Owned by Tecno_M@ster
Mitnick wants to save others from hackers
By Troy Anderson, Staff Writer
THOUSAND OAKS -- Just five years ago, cyber-crime poster boy Kevin Mitnick was
on a desperate cross-country hacking spree, using cellular telephones and his
wits to avoid FBI agents and U.S. marshals.
Now just several months out of prison, the man who authorities feared could
launch nuclear missiles with his computer insists he's kicked his hacking
addiction and wants to help rid the world of digital criminals.
"Before all this, everybody had the image that I was this cyber-monster,
the evil villain of the world," Mitnick said during an interview last week
at his dad's apartment in Thousand Oaks.
"After all these experiences, brushes with the law, ending up in jail
and doing things that are counterproductive to society, I'm attempting to take
my abilities and use them for the public's good. I'm trying to use my background
and expertise in helping others prevent computer break-ins."
No longer pursued by government agents, he is a computer-age folk hero
courted by Congress, movie studios, radio talk shows and Internet businesses who
want to mine him for his cyber-world insight.
Los Angeles attorney David Schindler, who was chief prosecutor on the Mitnick
case until last year, said he does not begrudge Mitnick the chance to make money
off his talent.
"What would be of concern is the extent to which his notoriety extends
from his prior criminal activity," he said. "And from that end it is
somewhat ironic and unfortunate that he should become a purported expert when
there are hundreds, if not thousands of law-abiding, talented consultants who
frankly know far more than Mr. Mitnick about how to safeguard systems."
Criticism aside, Mitnick is still a darling of the hacker underground. His
fans run a "FreeKevin.com" web site and media critic Steven Brill
offered him a job as an online columnist for the e-business venture "Contentville."
Getting offers He's been offered a job as the host of a Los Angeles radio
talk show and as a consultant for a cyber-crime movie. The television show
"America's Most Wanted" asked him to appear as an expert on computer
hacking. He was paid to write an article for Time magazine.
"I'm not tempted to hack anymore," he said. "It's weird. I've
kind of grown out of it. I'm not saying prison rehabilitated me. That's a crock.
All prison is is punishment. I'm 36 years old now. Hackers tend to grow out of
it in their early 30s.
"There is the myth of Kevin Mitnick and the reality of Kevin Mitnick.
The reality is I did wrong. I broke into computers for the fun, the thrill and
the intellectual challenge.
"Then you have the myth of this guy who wants to screw with anybody any
way he can. He can get into your credit record, send a virus, erase police
records and break into the National Security Agency."
Under a plea bargain, he pleaded guilty to various computer crimes stemming
from a scheme to obtain proprietary software belonging to cellular telephone and
computer software companies, according to court documents. He was sentenced to
68 months in jail and ordered to pay $4,525 in restitution and assessments,
which he has already paid.
Admits to crimes Since 1981, Mitnick was arrested four times and imprisoned
for six years, nine months. Although he admits to breaking the law, he said
government claims that he caused companies hundreds of millions of dollars in
damage were based on the costs of research and development for the software he
downloaded.
"How did the government justify treating me as the hacker poster boy?
They had to show how much damage I caused."
Mitnick's father, Alan, said he's elated that his son is out of prison, but
he's baffled by the government's reluctance to allow him to take various jobs.
"We're not talking about John Dillinger or Bonnie and Clyde," he
said. "We're talking about a white-collar, no-profit kind of crime. More of
a pain in the ass type of crime. To say he should get a job pounding nails in
construction -- that's just a waste of a very talented brain."
The terms of his probation are designed to control the "compulsive and
serial nature of his hacking," said Christopher Painter, deputy chief of
the Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section at the U.S. Department of
Justice.
His federal probation officer, Larry Hawley, said he leans toward allowing
Mitnick to take some of the offers to help society stop cyber-villains.
But Mitnick won't be allowed to travel outside the Southern California area
until his probation ends in 2003.
Barred from computers Since his release from federal prison in January,
Mitnick has been barred from using the computers he loves so much. But that
hasn't kept him from enjoying some of the same technology that gave him his
start in computers.
He carries a cellular telephone and drives a fiery red Toyota MR2 sports car,
equipped with an amateur (HAM) radio -- all approved by his federal probation
officer.
The good-natured, articulate 36-year-old man, whose hijinks began as a
teen-ager and gained intensity in his days at Pierce College, once was the FBI's
most-wanted hacker. The convicted cyber-bandit led the FBI on a three-year chase
from Denver to Seattle before he was apprehended in Raleigh, N.C., in 1995.
Mitnick said he spent those years using various aliases, working on computer
systems at a law firm in Denver and on a systems help desk at a hospital in
Seattle.
The shy son of a Panorama City waitress said his fascination with technology
began at age 11 when he swept the floors and did inventory at Radio Shack in
exchange for getting to tinker with their HAM radios.
"I always carried my HAM radio with me," he said. "I wasn't
much into social relationships. As a kid, I was overweight. I didn't make
friends easy and one of the ways I could talk to people was over the radio. Even
today, I still use HAM radio."
One of his attorneys once said Mitnick was addicted to hacking, a comment
Mitnick says was a ploy to get him a lighter sentence.
"I don't think I'd classify myself as an addict," he said. "It
fed my ego. That's one of the reasons I did it -- for the ego boost. It made me
feel good."
Prison memories The downside of that is prison, a place of bad memories where
Mitnick said he was held in solitary confinement for eight months.
"They let you out of the cell for an hour a day into another small
little area. In short, it's like torture. It's very dirty and grim."
Mitnick said he was kept in solitary because the judge feared he could access
computers via the telephone, "lest I launch nuclear missiles by whistling
into the phone."
But the upside were his fans, who staged protests at federal courts around
the country, sported "Free Kevin" bumper stickers and sent him letters
of encouragement, magazines and money to buy items in the prison store.
One friend in Michigan still sends him Faygo Redpop soda in the can, a
favorite drink he can't do without.
"I must be crazy to get my soda sent to me from Michigan," he said.