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Just referencing his opinions ironically. He didn't have a valid point either. He simply didn't understand computers enough to see how they were being used.

by th0ma5 3y ago

defrost 3y ago
Sure, just barely enough to wing it as a systems administrator at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and to last just a few years as a school physics teacher. It's not like he had any first hand experience of either computers or computers in schools /s You might not like his opinions but they were his and of that time.
- th0ma5 3y ago
  > Any computer undergrounder can identify with and appreciate Stoll's obsession and patience in attempting to trace the hacker through a maze of international gateways and computer systems. But, Stoll apparently misses the obvious affinity he has with those he condemns. He simply dismisses hackers as 'monsters' and displays virtually no recognition of the similarities between his own activity and those of the computer underground. This is what makes Stoll's work so dangerous: His work is an unreflective exercise in self-promotion, a tome that divides the sacred world of technocrats from the profane activities of those who would challenge it; Stoll stigmatises without understanding (Thomas 1990). https://insecure.org/stf/them_and_us.txt https://insecure.org/stf/them_and_us.txt Just because I don't like his opinions or that they are old doesn't make him right for doing this. The appeal to his alleged authority of the time was part of the problem.
  - lukan 3y ago
    "He simply dismisses hackers as 'monsters' and displays virtually no recognition of the similarities between his own activity and those of the computer underground." Intention matters. His intention was to stop some hackers from espionage and possible sabotage. The KGBs hacker main intention was money. Otherwise I don't know anything about Cliff Stoll, nor read the book. But what I know about the KGB hack, they were no innocent curious boys playing with computers anymore, checking out what's possible. They sold their service to the KGB.
    - th0ma5 3y ago
      Very fair points. He has really worked hard seemingly to scrub the memory of the incomplete nature of his sensationalism at the time. You Google around and he is considered a vanguard of computer security, but his book capitalized on the sensationalism of film and television fiction of hackers at the time and other hacks in the news. A lot of this criticism only exists in the text files of BBSes from the time and his damaging opinions only on early evening tabloid tv of the era that isn't on YouTube. He eventually recanted a lot of this ideas a decade later, but has made no effort to address these criticisms head on that I can find. I guess it makes for compelling amateur sleuthing but what the governments of the time were dealing with are probably all still classified and were to him at the time as well. So his declarations of being first to many things are unfalsifiable.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

Just referencing his opinions ironically. He didn't have a valid point either. He simply didn't understand computers enough to see how they were being used.

by th0ma5 3y ago

Just referencing his opinions ironically. He didn't have a valid point either. He simply didn't understand computers enough to see how they were being used.

defrost 3y ago

Sure, just barely enough to wing it as a systems administrator at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and to last just a few years as a school physics teacher. It's not like he had any first hand experience of either computers or computers in schools /s You might not like his opinions but they were his and of that time.

th0ma5 3y ago
> Any computer undergrounder can identify with and appreciate Stoll's obsession and patience in attempting to trace the hacker through a maze of international gateways and computer systems. But, Stoll apparently misses the obvious affinity he has with those he condemns. He simply dismisses hackers as 'monsters' and displays virtually no recognition of the similarities between his own activity and those of the computer underground. This is what makes Stoll's work so dangerous: His work is an unreflective exercise in self-promotion, a tome that divides the sacred world of technocrats from the profane activities of those who would challenge it; Stoll stigmatises without understanding (Thomas 1990). https://insecure.org/stf/them_and_us.txt https://insecure.org/stf/them_and_us.txt Just because I don't like his opinions or that they are old doesn't make him right for doing this. The appeal to his alleged authority of the time was part of the problem.
- lukan 3y ago
  "He simply dismisses hackers as 'monsters' and displays virtually no recognition of the similarities between his own activity and those of the computer underground." Intention matters. His intention was to stop some hackers from espionage and possible sabotage. The KGBs hacker main intention was money. Otherwise I don't know anything about Cliff Stoll, nor read the book. But what I know about the KGB hack, they were no innocent curious boys playing with computers anymore, checking out what's possible. They sold their service to the KGB.
  - th0ma5 3y ago
    Very fair points. He has really worked hard seemingly to scrub the memory of the incomplete nature of his sensationalism at the time. You Google around and he is considered a vanguard of computer security, but his book capitalized on the sensationalism of film and television fiction of hackers at the time and other hacks in the news. A lot of this criticism only exists in the text files of BBSes from the time and his damaging opinions only on early evening tabloid tv of the era that isn't on YouTube. He eventually recanted a lot of this ideas a decade later, but has made no effort to address these criticisms head on that I can find. I guess it makes for compelling amateur sleuthing but what the governments of the time were dealing with are probably all still classified and were to him at the time as well. So his declarations of being first to many things are unfalsifiable.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]