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Kevin Lee Poulsen (born November 30, 1965) is an American former
black-hat A Black Hat (Black Hat Hacker or Blackhat) is a computer hacker who usually violates laws or typical ethical standards. The term originates from the 1950s westerns, when bad guys typically wore black hats and good guys white hats. Black hat hacker ...
hacker A hacker is a person skilled in information technology who uses their technical knowledge to achieve a goal or overcome an obstacle, within a computerized system by non-standard means. Though the term ''hacker'' has become associated in popu ...
and a contributing editor at ''
The Daily Beast ''The Daily Beast'' is an American news website focused on politics, media, and pop culture. It was founded in 2008. It has been characterized as a "high-end tabloid" by Noah Shachtman, the site's editor-in-chief from 2018 to 2021. In a 20 ...
''.


Biography

He was born in Pasadena,
California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
, on November 30, 1965.


Black-hat hacking

On June 1, 1990, Poulsen took over all of the telephone lines for
Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...
radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30  hertz (Hz) and 300  gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a tr ...
station
KIIS-FM KIIS-FM (102.7 MHz) is a commercial radio station licensed to Los Angeles, California, United States, and broadcasts to the Greater Los Angeles area. The station airs a top 40 format. Owned by iHeartMedia, KIIS-FM is the origin of the conglome ...
, guaranteeing that he would be the 102nd caller and win the prize of a Porsche 944 S2. When the
Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice ...
started pursuing Poulsen, he went underground as a fugitive. A storage company cleared out a storage shed in Poulsen's name due to non-payment of rent, where computer equipment was discovered which was furnished to the FBI for evidence. When he was featured on NBC's ''
Unsolved Mysteries ''Unsolved Mysteries'' is an American mystery documentary television show, created by John Cosgrove and Terry Dunn Meurer. Documenting cold cases and paranormal phenomena, it began as a series of seven specials, presented by Raymond Burr, Ka ...
'', the show's
1-800 A toll-free telephone number or freephone number is a telephone number that is billed for all arriving calls. For the calling party, a call to a toll-free number from a landline is free of charge. A toll-free number is identified by a dialing pref ...
telephone lines mysteriously crashed. Poulsen was arrested in April 1991 following an investigation led in part by John McClurg. In June 1994, Poulsen pleaded guilty to seven counts of conspiracy, fraud, and wiretapping. He was sentenced to five years in a federal penitentiary and banned from using computers or the internet for three years after his release. He was the first American to be released from prison with a court sentence that banned him from using computers and the internet after his prison sentence. Although Chris Lamprecht was sentenced first with an internet ban on May 5, 1995, Poulsen was released from prison before Lamprecht and began serving his ban sentence earlier. (Poulsen's parole officer later allowed him to use the Internet in 2004, with certain monitoring restrictions).


Journalism

Poulsen reinvented himself as a
journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalis ...
after his release from prison and sought to distance himself from his criminal past. Poulsen served in a number of journalistic capacities at California-based security research firm
SecurityFocus SecurityFocus was an online computer security news portal and purveyor of information security services. Home to the well-known Bugtraq mailing list, SecurityFocus columnists and writers included former Department of Justice cybercrime A c ...
, where he began writing security and hacking news in early 2000. Despite a late arrival to a market saturated with technology media, ''SecurityFocus News'' became a well-known name in the tech news world during Poulsen's tenure with the company and was acquired by
Symantec Symantec may refer to: *An American consumer software company now known as Gen Digital Inc. *A brand of enterprise security software purchased by Broadcom Inc. Broadcom Inc. is an American designer, developer, manufacturer and global supplier ...
. Moreover, his original investigative reporting was frequently picked up by the mainstream press. Poulsen left SecurityFocus in 2005 to freelance and pursue independent writing projects. In June 2005, he became a senior editor for ''
Wired News ''Wired'' (stylized as ''WIRED'') is a monthly American magazine, published in print and online editions, that focuses on how emerging technologies affect culture, the economy, and politics. Owned by Condé Nast, it is headquartered in San Fran ...
'', which hosted his blog, 27BStroke6, later renamed Threat Level. In October 2006, Poulsen released information detailing his successful search for registered
sex offender A sex offender (sexual offender, sex abuser, or sexual abuser) is a person who has committed a sex crime. What constitutes a sex crime differs by culture and legal jurisdiction. The majority of convicted sex offenders have convictions for crim ...
s using MySpace to solicit sex from children. His work identified 744 registered people with MySpace profiles and led to the arrest of one, Andrew Lubrano. In June 2010, Poulsen broke the initial story of the arrest of U.S. service member
Chelsea Manning Chelsea Elizabeth Manning (born Bradley Edward Manning; December 17, 1987) is an American activist and whistleblower. She is a former United States Army soldier who was convicted by court-martial in July 2013 of violations of the Espionage A ...
and published the logs of Manning's chats with Adrian Lamo regarding
WikiLeaks WikiLeaks () is an international non-profit organisation that published news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous sources. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activist, is generally described as its founder and director and ...
. In June 2019, Poulsen was accused of
doxing Doxing or doxxing is the act of publicly providing personally identifiable information about an individual or organization, usually via the internet. Historically, the term has been used interchangeably to refer to both the aggregation of this in ...
Shawn Brooks, a 34-year-old
Trump supporter Trumpism is a term for the political ideologies, social emotions, style of governance, political movement, and set of mechanisms for acquiring and keeping control of power associated with Donald Trump and his political base. '' Trumpists'' ...
living in
The Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New ...
, when Poulsen revealed his identity in an article published in ''The Daily Beast'' on June 1, 2019 for being the alleged creator and disseminator of a fake video, which showed
Nancy Pelosi Nancy Patricia Pelosi (; ; born March 26, 1940) is an American politician who has served as Speaker of the United States House of Representatives since 2019 and previously from 2007 to 2011. She has represented in the United States House of ...
speaking in a slurred manner.


