Some Light Reading.

SO I just finished reading Jonathan Littman's version of the years Mitnick spent running from the feds and the phone companies.

The Fugitive Game: Online with Kevin Mitnick

Jonathan Littman

Takedown: The Pursuit and Capture of Kevin Mitnick, America's Most Wanted Computer Outlaw-By the Man

Tsutomu Shimomura

In Littman's book he writes about the many phone conversations that he and the fugitive Mitnick had. He also portrays Tsutomu Shimomura(they guy that finally caught him), as a fame seeker. According to the book both John Markoff and Tsutomu went after Mitnick with the fervor and drive of people looking for a rapist or mass murder. The charges against Mitnick were only a simple probation violation. The trumped up allegations that were made by the companies Mitnick had gotten source code he had stolen. The companies and the government claims the code was worth millions of dollars. Was it really, can you put a dollar amount on

something that hasn't been sold or bought? I could create a widget and say that if someone stole it was worth 10 billion because of future sales.

I also read the book by Tsutomu and Markoff. I felt it drew some

conclusions that are not formed by the facts. Whether Littman or Markoff we're right by the facts will never be able to be proved outside of witness reports. I did like how Littman, who also was hacked by Mitnick. Yet even so never really made a judgment call about Mitnick and the reason why.

colored view as the book. I was some what pleased and a little disappointed by. Pleased because they didn't make Mitnick out to be a terrorist that Markoff and the media did. Disappointed because the story did take on a new twist adding that Tsutomu had some secret program that would crash major systems. Funny that never came out in the real trial. Mitnick did have the OKI open source code and that alone was a dangerous piece of information. Yet he never used it to sell anything, get anything or in any transaction that committed a  crime (accept for the illegal wiretapping abilities the phone could do.).