Freedom Downtime Page #11

But l think he did it

to keep Kevin's evil image.

Maybe he believed

some of the things himself.

Okay, isn't a newspaperman...

supposed to investigate something

before they publish it...

before they put it in the newspaper as fact?

l know Spencer Tracy

and Clark Gable always did.

We didn't know what we were walking into.

Would Markoff tell us things about Mitnick...

that would shock and horrify us?

Or would he realize...

how much his front-page stories

and books had demonized Kevin...

helping to put him in the lousy place

he was still in?

This was our one chance

to make a difference.

And, more than anything,

we wanted to be fair.

So we came up with the Markoff Meter.

We set a bar on his left and right side...

and resolved not to judge him badly

until he said six bad or inaccurate things.

And if he said six good things...

well, then, the hacker world

would just have to deal with it.

Maybe this wouldn't be so bad.

Nowthere's an easy point

for common courtesy.

l wanted to get to the heart of the matter

Like howthey knew it was Kevin

they were chasing in the first place?

When l called the Qualcomm guys,

they had been talking to the FBl.

And the FBl believed that it was Kevin

who had social engineered them.

Why?

l don't know enough

about what was going on...

inside the FBl investigation.

That's a good question. l don't know why

But the FBl told the Qualcomm people

that it was Kevin.

And, to my mind, as a reporter,

it fit Kevin's M.O.

-Which is what?

-Social engineering.

Really good social engineering.

But there are thousands

of hackers out there--

That's true.

l'm not saying it's proof.

l'm simply saying

the FBl believed it was Kevin.

Did they hear a voice

or did they have a voice recording?

Did they have a voice recording?

That's a good question. What did they have?

This we couldn't forgive.

Before you print front-page stories

about people eluding the authorities...

shouldn't you have

some real conclusive evidence?

What did Kevin do that was diferent?

He had a reputation

as being a very good social engineer.

l've heard some tapes,

l've heard some people assert this.

lf he in fact was the person

who was at Qualcomm...

then he was a good social engineer.

Nowthat's better. No need to be stingy

with the compliments, after all.

One thing that's been following

Kevin Mitnick...

since the first story Markoff wrote about him

is this myth about breaking into NORAD.

When you say something like that

enough times, people start to believe it.

And in Kevin's case,

it really made him into a villain.

So where did the NORAD stuff come from?

The NORAD stuff...

is stuff that l got from someone...

who was in legal trouble

with Kevin early on.

So l have not been able to interview Kevin

face to face.

l've heard he said that it's inaccurate

but l haven't been able to ask him.

The story did come from a friend of his.

l knowthere are lots of stories

and you gotta sort through them.

But what stories have stuck?

l remember the Kristy McNichol thing.

That didn't stick. NORAD didn't stick.

Security Pacific l think is probably one

that stuck, that probably should stick.

-You know about that?

-The bank that he got a job at--

That's right.

And then there was a press release...

that suggested that the bank

was in financial trouble...

though they managed to keep it of the wire,

it almost went on.

But what links that to Kevin?

The police investigators that we interviewed

believed it was Kevin.

Based on what?

Based on what....

Just coincidence of things.

Who else would do something like that?

You've got to be kidding!

You used ''who else''

to pin a crime on the guy...

on the front page of the NewYork Times...

without even using

the word ''allegedly'' anywhere?

This was reported as fact

but it was never backed up.

Just like NORAD, just like Kristy McNichol...

just like everything that made them

want to catch Kevin so badly.

Let's look at the issue

of solitary confinement.

lt wasn't mentioned

in the front-page article...

that Kevin was in solitary for 8 months

and was desperate not to go back...

and that this above all

was what made him run.

l mean, he didn't want to go back to jail.

Not just jail, solitary confinement.

Eight months.

Was he in solitary before?

This was his first time.

He spent 8 months in solitary in 1989?

l didn't realize.

Wait. He didn't spend 8 months in prison.

He was only in prison for six months in '89.

You've written two books on the guy

as well as countless articles.

You're somewhat of an expert

on Kevin Mitnick...

and you didn't know

he was in solitary confinement?

Or even how long his sentence was?

For the record, Mitnick spent a year

in prison in 1988...

eight months of which

was in solitary confinement...

plus another six months in a halfway house.

With the psychologists in town

we could confirm...

locking Kevin in solitary

was a f***ed-up thing to do.

l think it's inhumane, and l think there are

better ways to handle our problems.

Obviously if this person has been able

to do some of the things...

that they think he was doing

with a computer, he's very bright.

That's a real talent that's being wasted.

And, to lock him up, especially

in solitary confinement for 8 months....

We wouldn't treat an animal that way

And yet, this is a talented individual?

Excuse me.

-lt's not right.Thank you.

-Thanks very much.

Wait, he was in solitary

the entire time he was at Lompoc?

A large amount of the time. Eight months.

Yeah, that's pretty hard.

Okay. Markoff gains a point

for that show of humanity.

Now, here's something interesting.

When Kevin was on the run...

he communicated with an lsraeli hacker

known as jsz...

who's believed to be the mastermind behind

the hacking that Kevin was blamed for.

Yet Markoff never wrote a story about him...

and didn't even followthrough

when jsz moved to New York.

ln fact, none of the authorities

seemed to care either...

almost as if these crimes were really trivial.

Nowthat would be a great story,

wouldn't it, John?

l thought a lot about that.

l just haven't had time to do the reporting.

l've got a day-to-day beat out here.

You're right. lt's probably a great story

l would love to talk to jsz.

-l should come to New York--

-That story was going on back then.

Jsz was supposedly the mastermind

behind everything.

l never knew what the relations were.

The only thing l could say that l knew..

was that jsz and Kevin...

were actively trading

information and software.

That's what l knew.

l knew nothing about masterminding.

lf you asked me

to reconstruct just from what l knew..

it was jsz provided the tools

and Kevin made the attack.

But l have no idea if that's true.

No idea?

lsn't this what the book, series of articles,

and nowthe film are supposedly based on...

what Kevin actually did?

l was amazed by what he didn't know

But there was more that he did know

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