A Look Into the Chinese Hacker Underworld

beachels416 writes "The NY Times gained access to a Chinese hacker-for-profit, referred to as 'Majia,' and observed him during one of his nightly 'sessions.' From the article: 'Oddly, Majia said his parents did not know that he was hacking at night [hacking is illegal in China]. But at one point, he explained the intricacies of computer hacking and stealing data while his mother stood nearby, listening silently, while offering a guest oranges and candy.' At another point Majia spoke about the recent Google attacks, and claimed to have particular knowledge of the exact vector used. Nothing too new, but an interesting read nevertheless."

Comments

Re:A real hacker...

[MindPrison]

and that should be "Dvorak"... damn autism...

Lots of content

[interkin3tic]

To sum up the article for those too lazy to read it

A chinese guy works a day job, works as a hacker at night. Likes to stay anonymous and take money from people's bank accounts.

I guess the fact that this is a chinese guy is shocking to some new york times readers?

Re:Lots of content

[blitzkrieg3]

Actually, even your negative synopsis of the piece flies in the face of conventional wisdom, which is that attacks of Chinese origin are all a carefully orchestrated by the ruthless and scheming Chinese government.

Security researchers have identified the attacks against Google to be largely from the Chinese government, as were the politically motivated attacks against the Dala Lama and other Tibetan exiles. There is almost no doubt that the majority of the hacking that goes on in China (and elsewhere) is of the sort that TFA reports on, but linking it to the recent attacks on Google and other US government contractors is disingenuous.

Perspective check

[abbynormal brain]

The article highlights two important facts
1. Fun
2. Profitable

It's been a long time since I broke into my grade school's soda/chips/candy closet from a skylight on the roof. Sitting there drinking soda and enjoying chips, I can clearly remember how exciting (breaking in) and rewarding (chips/soda) it was. Later, I learned to respect other people's property.

So what now?
If you park a trailer in an accessible area ... expect the back doors to be open and the cargo gone. It's very exciting - it's very rewarding. Is it wrong - sure. Are the thieves the ones to blame - no. Not exactly. The thieves are not the ones to blame - the thieves are to be expected. It's an ongoing game where we square off with human nature - make it furn for the security side - keep building better mouse traps. Don't like this perspective? Ok - change human nature then. Good luck.

Re:Perspective check

[ArbitraryDescriptor]

You desire something X much. Your perception of the consequences finds them to be of Y severity.
if(X>Y){
stealing = rational
} else {
stealing = irrational
}

You may be wrong about Y, but given the set of information you behaved rationally. In other words: If you feel you would benefit a net life-improvement by taking the object, it seems rational to do so. Doesn't mean it's ethical, but the debate of moral absolutes and human nature is another subject entirely.

Contact the Sales dept...

[fahrbot-bot]

For less than $6, one can even purchase the "Hacker's Penetration Manual."

Sure, please enter your Credit or Debit card info along with Name, Address ... Allow six weeks for delivery.

Re:Contact the Sales dept...

[The Archon V2.0]

For less than $6, one can even purchase the "Hacker's Penetration Manual."

Sure, please enter your Credit or Debit card info along with Name, Address ... Allow six weeks for delivery.

I did that. Not a very good book. "Chapter One: Social Engineering." is just six pages of "LOL!" repeated over and over.

Re:Well now...

[CorporateSuit]

Indeed. Who knew they had oranges in China?

Panda Express.

Anyone here thinks it's actually a good thing?

[francium de neobie]

I guess plenty of Slashdotters learned a bit about computing from minor cracks - almost everyone has changed a save game file with a text or hex editor. Insecure network shares at your school network. Getting your neighbors' insecure Wifi passwords, someone probably thinks MAC filtering alone is safe. Modifying Flash games to give yourself 2^31 - 1 points on the high score board. Getting root on random poorly secured UNIX terminals in tech expos. Getting into someone else's IIS and read his local files via the canonical path bug many years ago. etc.

Sure it's not healthy if all you do are these minor thing and you keep doing these stuff for years. But it's a good inlet for kids to learn computing nevertheless.

Re:Wrong word?

[Lord Ender]

Welcome to the English language. When 99% of the population understands a certain word to mean a certain thing, then that word does, in fact, mean that thing.

What you will find even more confusing is that words sometimes have multiple meanings! For example, the word "hacker" could mean both "a clever programmer", "a golfer", and "a person who circumvents computer system security." All three at the same time! It's amazing.

She's not stupid

[uvajed_ekil]

Oddly, Majia said his parents did not know that he was hacking at night [hacking is illegal in China].

His parents know. If he hacks for money, is up late at night fiddling with computers all the time, and talks about hacking with unusual guests right in front of his mom, she knows what is going on. This is a mother with traditional, conservative beliefs who does not want to be rude and is reluctant to admit that her son is a criminal, so she ignores the entire situation. Not that unusual, and not indicative of some strange counter cultural underworld that is unique to China. Though I'm sure my folks and my friends' parents all thought our blue boxes, black boxes, and mobile (as in, in a car) collections of computers and cordless phones were all for educational purposes back in the day, and the 2600 meetings were just to hang out and drink coffee, since that's what we told them.