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A real cyber-crime thriller
By J.D. Biersdorfer |
August 14, 2011, Sunday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
CONSIDERING the fact that Windows 95 hadn't even been released when federal agents finally caught up with the computer hacker Kevin Mitnick, one might assume his new memoir would be full of stale old tech-and-techniques that no one in 2011 could possibly care about. But as Mitnick makes clear here, don't jump to conclusions.
While he excelled at infiltrating computer systems from a keyboard and had a sharp memory for numbers, "Ghost in the Wires" (written with William L. Simon) really showcases another of Mitnick's skills: social engineering, or what he describes as "the casual or calculated manipulation of people to influence them to do things they would not ordinarily do."
By doing his research and impersonating authority figures over the phone or by e-mail, Mitnick found he could persuade just about anybody - programmers, technicians, even the nice lady at the Social Security Administration - to give him the things he wanted, like passwords, computer chips and personal information about FBI informants on his tail. "People, as I had learned at a very young age, are just too trusting," he writes.
It's this element to his story that makes "Ghost in the Wires" read like a contemporary uber-geeky thriller. Many of today's computer viruses and identity-theft scams - and even the recent phone-hacking scandals of certain newspapers - depend on social engineering mixed with a misuse of technology to dupe the unsuspecting. In that regard, Mitnick's memoir also serves as a wake-up call for anyone trying to keep personal information private. (Out of prison since 2000, Mitnick now works as a security consultant.)
Mitnick grew up as an only child of divorced parents, moving frequently in the Los Angeles area. He was something of a loner, and his early pursuits included studying magic tricks and ham radio. When he was 12, the revelation that he could ride the local bus system free with a US$15 punch and books of half-used blank transfer tickets fished out of a dumpster behind the bus depot gave him a sense of what he could do (legal or otherwise) if he put his mind to it. Even if one is unfamiliar with Mitnick's life story, it's kind of obvious where he's heading here, and it's far beyond the bus routes around San Bernardino County.
Driven by curiosity and compulsion, Mitnick spent most of his young adulthood pilfering proprietary code from technology companies like Sun Microsystems and Novell, partly so he could look for bugs and security holes to use to his advantage, and partly for the thrill of the hunt.
For those interested in computer history, "Ghost in the Wires" is a nostalgia trip to the quaint old days before hacking (and hackers) turned so malicious and financially motivated. Unlike computer criminals today, Mitnick ignored the credit card numbers he stumbled across in his pursuit of code. He summed up his personal motive to the former Wall Street trader Ivan Boesky when they were both in prison: "I didn't do it for the money; I did it for the entertainment."
While he excelled at infiltrating computer systems from a keyboard and had a sharp memory for numbers, "Ghost in the Wires" (written with William L. Simon) really showcases another of Mitnick's skills: social engineering, or what he describes as "the casual or calculated manipulation of people to influence them to do things they would not ordinarily do."
By doing his research and impersonating authority figures over the phone or by e-mail, Mitnick found he could persuade just about anybody - programmers, technicians, even the nice lady at the Social Security Administration - to give him the things he wanted, like passwords, computer chips and personal information about FBI informants on his tail. "People, as I had learned at a very young age, are just too trusting," he writes.
It's this element to his story that makes "Ghost in the Wires" read like a contemporary uber-geeky thriller. Many of today's computer viruses and identity-theft scams - and even the recent phone-hacking scandals of certain newspapers - depend on social engineering mixed with a misuse of technology to dupe the unsuspecting. In that regard, Mitnick's memoir also serves as a wake-up call for anyone trying to keep personal information private. (Out of prison since 2000, Mitnick now works as a security consultant.)
Mitnick grew up as an only child of divorced parents, moving frequently in the Los Angeles area. He was something of a loner, and his early pursuits included studying magic tricks and ham radio. When he was 12, the revelation that he could ride the local bus system free with a US$15 punch and books of half-used blank transfer tickets fished out of a dumpster behind the bus depot gave him a sense of what he could do (legal or otherwise) if he put his mind to it. Even if one is unfamiliar with Mitnick's life story, it's kind of obvious where he's heading here, and it's far beyond the bus routes around San Bernardino County.
Driven by curiosity and compulsion, Mitnick spent most of his young adulthood pilfering proprietary code from technology companies like Sun Microsystems and Novell, partly so he could look for bugs and security holes to use to his advantage, and partly for the thrill of the hunt.
For those interested in computer history, "Ghost in the Wires" is a nostalgia trip to the quaint old days before hacking (and hackers) turned so malicious and financially motivated. Unlike computer criminals today, Mitnick ignored the credit card numbers he stumbled across in his pursuit of code. He summed up his personal motive to the former Wall Street trader Ivan Boesky when they were both in prison: "I didn't do it for the money; I did it for the entertainment."
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