Yesterday I changed my WIFI name to “Hack me if you can”.. When I Checked it today it was “Challenge Accepted”.
In the world of web where we get the global connectivity, it is far easier to break into someone’s personal zone. By personal, we do not just mean the social media. The world wide web which has become the hub of storing and restoring information, considered to be the safest vault, is a mere toy in the hands of a few computer geniuses. Hackers, Black Hat Hackers, villains, crackers, cyber-criminals, cyber pirates as they are well-known, throw a malicious software or virus at a system to gain the access to the desired information. They may can break into your system too. Here are top hackers of all time.
1. Kevin Mitnick
From the way he look is almost in polite to say that the most wanted computer criminal of united states history. As the US department of justice once called than Kevin Mitnic skill was visible in very young age and age 13 his entertainment was hacking into the phone systems.Kevin Mitnic became the poster boy for hackers everywhere when,in the early Nineties he hacked into everything from communications giants Nokia and Motorola to IBM.
MITNIC build such a reputation by breaking into the network of companies like Nokia IBM and Motorola.But in 1993 after making one hack too many into telephone service company Pacific Bell, the FBI began investing him This man hunt was widely publicized and Mitnic went on the run for two and half years. He was eventually caught in 1995 and served five years in prison.The court found him so threatening that for 8 months of his sentence he was placed in solitary confinement Law enforcement had convinced a judge that he could start a nuclear war by whistling codes into a payphone.
But today Mitnic is free and no longer feared by his client because he reinvented himself y switching side.He also written several books about wild online dates.He is no longer security breaking intruder but a white hack hacker who helps company to solve their security issues.
2.Jonathan James (COMRADE)
This was the case of Jonathan James who went under the name COMRADE he was the first Jewish in the USA sentenced for computer hacking back in 2000.At the age of 15,child prodigy Jonathan James hacked into basically everything he could,from the Florida based Miami-Dade School system to the Us defense Threat Reduction Agency,who are supposed to protect the country from weapons of mass destruction. He even found a way into NASA systems,Stealing $1.7 million worth of software which could control the physical environment of the International Space station.
James introduced into the government system and obtain the source code for the international space station.This mean he got access to the software which was response for controlling the physical environment of the station.Once the NASA detected intrusion they had to shut down their computers for 3 weeks and in order to fix the system. Even though James didn’t get the way with it. One can say he did a favor because he reviled huge security for us. As he explained they likes some serious computer security and the hard part is learning it. You can say that’s wrong since he did these by using only the old school Pentium computer.
This National security breach wasn’t taken lightly and In 2000 James was arrested and convicted on 2 counts of juvenile delinquency. His sentence? six months house arrest, probation until the age of 18, and a written letter of apology to NASA. He was on the government’s farad from then on , and in 2008 James house was raided when he was suspected of taking part in another series of hacks, But the possibility of being jailed for a crime he claimed . He hadn’t committed evidently spooked James and he killed himself, despite having been arrested for the crime.
3.Kevin Poulsen (Dark Dante)
As harmless as he looks this is Kevin Poulsen, one of the hacker in USA history. After hacking telephone company computer in order to manipulate the phone line leading to the Los Angles radio station , so he could be the winning scholar phone and radio contest. Among the prizes he got himself in the way were 20,000$ cash and Porsche 944 S2.
But the hacking into Federal Investigation database that really got him into trouble. He attracted the authority attention and had to go in hiding for 18 months . After that he got arrest and sentenced for 5 years behind the bars. At that time longest US sentence for hacking.
Hacking Radio Phone Contest
Hacking FBI
Prison sentence for 5 years
4.George Hotz (Geo Hot)
George Hotz also known as Geo Hot started building his own reputation as serious hacker. He became the first reported person in the history to be able to say “This is the world first unlocked i phone “ . This event was so huge and George Hotz was contacted by a milliner given an offer that he simply couldn’t refuse to trade unlocked i phone for 3 new i phones and brand new Nissan 350Z. This is the only start for Hotz because in the following year he hacked the Sony play station 3 and got illegal trouble for doing it.
5.Matthew Bevan & Richard Pyrce
A mentor is supposed to take you under their wing & show you the ways of the world but instead 16 year old Richard Pryce was shown the dark of the matrix when he and his 21 year old mentor Matthew Bevan committed a series of hacks against government agencies. Together, they hacked the United States Air Force, NASA (again) and NATO, copying battlefield simulations & trying to find evidence of UFOS.
