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Servers, Hackers, and Code In the Movies

Posted by Zonk on from the what-no-angela-bennett dept.

Billosaur writes "As with anything, Hollywood has a weird way of viewing computer technology and the people who use it. To help quantify things, take a look at The Top 20 Movie Hackers, the Top Ten Movie Servers, and the things code doesn't do in real life." From the servers article: "3. UNIX environment - Jurassic Park (1993). The UNIX environment here is a classic geek joke. Everything we saw was real - created by Silicon Graphics and called IRIX. InGen was the corporation funding the island, and from an IT perspective they let the worst possible thing happen: they allowed one programmer to design the infrastructure with no supervision. What's worse, they obviously required no documentation of what was done. The result was a kid had to hack in and gain ROOT privileges. The likelihood of a young kid knowing a way to get ROOT (and not a more experienced programmer) is pretty hard to swallow. The hardware for this server was probably minimal, running door locks and starting Quicktime movies. 'We spared no expense!' You would think that with the millions of dollars they spent on the park, they could have hired a couple newbie programmers and added a server on the backend."

3 of 445 comments (clear)

  1. Re:My favorite (I try again, it's late) by euice · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Is still the movie where the hacker had to break into a box using a simple login window while getting a blowjob.

    He was used to crack 2048 Bit encryptions but jumped over his own shadow by cracking a 4096 bit key.

  2. I have three words for you by kimvette · · Score: 0, Redundant

    1. Suspension
    2. Of
    3. Disbelief

    Even crappy technically ignorant movies like Wargames, ID4, and Hackers are fun to watch.

    --
    The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
  3. Independence day? by tempestdata · · Score: 0, Redundant

    I dont remember the name of the character (or the actor for that matter) but you gotta give props to the guy who can design a virus that can disable a completely alien computer system and then hack into that alien space ship's computer system to implant a virus from an iBook! I mean we're talking alien communication protocols, alien hardware, alien software, alien everything!! ... unless ofcourse aliens use macs.

    Not to mention. HE SAVED THE EARTH! No top 20 greatest movie hackers to have ever existed list is complete without him!

    --
    - Tempestdata