SecureDrop

Poulsen,
Aaron Swartz Aaron Hillel Swartz (November 8, 1986 – January 11, 2013) was an American computer programmer, entrepreneur, writer, political organizer, and Internet hacktivist. A prolific programmer, Swartz helped develop the web feed format RSS, the tech ...
, and James Dolan designed and developed SecureDrop, an
open-source software Open-source software (OSS) is computer software that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. ...
platform for
secure communication Secure communication is when two entities are communicating and do not want a third party to listen in. For this to be the case, the entities need to communicate in a way that is unsusceptible to eavesdropping or interception. Secure communication ...
between
journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalis ...
s and
sources Source may refer to: Research * Historical document * Historical source * Source (intelligence) or sub source, typically a confidential provider of non open-source intelligence * Source (journalism), a person, publication, publishing institute o ...
. It was originally developed under the name ''DeadDrop''. After Swartz's death Poulsen launched the first instance of the platform at ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'', on 15 May 2013. Poulsen later turned over development of SecureDrop to the Freedom of the Press Foundation, and joined the foundation's technical advisory board.


Personal life

Kevin Poulsen lives in San Francisco with his wife and two children.


Awards

* 2011
Webby Award The Webby Awards are awards for excellence on the Internet presented annually by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, a judging body composed of over two thousand industry experts and technology innovators. Categories includ ...
( International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences), Law category, for Threat Level * 2011
Webby Award The Webby Awards are awards for excellence on the Internet presented annually by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, a judging body composed of over two thousand industry experts and technology innovators. Categories includ ...
( International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences), People's Voice award, Law category, for Threat Level * 2010 SANS Top Cyber Security Journalists (
SANS Institute The SANS Institute (officially the Escal Institute of Advanced Technologies) is a private U.S. for-profit company founded in 1989 that specializes in information security, cybersecurity training, and selling certificates. Topics available for t ...
) * 2010, MIN Best of the Web (Magazine Industry Newsletter), Best Blog, for Threat Level * 2009, MIN Digital Hall of Fame (Magazine Industry Newsletter) Inductee * 2008, Knight-Batten Award for Innovation in Journalism (J-Lab) Grand Prize * 2007, Knight-batten Award for Innovation in Journalism (J-Lab) Grand Prize


Books

*


See also

*
DEF CON DEF CON (also written as DEFCON, Defcon or DC) is a hacker convention held annually in Las Vegas, Nevada. The first DEF CON took place in June 1993 and today many attendees at DEF CON include computer security professionals, journalists, lawyer ...
*
Kevin Mitnick Kevin David Mitnick (born August 6, 1963) is an American computer security consultant, author, and convicted hacker. He is best known for his high-profile 1995 arrest and five years in prison for various computer and communications-related crim ...
*
List of computer criminals Convicted computer criminals are people who are caught and convicted of computer crimes such as breaking into computers or computer networks. Computer crime can be broadly defined as criminal activity involving information technology infrastructu ...
* '' The Secret History of Hacking'', a 2001 documentary film featuring Kevin Mitnick


References


Further reading

*Jonathan Littman, ''The Watchman: The Twisted Life and Crimes of Serial Hacker Kevin Poulsen'', 1997, publisher: Little, Brown.


External links


KevinPoulsen.com
Poulsen's personal website
Threat Level
(former 27BStroke6) Blog by Kevin Poulsen and
Ryan Singel Ryan Singel is a San Francisco-based blogger and journalist covering tech business, tech policy, civil liberty and privacy issues. His work has appeared extensively in ''Wired.com'', and Singel co-founded the Threat Level blog with journalist and c ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Poulsen, Kevin 1965 births American computer criminals American male journalists American money launderers American technology writers Journalists from California Living people People from Pasadena, California Webby Award winners