[flagged]
Kevin Mitnick has died
61–70 of 666 posts
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#62Rest In Peace Kevin. You were the reason why I started programming. I loved reading your books when I was younger.
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#63Mitnick was a hacker hero of mine in my youth. I think I’ve understood his role as jester prior to conviction less as I’ve grown older, but there’s something about the boyhood charm of being so divorced from the potential consequences of one’s actions that is almost unique. Mitnick had so many stories that entranced the people around him. I heard one second hand of Mitnick dealing with a bank who had early voice veri…
[deleted]
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#64He certainly was an interesting person. It was always amazing the degree to which law enforcement prosecuted his hacking and cracking, when it seems like much more impactful crimes involving computers go uninvestigated. Plenty of people are hounded by threats of violence into leaving their jobs and homes, that seems far more impactful than Mitnick's crimes. And FYI, while he died unexpectedly young, a 57-year-old man…
> a 57-year-old man in the US has only a 50% chance of living to see their child reach 23 years of age Perhaps a clearer way to put it: a 57-year-old man in the US has a 50% chance of living to 80, which doesn't seem quite as shocking of a statement.
It might also be loaded with the assumption the man has a child - I'd assume outcomes are different for those with and without? I wonder by how much.
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#65[flagged]
Very big, very cheap talk.
The website you're using is called "Hacker News" for a reason.
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#66[deleted]
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#67Oh man, oh man. This is heart-breaking. Even though I never met Kevin IRL, he was always something of a.. well, maybe not a "role model" exactly, but certainly an inspiring character in many regards. Some of my earliest forays into the world of phone phreaking and related activities were inspired by the stories I read about Mitnick and his crew out in LA, in Markoff and Haffner's book Cyberpunk. For a while me and some of the guys I ran with would use the word "Kevin" as a sort of code-word for this stuff to avoid telling our parents any more than necessary about what we were doing
"Where are you going to night boys?"
"Oh, we're going to hang out with Kevin."
(this meant a night of trashing telco dumpsters, fucking around with payphones, and various other dubious activities)
"Oh, OK. Well, be careful."
That sort of thing.
Wow. Never saw this coming. I didn't even know he'd been ill.
Anyway... RIP, Mr. Mitnick. May there be clueless operators to social engineer, on "the other side".
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#68Serious question: why revere Mitnick, but not someone like SBF? Mitnick is admired for his technical skill and social engineering prowess, but the same argument could be made that SBF is also exceptional in this regard on an even larger scale. Both are (alleged) criminals. Genuinely curious what makes Mitnick morally good in the eyes of HN. Was it his redemption arc as a “white hat”?
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#69RIP my friend.
Re: Kevin Mitnick has died
#70Oh man, oh man. This is heart-breaking. Even though I never met Kevin IRL, he was always something of a.. well, maybe not a "role model" exactly, but certainly an inspiring character in many regards. Some of my earliest forays into the world of phone phreaking and related activities were inspired by the stories I read about Mitnick and his crew out in LA, in Markoff and Haffner's book Cyberpunk . For a while me and s…
Everything Markoff ever wrote was untrue.