In addition the pair hacked into Korean Atomic Research Institute’s database and copied the information onto the United States Air Force systems. The US didn’t know who had given them the information and where concerned that if North Korea found out..they could accuse them of spying and potentially threaten war in return. Luckily the data was South Korean meaning any potential tension could have been easily de-escalated. The pair got off lightly with price being fined $1,500. By the time Bevan’s case came to court , the lack of evidence against him led to a full acquittal
6. Edward Majerczyk
Do you remember the nude photo leak in 2014, wittily referred to as “celebgate” or “Fappening” by 15 years old with sticky palms? well, this was down to several figures including Edward Majerczyk, the serial hacker cracked the i cloud and Gmail accounts of hundreds of celebrities , including Jennifer Lawrence , in order to obtain nude for his “personal use”. But this didn’t last long and these nude images found their way onto the internet for everyone to see.
The photo made headlines worldwide & caused a fair amount of concern over the security of people’s private date. It seemed the hackers were able to break into i cloud accounts with a simple e-mail address. Majerczyk was convicted of the hack in September 2016 and took responsibility for the invasion of privacy. It is thought he will face a 9 month prison sentence.
7.Gary Mckinnon(SOLO)
British citizen Gray Mckinnon has been called the most dangerous hacker in history after being accused for hacking 97 United States military & intelligence systems over a 13-month period, starting in 2002.He worked as system admin by day day and hacker at night. On one network alone he caused 2,000 computers to be shut down, deleting weapons logs & other important files . During another hack,Mckinnon got straight to the point and left the message”your security is crap” on the US military website. According to Mckinnon the campaign of messaging with the Americans was largely to do with his attempt at trying to find evidence for UFO.
After hacking into NASA website, he claimed to have found images of extraterrestrial spaceships. He also claimed that he’d uncovered an Excel Spreadsheet detailing the names of “Non-Terrestrial officers” who work in the US Air force as well as the details of a secret space program named Solar Warden. He was eventually detained in 2002 when an American grand jury indicted him and called for his extradition. However but 10 years later the British government threw out the raise against him.once he was caught he was accused of causing $700,00 worth of damaged.
He is famous not only for that because what he found in these computers consist of top secrets of UFO’s cover ups and similar government secrets. He managed to revel all of these while hacking from his girlfriend aunts house.
8.Guardians Of Peace.
In the autumn of 2014 Sony pictures announced the planned release of their latest comedy , the interview in which Seth Rogen and James Franco came up with an elaborate plot to kill the leader of North Korea, Kim Jang-un . But before the film could be released a group calling themselves “Guardians Of Peace” demanded that Sony pull the interview from upcoming screenings. They reveled that they had hacked Sony’s system and stolen information including 47,000 Social security numbers and a whole series of embarrassing emails.
These purportedly revealed Hollywood secrets and Celeb gossip, including an email by Hollywood producer Scott Rudin in which he called Angelina Jolie a “minimally talented spoiled brat”. Not content with just embrassing Sony , Guardians Of Peace went on release malware on Sony systems and even threatened to commit terrorist attacks at film screenings if “The Interview “ wasn’t canned while the us formally accused North Korea of the attack, there are those who say that’s too convenient The hackers have never been caught.
9.Karl Koch
Now to the dark days of the cold war Karl was a German computer hacker during the eighties who associated with a hacker group called the Chaos Computer Club. This group of renegades would hack into US government computer systems and steal information and source codes to sell to the Soviet Security Agency , the KGB On their hit list was NASA(as always ),the US chief of staffs data bank, and the Max Planck Industries for Nuclear physics. In 1989 the West German authorities discovered this espionage and Koch , along with the other members of the club began to co- operate, confessing to their crimes with premise they wouldn’t be prosecuted . Soon after his confession , Koch was found burned to death in a forest near Celle in Germany . The death was officially ruled as a suicide, but numerous conspiracy theorist believe he was killed by either the German State or KGB to prevent further co -operations.
10.Higinio Ochoa
This is something more-than you might thing . Its the signature of that text of an hacker Higinio Ochoa under the nick name of WORMER with leave behind him in system he hacked into. Eventually same picture became his own downfall.
Wormer and his hacker buddies formed a group called “CABIN CR3W” together they hacked into police and other US law enforcement agencies online database where they can get secret information . One time after hacking into the same database & leaving behind the secret bikini picture the FBI saw it as an opportunity to capture him. They track down the GPS co ordinates from the very same bikini photo it lead to wormer girlfriend’s house. 3 years of Prison was not enough to punish him, he prohibited from using the internet, so that he lives today offline .
Written By/Kajan -2rd Year 2nd Semester -Cyber Security Student SLIIT