being used as a "hacker". Any Joe on the street could and likely has done what he has .. the title is sensationalism and frankly I've become tired of this nonsense in the media over these riots.

Re: Why you don't steal from a hacker.

#89

Post by jcfrei »

CapitalistCartr wrote: post #83
jcfrei wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think he surrendered his privacy voluntarily . exposing his picture and info has nothing to do with law enforcement - that's just self-administered justice. a well functioning state of law / rule of law (I dunno how you call it in english) works by sentencing criminals to prison according to the scale of their crime. not by punishing them overtly and excessively as a warning to other criminals (that's just ba…

All that happened is that the World knows that he is a criminal. His right to privacy doesn't mean the right to conceal his misdeeds from the rest of us, nor the right for us to keep silent about it.

No, just because you become a criminal doesn't mean you lose your right to privacy. Whether the act itself was unlawful or not doesn't really matter (to a certain extent).
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