Defeating the Hackers

Defeating the Hackers

2013, Science  -   26 Comments
Ratings: 7.53/10 from 201 users.

This is a rather unlikely group of scientists, they're experts in codes and code-breaking... leading researchers in the baffling world of quantum physics. They may have built the most advanced computer in the universe and together they're taking on one common enemy - hackers. The greatest threat today to the world is the keyboard.


Mat Honan considered himself to be pretty savvy when it comes to security and Internet, but last year he discovered just how devious hackers can be. The first clue that something bad was happening came when he tried to charge his phone. The whole hack took less than 45 minutes. Mat thought he was the victim of a classic hack... someone that repeatedly tried to crack his password and eventually succeeded. He went online to write what happened and then, unexpectedly, the hackers got in touch with him.

For Mat it wasn't just personal, he's also a writer for Wired Magazine. His hackers had discovered a series of loopholes in the Internet which taken together left him completely unprotected. The first step was to find a way stealing his identity from one of his many online accounts. Their way in was a simple phone call to the online shopping service Amazon. It was a simple deception, but effective and after a few clicks they destroyed his digital life. These hackers new the security flaws of the net and how to use them... one after another to pull off this con.... and they were just teenagers.

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26 Comments / User Reviews

  1. uhsuew

    bruh why are they all dead now

  2. Joris Rietveld

    Hacking is creative and has a bad name because people don't understand
    what hacking is and the media is only negative about hacking.

  3. chase caruso

    I hate hackers I play games all the time with hackers and it just upsets me that happening

  4. Daniel Private

    Rich people getting hacked, I dont mind that lol

    1. M. Borburg

      NOBODY deserves to be hacked on their own computers!!!
      This disgusting action is an unlawful intrusion that could and SHOULD be better delt with by Internet Security organizations alround the world! They should report malicious hackers to Microsoft!

  5. Franky Frumchuk

    It disgusts me that social engineering is considered "hacking" or that the little kiddies who do it think they're of any sort of greatness. The biggest shame is that they'll never actually learn how to crack anything legitimately.

  6. Philip Fong

    Disturbing background sound at 23min, terrible sound at 36min. This is supposed to be a documentary, not movie.

  7. bringmeredwine

    Well, this was quite interesting, though difficult to understand at times, because I can barely use my cell phone.
    I tried to find out how Barnaby Jack actually died and kept hitting dead ends.
    Does any one really know?

    1. Doris

      I would like to know myself, something's fishy me thinks

    2. Matt Kukowski

      Well he was obviously wacked because he found a 'hack' or too many 'hacks' that were being used effectively by people wanting to keep those same hacks a secret. Why else would someone want him dead?

      Why is it, that when someone does something to expose important things, always end up dead?

      I remember reading about how secret spies used modified Umbrellas to gab someone in the back of the heel with a tiny be'be filled with poison as they walked casually by.

      I think this hacker exposed something high tech similar to the poisonious secret umbrella and someone got mad they could not use that trick any more.

      Same thing with the hacker that was found hanging, the guy that invented RSS feeds and political internet tools to petition the government... he was wacked too.

  8. dufas_duck

    I read an article where a government 'security' [?] expert believes that approximately 20 percent of the US population cannot be effectively profiled or tracked due to them not using credit cards, no magazine subscriptions, no internet access, no cell phone, etc, etc, and generally, as the government puts it, off the radar. In the past, these low profile individuals were thought of as either eccentric, frugal, social drop outs, homeless, or following an alternative life, as stated by this security expert, the government is wondering what some of these people are trying to hide.

    It seems that a lack of info about a person can create as much trouble for that individual as too much data can.... If the population is paranoid about the government snooping, where does this place the government's paranoia ??

    1. Matt Kukowski

      Right. I think that everyone has become paranoid to some extent. The people demand privacy, yet want to know what the Government is always up to ... it is hippocracy!

      The only solution is transparency. Everything important needs to be made public. Forget nude pics and childish non-sense like that. I am talking about important data MUST be transparent.

      Any datum that effects everyone, needs to be as transparent as possible. But, the problem is Corporate Patents, Secrets, Propriety MUST exist, if said Corporation is to be 'competitive'.

      So, as technology becomes more and more influential, the more dangerous (and beneifical) it becomes. So, what we do as humans, in order to maintain Profits and economy based on a numbering system, is to HIDE things. Deceive, lie and so forth. You can not be transparent AND allow the current 'system' to grow and thrive.

      So, either the system changes or it fails. In either case, guess what? It changes. And change is what a lot of entrenched people are afraid of. Rightfully so! No one wants to be poor and without love and food and security.

      I think disclosure and transparency is the only thing left to try that the human race has left to try. We should give it a go and see what happens when things become transparent for the first time in history. It could be amazing ... because we ALL know the current trend of the current 'system' is fatal.

      And no one is to blame... we are ALL to blame. No concentration camps or gila-tines required.... all that blame game stuff is so yesterday. Right?

  9. Kersh

    "In the past, it may have been nuclear weapons or weapons of mass
    destruction, but today we see that same level of capability being
    exercised by lone individuals using keyboards as opposed to bombs."
    I'm sorry, what? Hackers have the 'same level of capability' as a nuclear warhead? How much more nonsensical can you get?

    1. Val

      "How much more nonsensical can you get?"

      Read up there ^^^
      The guy going on about 666 and freemasonry and what not.

  10. CapnCanard

    Meh... the focus of this film seems more interested in protecting centralized source of political power than in protecting individuals. As if all hackers were malicious and highly deviant when the Stuxnet code was presumably a Mossad/CIA/NSA creation used to f*ck up Iran's attempt to get nuclear bomb. My point is that the true bad actors are governments acting on behalf of the most powerful economic forces, like Finance, Oil, Coal, Nuclear etc etc. Among these economic forces, Oil sits in the drivers seat as the value of the American dollar is directly tied to the price of oil. That is a very precarious position for America.

    1. Lenny

      People always blame AIPAC for influencing American politics, but the real elephant in the room is, and has always been, the Saudi oil lobby.

  11. megatron_mcdaniels

    Don't smell like propaganda at all...

  12. Guest

    by allowing a culture of giving out all our details online, we have given the future corporately run governments all they need to systematically cull our numbers. you don't need to pull a gun anymore, simply lock up their ID code and you will find them either becoming criminals to survive, hence eventually Jail or suicide and nobody will be to blame.) non-government sanctioned media will likely be illegal by then too so we won't hear about the growing number of faulty ID issues, costing people their lives. odd as it seems but the only weapon we will have by that time will be the robin hood hacker.

    1. Deborah Macaoidh Selim

      I guess you outsmarted them, "Guest".

    2. Justin Time

      funniest thing i've seen all day :D