Root Causes 322: RIP Kevin Mitnick

Hosted by

Tim Callan

Chief Compliance Officer

Jason Soroko

Fellow

Original broadcast date

July 31, 2023

In July famous security researcher Kevin Mitnick passed away. We briefly pay tribute to Kevin and talk about his contributions to white hat hacking as a practice.

Podcast Transcript

Lightly edited for flow and brevity.

Tim CallanWe have a little bit of a sober update, or bulletin I would say based on some recent news and just to get to it, there are many, many articles. I'm not going to quote one in particular but on July 16, 2023, Kevin Mitnick, probably the most famous computer hacker in history, died.

Jason SorokoIt's really unfortunate. This is not the first podcast that we've given that is recognizing the passing of a personality within the cybersecurity community but we had to call out this one just because Kevin Mitnick is a - - wasn't just that he was well known. I think that he was well known because he was very, very talented and as well, I actually brushed shoulders with him just the once. Can't say that I knew him but for those that I do know who knew him, he apparently was a great guy. So it's very sad. Sad to hear that.

Tim CallanSo if a lay person knows anything about Kevin Mitnick, what you probably might know is you remember the movie WarGames with Matthew Broderick. Supposedly, that character was based on Kevin Mitnick. It's what I hear. It's what they say. And he was a big black hat hacker. He was on the run for some period of time. I think he served some time and then at the end of that he flipped around, and he put on a white hat, and became basically a career security researcher and white hat for the rest of his career.

Jason SorokoThat's right. Tim. I think what he was best known for towards the end of his career was social engineering. He was a big voice. I think he was a board member of KnowBe4, a company is well known for his social engineering, training, and, simulations within the enterprise. He got into that quite a bit as well. But I also have read other people's accounts that he was involved with pen test right to the end and it was really technical and really passionate, and the guy just never lost his edge in terms of being a hacker, if you want to say it.

Tim CallanOne of the things that he always maintained was, look, I wasn't trying to be a criminal. I wasn't trying to steal. I wasn't trying to profit. I was just trying to solve problems. I was just trying to figure out how to do something. That sort of the folly of youth was I was figuring out how to do things the wrong way to the wrong end and I learned to do it differently. Now I'm still indulging that curiosity, but I'm doing it in a productive way. That strikes me as very credible. I believe that that was really the case. A big voice teacher, somebody who went a long way, in I think, popularizing some of the concepts that we now take for granted.

Jason SorokoExactly. I think that you can't really talk much about the white hats and the activity of being a white hat without Kevin Mitnick in terms of just that transformation of ultra curious people. He did time, four and a half years, five years, we could get into that.

Tim CallanPaid his debt.

Jason SorokoBut I don't think it's the most interesting part about him. Of course, that gives them the ultimate street cred, but this is my whole point is, thank God, you don't have to go to jail to have street cred as a white hat. And I think that it was, post Kevin Mitnick that the world kind of changed and realized exactly what you just said, Tim, there are other ways to do this and thank goodness that there is because a whole lot of what we talk about on this podcast is thank God the white hats found it first. How many times have you and I said that, and I think we owe some of that to him.

Tim CallanAbsolutely. For sure. The world of pen testing and white hat security research would not be what it is today without Kevin Mitnick. I completely believe that.

Jason SorokoYou got it. So apparently passed away July 16. Very recently.

Tim CallanAt the age of 59. Died of cancer.

Jason SorokoDied of apparently pancreatic cancer. That is public apparently. But, he left behind a wife and apparently - I'm reading this just off of Wikipedia. I have no way to verify. Apparently also an unborn child which just sounds terrible tragic.

Tim CallanOh wow. Anyway, so Kevin Mitnick, rest in peace. We thought you guys should know that and say a little bit about him and his contribution and thank him for his contribution to security.

Jason SorokoA huge name and a huge thanks to Kevin Mitnick. My God. There's so many good people on the good side of things because we'd be in bad shape right now with computing without people like that.

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