Black-hat hackers are cybercriminals that hack illegal information and spy on other people’s data to further their malicious goals. Some hackers, on the other hand, are motivated by social justice rather than personal gain (as they say). In this essay, I’ll identify the Black-Hat hackers who have made headlines and are now leading major corporations.
10 Black-Hat Hackers of All Time
We have compiled a list of the Black-Hat hackers of All Time. Let’s have a look at the list given below.
1. Kevin Mitnick
Kevin Mitnick was once the world’s most wanted cybercriminal. He had a computer fixation that led to a two-and-a-half-year hacking binge in which he stole millions of dollars in corporate secrets from IBM, Motorola, telecommunications corporations, and even the National Defense alert system. He was arrested twice for his crimes and spent time in prison both times, but today he works as a computer security expert.
2. Vladimir Levin
Vladimir Leonidovich Levin is a brilliant hacker from Russia. He accessed the accounts of numerous large corporate customers of Citibank in 1994 while working from his Saint Petersburg apartment with a dial-up connection and a laptop, stealing USD 10.7 million. He was sentenced to three years in prison. In 2005, however, an anonymous hacking gang emerged, claiming to be the true perpetrators of the robbery and that they had simply provided Vladimir the data he needed to steal the money. He is one of the Black-Hat hackers of All Time.
3. Mathew Bevan and Richard Pryce
When Mathew Bevan and Richard Pierce broke into military systems in 1996, they were 21 and 17 years old, respectively. They not only got into US military computers, but they also hacked into North Korean systems, according to officials. These individuals have the unusual distinction of almost starting a war.
4. Michael Calce a.k.a MafiaBoy
In the year 2000, a Canadian hacker named Michael Calce was responsible for a series of high-profile intrusions. Project Rivolta, as he dubbed it, was a distributed denial-of-service attack that brought down major websites such as Yahoo, FIFA, Amazon, eBay, CNN, and Dell, among others. After gloating about the attacks in an IRC chat area, he was apprehended and sentenced to eight months in prison. What’s the point of such a brief sentence? Michael was in his senior year of high school at the time.
5. Adrian Lamo
Adrian Lamo is best known for hacking into large corporations such as Yahoo, Bank of America, Citigroup, The New York Times, and Microsoft, but it was the manner in which he did so that made him famous. He hacked into big websites using public internet connections such as those found in libraries and coffee shops. And he was dubbed “Homeless Hacker” because of his mannerisms. He was sentenced to six months of house arrest in 2004 after being apprehended and ordered to pay $65,000 in reparations.
6. Jeanson James Ancheta
Jeanson James Ancheta was the first hacker to construct a botnet, a collection of hacked machines that collaborate legally. In 2004, he began working with botnets robot, a computer worm that let him to control 500,000 computers, including US military computers, over a network of infected computers. He was sentenced to 60 months in prison, forfeiting his BMW and paying more than $58,000 in fines.
7. Gary Mckinnon
Gary Mckinnon, sometimes known as Solo, is a Scottish hacker who orchestrated the world’s largest military computer breach. Between 2001 and 2002, he hacked into 97 US military and NASA computers, deleting key files such as weapon logs in approximately 24 hours. The government was projected to have lost $ 700,000 as a result of his hacking. He is one of the Black-Hat hackers of All Time.
8. Owen Walker
Owen Walker, aka AKILL, was only 17 years old when he allowed an international hacking gang to gain access to his computer, causing approximately $26 million in damages. The Bot virus, which infected 1.3 million computers throughout the world and caused them to crash, was created by a high school student. Despite the fact that he was apprehended, he was freed without being charged.
9. Astra
During that five-year time, the hacker Astra, whose actual name was never revealed, was a 58-year-old Geek Mathematician who was operated on between 2002 and 2008. He stole weapons technology data from the Salt Group in 3D modeling software, which he sold for up to USD 361 million to purchasers all throughout the world. He was discovered in an Athens, Greece apartment.
10. Albert Gonzalez
Albert Gonzalez stole 175 million credit card numbers and sold them online over a two-year period. Through identity theft, a large quantity of money was stolen from his victims, leaving them to fight to rebuild their credit ratings and get their money back. He was given a sentence of 40 years in prison.
Conclusion:
Here our list of the Black-Hat hackers of All Time comes to an end. If you know about other top black hackers, send us your suggestions. Until the next time, Goodbye!