Craig Silverman - Mafiaboy: A Portrait of the Hacker as a Young Man

PENGUIN CANADA

MAFIABOY

MICHAEL CALCE gained notoriety as the hacker Mafiaboy and pleaded guilty to fifty-six charges. After serving his sentence, he worked for a major computer retailer and wrote a computer security column for Le Journal de Montral. He now uses his knowledge to help people and business protect themselves online. He lives in Montreal.

CRAIG SILVERMAN is an award-winning journalist and author. A columnist for The Globe and Mail and Hour, a Montreal weekly, his writing has appeared in publications including The New York Times, International Herald Tribune, The Gazette (Montreal), and Report On Business magazine. He is the author of Regret the Error, which won the Arthur Rowse Award for Press Criticism, and the founder of the website www.RegretTheError.com. He lives in Montreal.

A PORTRAIT OF

THE HACKER AS

A YOUNG MAN

MICHAEL CALCE

WITH CRAIG SILVERMAN

PENGUIN CANADA

Published by the Penguin Group

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First published in a Viking Canada hardcover by Penguin Group (Canada), a division of Pearson Canada Inc., 2008

Published in this edition, 2010

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 (WEB)

Copyright Michael Calce and Craig Silverman, 2008

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

Manufactured in Canada.

LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

Calce, Michael

Mafiaboy : a portrait of the hacker as a young man / Michael Calce with Craig Silverman.

ISBN 978-0-14-305656-0

1. Calce, Michael. 2. Computer crimes. 3. Computer security. 4. Computer hackers CanadaBiography.

I. Silverman, Craig II. Title.

HV6772.C35A3 2010 364.168092 C2009-906279-8

Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

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In loving memory of Nicholas Groner (August 24, 1984-February 17, 1997)

You will never be forgotten

Introduction

I think its fair to say that personal computers have become the most empowering tool weve ever created. Theyre tools of communication, theyre tools of creativity, and they can be shaped by their user.

BILL GATES

HOT ON THE TRAIL OF MAFIABOY read a headline on technology news site Wired.com on February 15, 2000. That was the day Mafiaboy, my online alter ego, became a household name.

Before that moment, I was just an ordinary kid growing up in a Montreal suburb. I hung out with friends, went to school, and played basketball. I was a fifteen-year-old grade ten student living in my fathers house. Then I suddenly became international news.

In February 2000, the FBI named me, Mafiaboy, as a suspect in a series of online attacks that had targeted some of the giants of the internet, including Yahoo.com, eBay.com, CNN.com, and ETRADE.com. Their websites had been slowed or had completely ground to a halt as a result of massive denial-ofservice (DoS) attacks. Just like you would jam a phone system with a barrage of calls to prevent anyone else from getting through, someone had bombarded their web servers with so many requests that they were unable to serve content to visitors.

That someone was me.

Working from my bedroom on a suburban street in Montreal, I launched what remains one of the biggest series of DoS attacks ever to hit the internet. As a result, Mafiaboy became famous. Infamous. My online alias was mentioned on the news in countries around the world. Then U.S. president Bill Clinton responded to the attacks by convening a cybersecurity summit at the White House. Janet Reno, his attorney general, said her office wouldnt rest until I was apprehended.

I was hunted by the FBI and RCMP and eventually arrested and charged with close to seventy counts related to computer crimes. Along the way, my father was arrested on a questionable charge that was later dropped. A court order prevented me from seeing my best friends and from using computers and the internet. Reporters camped outside my home and school.

My life fell apart. I lost a sense of who I was.

This had never been a problem for me before. Ever since I first laid hands on a PC, at six years old, I knew my life would be forever linked to computers. School could be a struggle, but the computer always made sense to me. It was as if using it was encoded in my DNA. I soon moved from playing games to going online and learning about computer programming and networking. I was then drawn to the darker corners of the internet, joining hacker groups and learning how to inflict damage on my online enemies. Computers and hacking became my life. Then they forever changed it.

My attacks of 2000 were illegal, reckless, and, in many ways, simply stupid. At the time I didnt realize the consequences of what I was doing. That doesnt excuse what I did. Its important for me to state clearly that I recognize and regret the damage I caused. This book is not meant to excuse or glorify what I did. It is the story of how a childs obsession with computers resulted in some of the most written-about online attacks in history.

Despite entreaties from the press over the last eight years, I have kept quiet about what really happened on the night of my arrest, and about the events that followed. I remained silent as the media and law enforcement painted a portrait of me that is still held to be the truth to this day. I want to set straight the many inaccuracies about me that persist. I have done my best to verify my own memory of events with court records, evidence, and other sources. I have also attempted to speak with people who were involved in my case but have been largely rebuffed. In truth, theyve already had their say. Now its my turn.