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For many people, the term “hacker” is synonymous with cybercriminals, however, that’s not all true. A hacker is an expert who utilizes technical knowledge to achieve specific goals within a system. Furthermore, there are three types of hackers, and they include the white hat, black hat, and grey hat. Speaking of the white hat, also called “ethical hackers”, they utilize their knowledge to determine vulnerabilities in a system. The purpose of that is to prevent people from attacking it. On the other hand, the black hat hackers mostly take advantage of a system’s vulnerability, acquiring unauthorized access to sensitive information. As for the grey hat hackers, they look for a system’s vulnerabilities by gaining unauthorized access to it and then report it to the owner to get rewarded. That said, we’ll be sharing with you, in this post, the top 10 list of the most dangerous hackers of all time.
The first person on our list of the top 10 most dangerous hackers of all time is Kevin Mitnick. Born on August 6, 1963, Mitnick is an American hacker, popularly known for his high-profile 1995 arrest for cybercrimes. According to reports, the billionaire was accused of hacking several companies, including Nokia, Pentagon, Pacific Bell, and Motorola. He was charged with seven counts of fraud, including illegal wire interception, wire fraud, and computer fraud, and of course, he pleaded guilty to the charges. Because of that, the authority sentenced him to five years in prison, including eight months of solitary confinement.
Occupying the second position on our list of the top 10 most dangerous hackers of all time is Gary McKinnon. Gary, born on February 10, 1966, is a Scottish systems administrator and hacker. He became popular in 2002 after the authority accused him of masterminding the “biggest military computer hack in the world.
According to reports, Gary penetrated about 97 US military and NASA computers by virus installation from his girlfriend’s aunt’s house in London. He deleted a few files and also went ahead to ridicule the security forces, by writing “your securities crap”. Apart from that, reports also confirmed that Gary shut down the Washington network for 24 hours. Speaking of the network, it has about 2000 computers belonging to the US military. He also gained unauthorized access to the NASA system to acquire UFO sensitive information.
Next, on our list of the top 10 most dangerous hackers of all time, is a group, called Anonymous. Founded in 2003, Anonymous is an international activist group, popular for various cyberattacks against the governments, corporations, and the Church of Scientology.
Adrian Lamo, born on February 20, 1981, was an American threat analyst. He became popular after hacking into Yahoo in 2001. Apart from that, Adrian also hacked into the database of a few other top organizations, including the New York Times and Google, leading to his arrest in 2002. Unfortunately, he died on March 14, 2018, at the age of 37 years.
Albert Gonzalez currently occupies the fifth spot on our top 10 list of the most dangerous hackers of all time. According to reports, Albert is the world’s biggest theft of credit cards in human history. Furthermore, he was able to resell about 180 million credit cards from several companies, including OfficeMax, Dave and Buster’s, and Boston Market. He was able to accomplish his mission by making use of a sniffer device, acquiring data from internal corporate networks into it. Furthermore, reports also confirmed that he stole about $256 million from TJX alone, using SQL injection.
Occupying the sixth spot on our top 10 list of the most dangerous hackers of all time are Matthew Bevan and Richard Pryce. Both of them are a team of British hackers, mostly popular for their 1996 hacks on several military networks. Some of them include Griffiss Air Force Base, the Defense Information System Agency, and the Korean Atomic Research Institute.
Next up on our top 10 list of the most dangerous hackers of all time is Michael Calce. In 2000, Michael (also known as Mafiaboy) discovered how to gain access to networks of university computers. At that time, he was only 15 years old. After gaining access to the network, he acquired some sensitive data, which he used to disrupt Yahoo. Shortly after that, Michael also utilized a distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attack to bring down a few other companies, including Dell, eBay, CNN, and Amazon.
Jeanson James Ancheta occupies the eighth position on our top 10 list of the most dangerous hackers of all time. Unlike most hackers on this list, in 2005, Jeanson used a series of large-scale “botnets technology” to compromise about 400,000 computers. After that, reports confirmed that he rented some companies the machines. Well, the authority later arrested and sentenced him to almost 5 years (57 months) in prison.
Kevin Poulsen occupies the ninth spot on this list. In 1983, Poulsen (about 17 years old at that time) gained unauthorized access into the Pentagon’s computer network, called ARPANET. Of course, he was caught but wasn’t prosecuted because of his age. Five years after the incident, Poulsen further hacked into a federal computer, acquiring sensitive information about Ferdinand Marcos, the overthrown president of the Philippines. Reports also confirmed that Poulsen hacked a radio station contest, and won a Porsche, a vacation, and $20,000 for becoming the 102nd caller. Well, the authority later arrested him and banned him from using a computer for three years.
Last on our top 10 list of the most dangerous hackers of all time is ASTRA. Unlike most people on this list, we only know a little information about this hacker. According to reports, Astra was arrested in 2008 as a Greek mathematician (53 years old at that time). Furthermore, he reportedly gained unauthorized access to Dassault Group’s system for more than a decade, stealing brand-new weapons technology software and data. Reports also added that he sold the software to about 250 people from different countries in the world.