Why? Because it is just too easy for them to do so. Fusion’s Kevin Roose asked some of the best hackers at DEFCON to do their worst to him. But he didn’t knew the hackers would come so hard at him. It took just two weeks for hackers to take control of Roose’s email accounts, webcam, bank accounts, work and personal details. The hackers had chance to steal all his wealth and assets. Leaving financial aspect aside, they could have ruined Roose by finding out all his deepest darkest secrets using a mix of social engineering (tricking people), phishing and hacking devices. The hackers, who he met at hacking conference DefCon in Las Vegas, said they could even have made him homeless (presumably by pinching all his money) and compiled a 13-page dossier on him.
The hackers had access to everything that Roose had except for his fingerprints. Luckily for Roose, it was all part of an experiment to see just how secure the average person’s digital life is. Roose had also asked the hackers to promise not to actually take any of the money and not to publicly reveal the secrets. Roose notes in his blog : “It didn’t matter how good my defenses were. Against a pair of world-class hackers, my feeble protections were about as useful as cardboard shields trying to stop a rocket launcher. For weeks, these hackers owned the hell out of me. ‘They bypassed every defense I’d set up, broke into the most sensitive and private information I have, and turned my digital life inside out.” Thats why we say, never challenge a hacker!
