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Hacker Adrian Lamo Dies At 37 (zdnet.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the rest-in-peace dept.

Adrian Lamo, a well-known hacker known for his involvement in passing information on whistleblower Chelsea Manning and hacking into systems at The New York Times, Microsoft, and Yahoo in the early-2000s, has died at 37. ZDNet reports: His father, Mario, posted a brief tribute to his son in a Facebook group on Friday. "With great sadness and a broken heart I have to let know all of Adrian's friends and acquittances that he is dead. A bright mind and compassionate soul is gone, he was my beloved son," he wrote. The coroner for Sedgwick County, where Lamo lived, confirmed his death, but provided no further details. Circumstances surrounding Lamo's death are not immediately known. A neighbor who found his body said he had been dead for some time.

1 of 137 comments (clear)

  1. Re:90% chance of opioid overdose by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 3, Interesting

    We have often disagreed, but Bill has this right. (Except, perhaps, for the CIA importing heroin... that's so 1970s. But they still could be, for similar perverse reasons.)

    Basic economics has shown, and by real-world experience: end the drug war, and you also solve the other problems.

    Drug use does not go up, compared to other countries.

    Addiction rates go way DOWN. Without criminal penalty, more people seek treatment.

    Disease rates go way DOWN. No incentive to share needles (or other means of transmission) and spread disease.

    ALL LOGIC AND EXPERIENCE OVER MANY DECADES says that just like alcohol prohibition, the War On Drugs is not just a failure, but the cause of most of the problems.

    The majority of the non-suicide firearm deaths in the US are "criminal-enterprise-related". That means, almost always, something drug-related.

    Remove the underground profit motive, and you remove most of the related crimes and deaths.

    It's not just logic, we have 100 years of practice saying that is so.

    The status quo benefits BOTH sides: law enforcement, and drug dealers. Both have bigger budgets, and better weapons compared to before.

    And that won't stop. Until we eliminate the need for a black market.

    It's really pretty simple economics.