Former hacker Kevin Poulsen has, over the past decade, built a
reputation as one of the top investigative reporters on the
cybercrime beat. In Kingpin, he pours his unmatched access and
expertise into book form for the first time, delivering a gripping
cat-and-mouse narrative—and an unprecedented view into the
twenty-first century’s signature form of organized crime.
The word spread through the hacking underground like some
unstoppable new virus: Someone—some brilliant, audacious crook—had
just staged a hostile takeover of an online criminal network that
siphoned billions of dollars from the US economy.
The FBI rushed to launch an ambitious undercover operation aimed
at tracking down this new kingpin; other agencies around the world
deployed dozens of moles and double agents. Together, the cybercops
lured numerous unsuspecting hackers into their clutches. . . . Yet
at every turn, their main quarry displayed an uncanny ability to
sniff out their snitches and see through their plots.
The culprit they sought was the most unlikely of criminals: a
brilliant programmer with a hippie ethic and a supervillain’s
double identity. As prominent “white-hat” hacker Max “Vision”
Butler, he was a celebrity throughout the programming world, even
serving as a consultant to the FBI. But as the black-hat “Iceman,”
he found in the world of data theft an irresistible opportunity to
test his outsized abilities. He infiltrated thousands of computers
around the country, sucking down millions of credit card numbers at
will. He effortlessly hacked his fellow hackers, stealing their
ill-gotten gains from under their noses. Together with a
smooth-talking con artist, he ran a massive real-world crime
ring.
And for years, he did it all with seeming impunity, even as
countless rivals ran afoul of police.
Yet as he watched the fraudsters around him squabble, their ranks
riddled with infiltrators, their methods inefficient, he began to
see in their dysfunction the ultimate challenge: He would stage his
coup and fix what was broken, run things as they should be run—even
if it meant painting a bull’s-eye on his forehead.
Through the story of this criminal’s remarkable rise, and of law
enforcement’s quest to track him down, Kingpin lays bare the
workings of a silent crime wave still affecting millions of
Americans. In these pages, we are ushered into vast online-fraud
supermarkets stocked with credit card numbers, counterfeit checks,
hacked bank accounts, dead drops, and fake passports. We learn the
workings of the numerous hacks—browser exploits, phishing attacks,
Trojan horses, and much more—these fraudsters use to ply their
trade, and trace the complex routes by which they turn stolen data
into millions of dollars. And thanks to Poulsen’s remarkable access
to both cops and criminals, we step inside the quiet, desperate
arms race that law enforcement continues to fight with these
scammers today.
Ultimately, Kingpin is a journey into an underworld of startling
scope and power, one in which ordinary American teenagers work hand
in hand with murderous Russian mobsters and where a simple Wi-Fi
connection can unleash a torrent of gold worth million
關於作者：
KEVIN POULSEN is a senior editor at Wired.com and a
contributor to Wired magazine. He oversees cybercrime, privacy, and
political coverage for Wired.com and edits the award-winning Threat
Level blog wired.comthreatlevel, which he founded in 2005.
購物車/收銀台(0) | 在線留言板
| 付款方式
| 運費計算
| 聯絡我們
| 幫助中心 |
加入書簽
HOME
新書上架
