One of the most feared yet idolized hackers of all time, Kevin Poulsen is considered by many to be a hacking prodigy. His youth was spent using his talents strictly for juvenile fun and the pursuit of knowledge. But the deeper he delved into hacking, the further he went to the dark side. Eventually, his criminal exploits led to the first ever espionage case leveled against a hacker.

Poulsen, who likes to call himself the “Dark Dante,” was born in 1975 in Pasadena, California. He had been a brilliant teenage hacker and the focuses of his life were his computer talents. He was extremely well known in the hacker society as one whose actions were reminiscent of hi-tech movies like “War Games.” This was a 1983 movie which highly glorified the prowess of the typical hacker. However, Kevin was able to prove himself capable of matching even the standards of the fictional villains in the movie. Fellow hackers were spellbound. “Kevin is extremely good at software and brave at taking chances,” said one former colleague. “Kevin was a 24-hour-a-day hacker.”

Poulsen’s forte was cracking otherwise impregnable government and military systems. He specialized at this to such an extent that the defense industry even offered him a dream job as a security-cleared consultant. His job was testing the integrity of Pentagon security systems. From that point on he led two separate lives; at day, he was a “white hat” who hacked to improve government secret protection systems, by night, he was a “black hat”, hacking for personal gain and his intrusions gradually became increasingly criminal. He was wrong, however, to think that he was completely beyond the arm of the law.

Things moved quickly once Poulsen’s other life was discovered. In November 1989, he was charged on as many as 19 counts of fraud, conspiracy, money laundering and wiretapping. All this in total could have given him a whopping 37 years in jail. But he had other plans. He took off and was beyond the long arm of the law for as long as 17 months.

While on the run, Poulsen dug deep into Pacific Bell’s giant switching networks so as to explore and exploit nearly every element of its computers. His adventures led to a well-known incident with KIIS-FM, a radio station, in Los Angeles. As a result of this incident, he became even more popular within the hacker cult.

Each week, the station ran the “Win a Porsche by Friday” contest. In this contest, a $50,000 Porsche is awarded to the 102nd caller who calls after a particular sequence of songs announced earlier in the day is played.

On the morning of June 1, 1990, businessmen, students, housewives, desperados, mere contest fanatics etc. jammed all the telephone lines with their auto-dialers and car phones. But Poulsen played the game differently. With the help of his almost equally talented accomplices stationed at their own computers, he seized full control of the station’s 25 telephone lines, effectively blocking out all calls excluding their own. With careless ease, he made the 102nd call and collected his Porsche.

His exploits did not end there. It is known that he wiretapped a number of intimate phone calls of a Hollywood actress, possibly with the intention of blackmailing her. He even conspired to steal classified military orders, and went so far as to crack an Army computer and snoop into an FBI investigation of former Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos.

Eventually the authorities caught up with Poulsen. While raiding his house and car, the FBI found a treasure trove of electronic devices. According to an agent, these would have “put James Bond to shame.” Even while in custody, he made several attempts to hack into and sabotage the FBI investigation so as to destroy all the evidence gathered against him.

The court later amended Poulsen’s original 19 counts of computer crimes to include charges of espionage and possession of classified documents. This was after evidence of stolen classified material was found in a locker Poulsen had used but had not paid rent for.

He pleaded guilty in July 1994 in the U.S. District Court at Los Angeles to seven counts of mail, wire and computer fraud, money laundering and obstruction of justice. This was in connection with the KIIS-FM Radio Station incident and others. Eventually, he was sentenced on April 10, 1995 to 51 months (more than 4 years) in prison and over $56,000 in restitution to all the radio stations he scammed. It was the longest and most severe sentence ever handed down for a cybercriminal. Interestingly, he was also punished for an additional 3 years by being forbidden from touching a computer.

All this was punishment enough according to him as he is now a fully reformed and “penitent" journalist, according to him, and he now serves as editorial director for Security Focus.

Reference

TLC: The Hall of Fame of famous hackers and phreakers
http://tlc.discovery.com/convergence/hackers/bio/bio.html

Kevin Poulsen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Poulsen

Internet Hackers - Kevin Poulsen
http://livinginternet.com/i/ia_hackers_poulsen.htm

A Crime By Any Other Name ...
http://www.theta.com/goodman/crime.htm