Peer to Peer Magazine

38 PEER TO PEER: THE QUARTERLY MAGAZINE OF ILTA | SUMMER 2018 EXTRAS Give Him Hack a Chance… I know Sully (Kevin Sullivan, the session moderator) mentioned you got into hacking because you were bored, but were there any other influences that made you think that this was a viable hobby? Marcus Weinberger: I think I actually started out of necessity – when my old school blocked websites; I downloaded a proxy to get online. I also wanted to learn stuff that looked cool. You mentioned some friends during your session speech; do your friends do this? Or is this more of a one-to-one hobby? I recently switched schools and there are kids who are into computers. We talk about new bugs; I challenged one kid to break the hardest secure shell program I could make; he broke into it. I wanted to get involved in technology; my dad always fixed things around our home. Ben Weinberger: I didn't encourage him to get into it [hacking]. It's odd – there must be some weird hacker gene that makes him good at it. You're at the stage where you're thinking about college? Do you have any plans for university? I haven't looked at what is available, but I'd want to go into computing and computer science. I have GCSEs coming up and definitely want to go to university; as long as they have a good computing department. Where (if even) do you see this being applied to your professional life? Hopefully I'll get a job in this [hacking and computing]; there are lots of jobs out there. I didn't see a career option for this type of thing when I was his age. There wasn't an expectation MW MW BW MW MW BW ILTA members first got a glimpse of Marcus Weinberger, a 15-year old student from England, as he and his father, long-time ILTA member Ben Weinberger, walked into a session room at the 2018 LegalSEC Summit. The room was fully seated, and a sizeable standing room-only portion pulled at the doorways, as Marcus stepped up to the podium, took a breath, and then hijacked the room. For an hour, Marcus was able to enthrall us all; a competent speaker and avid "ethical hacker." Marcus showed us all how easily, cheaply, and competently a teenage enthusiast could wreak havoc on (or help) unsuspecting and vulnerable people or businesses, as his session revealed. I got together with Marcus, for his first ever print interview, after witnessing his remarkable session at LegalSEC. He will also be leading a session at ILTACON 2018, again showing us all how easily people and businesses can be hacked, identifying vulnerable technologies and entry points. Interview held in July 2018 by ILTA Marketing Content Manager Beth Anne Stuebe Give Him Hack a Chance…

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