Die Datenschleuder: Das wissenschaftliche Fachblatt für Datenreisende, 1-96 (1984-2011) [German]

29 December 2011, dusan

Die Datenschleuder. Das wissenschaftliche Fachblatt für Datenreisende, literally translated as The Data Slingshot: The scientific trade journal for data voyagers, is a German hacker magazine that is released in irregular intervals by the Chaos Computer Club (CCC).

Topics include political and technical aspects of the digital world such as freedom of information, data privacy (data protection), closed-circuit television, personal privacy (personal rights), cryptography and many more.

Die Datenschleuder was first published in 1984 and also can be subscribed to independent of a membership in the CCC. Back issues are freely available on the Internet as well. The current print paper format is DIN A5 as per ISO 216. Its editorial office is carried on virtually over the Internet, while the magazine itself is printed in and distributed from Berlin.” (Wikipedia)

Edited by 46halbe, starbug and erdgeist
Publisher Chaos Computer Club e.V., Hamburg
ISSN 0930-1054

Magazine website

PDFs/HTML
PDFs/HTML
Internet Archive

Paul Graham: Hackers & Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age (2004)

29 December 2011, dusan

We are living in the computer age, in a world increasingly designed and engineered by computer programmers and software designers, by people who call themselves hackers. Who are these people, what motivates them, and why should you care?

Consider these facts: Everything around us is turning into computers. Your typewriter is gone, replaced by a computer. Your phone has turned into a computer. So has your camera. Soon your TV will. Your car was not only designed on computers, but has more processing power in it than a room-sized mainframe did in 1970. Letters, encyclopedias, newspapers, and even your local store are being replaced by the Internet.

Hackers & Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age, by Paul Graham, explains this world and the motivations of the people who occupy it. In clear, thoughtful prose that draws on illuminating historical examples, Graham takes readers on an unflinching exploration into what he calls “an intellectual Wild West.”

The ideas discussed in this book will have a powerful and lasting impact on how we think, how we work, how we develop technology, and how we live. Topics include the importance of beauty in software design, how to make wealth, heresy and free speech, the programming language renaissance, the open-source movement, digital design, internet startups, and more.

Publisher O’Reilly Media, Inc., 2004
ISBN 0596006624, 9780596006624
258 pages

Review (Slashdot.org)

Author
Publisher
Google books

PDF (updated on 2014-9-14)

Kevin Poulsen: Kingpin: How One Hacker Took Over the Billion Dollar Cyber Crime Underground (2011)

28 July 2011, dusan

Former hacker Kevin Poulsen has, over the past decade, built a reputation as one of the top investigative reporters on the cybercrime beat. In Kingpin, he pours his unmatched access and expertise into book form for the first time, delivering a gripping cat-and-mouse narrative—and an unprecedented view into the twenty-first century’s signature form of organized crime.

The word spread through the hacking underground like some unstoppable new virus: Someone—some brilliant, audacious crook—had just staged a hostile takeover of an online criminal network that siphoned billions of dollars from the US economy.

The FBI rushed to launch an ambitious undercover operation aimed at tracking down this new kingpin; other agencies around the world deployed dozens of moles and double agents. Together, the cybercops lured numerous unsuspecting hackers into their clutches. . . . Yet at every turn, their main quarry displayed an uncanny ability to sniff out their snitches and see through their plots.

The culprit they sought was the most unlikely of criminals: a brilliant programmer with a hippie ethic and a supervillain’s double identity. As prominent “white-hat” hacker Max “Vision” Butler, he was a celebrity throughout the programming world, even serving as a consultant to the FBI. But as the black-hat “Iceman,” he found in the world of data theft an irresistible opportunity to test his outsized abilities. He infiltrated thousands of computers around the country, sucking down millions of credit card numbers at will. He effortlessly hacked his fellow hackers, stealing their ill-gotten gains from under their noses. Together with a smooth-talking con artist, he ran a massive real-world crime ring.

And for years, he did it all with seeming impunity, even as countless rivals ran afoul of police.

Yet as he watched the fraudsters around him squabble, their ranks riddled with infiltrators, their methods inefficient, he began to see in their dysfunction the ultimate challenge: He would stage his coup and fix what was broken, run things as they should be run—even if it meant painting a bull’s-eye on his forehead.

Through the story of this criminal’s remarkable rise, and of law enforcement’s quest to track him down, Kingpin lays bare the workings of a silent crime wave still affecting millions of Americans. In these pages, we are ushered into vast online-fraud supermarkets stocked with credit card numbers, counterfeit checks, hacked bank accounts, dead drops, and fake passports. We learn the workings of the numerous hacks—browser exploits, phishing attacks, Trojan horses, and much more—these fraudsters use to ply their trade, and trace the complex routes by which they turn stolen data into millions of dollars. And thanks to Poulsen’s remarkable access to both cops and criminals, we step inside the quiet, desperate arms race that law enforcement continues to fight with these scammers today.

Ultimately, Kingpin is a journey into an underworld of startling scope and power, one in which ordinary American teenagers work hand in hand with murderous Russian mobsters and where a simple Wi-Fi connection can unleash a torrent of gold worth millions.

Publisher Crown Publishing Group, 2011
ISBN 0307588688, 9780307588685
288 pages

author
publisher
google books

PDF (EPUB)