The Watchman
Ratings1
Average rating4
15
Ratings1
Average rating4
This is a first-rate detective story--and all true. It's the story of a seemingly invincible electronic thief, con man, and stalker--and the people who tracked him down. Jonathan Littman brings his readers straight into the world of cyberpunk crime as he shows the origins, development, and climax of the wildest and most audacious known crime spree in cyberspace. Hundreds of hours of interviews allow Littman to tell much of the story through the eyes of those who lived it, and his own edgy style and excellent pacing make for a thriller that's hard to put down.
Reviews with the most likes.
Executive Summary: Another pretty interesting read about the early days of computer crime.Full ReviewKevin Poulsen is often called “The Other Kevin”. Not quite as infamous as Kevin Mitnick, Poulsen may have been the more technically proficient of the two, and less capable as a social engineer.I had heard of his two most famous hacks, that being winning not one, but two Porches from a radio give away, and supposedly crashing the the Unsolved Mysteries call in lines when his story was aired on the show. The first was confirmed and explained in detail, while the latter seemed to be glossed over for some reason. It was insinuated, but not confirmed.It appears that Mr. Littman had cooperation not only from many of the people in Kevin's life, but eventually Kevin himself. Hopefully this means that we get a pretty accurate picture of how things went down.I had recently read Mr. Poulson own computer crime book: [b:Kingpin: How One Hacker Took Over the Billion-Dollar Cybercrime Underground 9319468 Kingpin How One Hacker Took Over the Billion-Dollar Cybercrime Underground Kevin Poulsen https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320477825s/9319468.jpg 14202643] and really enjoyed it. It's nice to know this story of brilliant but somewhat troubled young man has a happy ending, since the book was released shortly after his release from jail with a more abigious ending.For those who may not know (though I suspect most people who pick up this book already knows who he is), Mr. Poulson has been a well known writer in the computer security and currently works for Wired. It seems to have been a long and dark journey to get there though.I never knew he once had a security clearance or briefly worked for Sun Microsystems. It leaves you to wonder what he might have accomplished if he could have controlled his darker impulses.The other thing that struck me was like Mitnick, they people prosecuting him felt the need to come up with bogus charges. He was guilty of all kinds of non computer crimes that they should have been able to prove, but they seemed to want to prosecute him for computer crimes he didn't commit (like espionage).Overall it was a pretty fascinating read that I didn't find too technical, but may be a bit too in-depth for non-computer folks.
