went back to sleep while its masterâs code did its magical work, stripping away defenses created by corporate programmers, people who followed industry-standard rules.
Rules that made them quite predictable ⦠and vulnerable.
He sighed. There was a time long ago when he had been one of them, IT professionals with titles such as systems analyst, data modeler, Web master, and database administrator. He had developed his foundational skills in that environment until his desire to be different conflicted with the predetermined programming guidelines of the corporate world.
He was good. In fact, his last supervisor had told him that he was one of the best programmers on their floor.
Brilliant, was the word he had used.
But they were letting him go.
His methods to develop and refine algorithms, albeit quite efficient and elegant, clashed with the companyâs well-established processes. In other words, his skills were too good for them.
But that had been the party line. In reality, his jobâas well as the jobs of many of his colleaguesâhad gone to India for a fraction of their U.S. salaries, plus they didnât need to provide benefits. All in the name of controlling cost.
Arturo Zepeda, a second-generation Cuban American, became Art-Z that day, on his way to his rented studio apartment in South Florida to develop some of the most elegant code ever writtenâcode that allowed him to enter public and private networks completely undetected and siphon just enough funds to pay the bills, own his small home, his modest carâand the finest hardware and software money could buy.
The hacker smiled at his companion and scratched her gently behind the ears while the code continued to bore into the firewall, like a digital drill. Most hackers chose handler names that had no resemblance to their real names. But then again, most of his brothers-in-arms also strived for fame and glory, boldly breaking into financial institutions, corporations, and government agencies to prove something, to wreak havoc, or steal millions. And then they even had the stupidity to claim responsibility in some chat room or blog.
Not me, thought Art-Z, proud of the elegance of his techniques as well as of his handler name, which allowed him to operate anonymously while retaining some semblance of his identity, of his heritage. In addition, unlike his fellow hackers, Art-Z conducted his online activities right below the level where it was not financially justifiable for his corporate victims to devote the resources required to track him downâassuming that they could actually find someone good enough to do so.
That philosophy had allowed Art-Z to stick it to The Man while safely living off his dark trade by the progressive use of a ârounding-downâ technique, custom codes secretly inserted into the networks of targeted institutions to round-down bank deposits and transfer the excess funds into temporary accounts. Five hundred dollars from a bank in Laredo, Texas, with questionable affiliations to the Mexican cartel. A thousand from an exports-imports firm in Canada doing business with Cuba. Fifteen hundred from an insurance company in Western Michigan connected to the UAW, which Art-Z held responsible for bringing down Detroit. And even two thousand from the R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company.
The trick to long-term use of this age-old hacker technique, however, was in keeping the level of these temporary accounts quite low before closing them and transferring the stolen funds to one of three accounts in the Bahamas, Ontario, or the Cayman Islands via a globally mind-boggling maze of connections guaranteed to give the finest government agencies an unforgettable cyber migraine. But again, each of his actions always remained below the level of interest from authorities on the hunt for bigger fish to fry.
Art-Z browsed through his arsenal of algorithms, programs written and rewritten through a lifetime of hacking for
Rules that made them quite predictable ⦠and vulnerable.
He sighed. There was a time long ago when he had been one of them, IT professionals with titles such as systems analyst, data modeler, Web master, and database administrator. He had developed his foundational skills in that environment until his desire to be different conflicted with the predetermined programming guidelines of the corporate world.
He was good. In fact, his last supervisor had told him that he was one of the best programmers on their floor.
Brilliant, was the word he had used.
But they were letting him go.
His methods to develop and refine algorithms, albeit quite efficient and elegant, clashed with the companyâs well-established processes. In other words, his skills were too good for them.
But that had been the party line. In reality, his jobâas well as the jobs of many of his colleaguesâhad gone to India for a fraction of their U.S. salaries, plus they didnât need to provide benefits. All in the name of controlling cost.
Arturo Zepeda, a second-generation Cuban American, became Art-Z that day, on his way to his rented studio apartment in South Florida to develop some of the most elegant code ever writtenâcode that allowed him to enter public and private networks completely undetected and siphon just enough funds to pay the bills, own his small home, his modest carâand the finest hardware and software money could buy.
The hacker smiled at his companion and scratched her gently behind the ears while the code continued to bore into the firewall, like a digital drill. Most hackers chose handler names that had no resemblance to their real names. But then again, most of his brothers-in-arms also strived for fame and glory, boldly breaking into financial institutions, corporations, and government agencies to prove something, to wreak havoc, or steal millions. And then they even had the stupidity to claim responsibility in some chat room or blog.
Not me, thought Art-Z, proud of the elegance of his techniques as well as of his handler name, which allowed him to operate anonymously while retaining some semblance of his identity, of his heritage. In addition, unlike his fellow hackers, Art-Z conducted his online activities right below the level where it was not financially justifiable for his corporate victims to devote the resources required to track him downâassuming that they could actually find someone good enough to do so.
That philosophy had allowed Art-Z to stick it to The Man while safely living off his dark trade by the progressive use of a ârounding-downâ technique, custom codes secretly inserted into the networks of targeted institutions to round-down bank deposits and transfer the excess funds into temporary accounts. Five hundred dollars from a bank in Laredo, Texas, with questionable affiliations to the Mexican cartel. A thousand from an exports-imports firm in Canada doing business with Cuba. Fifteen hundred from an insurance company in Western Michigan connected to the UAW, which Art-Z held responsible for bringing down Detroit. And even two thousand from the R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company.
The trick to long-term use of this age-old hacker technique, however, was in keeping the level of these temporary accounts quite low before closing them and transferring the stolen funds to one of three accounts in the Bahamas, Ontario, or the Cayman Islands via a globally mind-boggling maze of connections guaranteed to give the finest government agencies an unforgettable cyber migraine. But again, each of his actions always remained below the level of interest from authorities on the hunt for bigger fish to fry.
Art-Z browsed through his arsenal of algorithms, programs written and rewritten through a lifetime of hacking for
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