
Marcus Hutchins pleads not guilty in US - 0xbadf00d
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-40923065
======
thephyber
Does anyone have a technical breakdown of what code he admits to have written?
TIA

I'm late to the party and most of the articles I've seen so far focus more on
the person and WannaCry as opposed to the 2013-2014 aspect.

~~~
armada651
Apparently it's about this code: [https://www.malwaretech.com/2015/01/inline-
hooking-for-progr...](https://www.malwaretech.com/2015/01/inline-hooking-for-
programmers-part-2.html)

This is function hooking code. It's useful when you need to change the
behaviour of an application, by redirecting a function call to your own
function.

Like any piece of code it has both legitimate and nefarious uses. However,
function hooking is very basic stuff.

Anyone who has ever tried to learn how things work under the hood will have
written function hooking code before.

~~~
lawnchair_larry
What's your source on that being the code in question?

~~~
icpmacdo
Not OP and idk but do you think Rob[0] it referencing this hooking code or
something else on his Github[1]

[https://twitter.com/ErrataRob/status/893197917493882880](https://twitter.com/ErrataRob/status/893197917493882880)

[https://github.com/MalwareTech/BasicHook](https://github.com/MalwareTech/BasicHook)

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DKnoll
This headline is editorialised. Some basic OSINT will show he also sold a
banking trojan previously, which is what he is facing charges for.

~~~
willstrafach
That is an allegation which has not been proven without a doubt.

The headline, while complimentary, makes sense as it identifies him in the way
most folks would recognize.

~~~
tptacek
That's the point of a criminal conspiracy: to be well-known only for positive
things, and for nobody to know about your involvement in negative things.

Obviously, he hasn't been found guilty of anything, and you're entitled to
argue that the evidence suggests he isn't. The only thing you can't reasonably
argue is what you've tried to argue here, which is that we should judge this
person by what they were previously best known for.

~~~
willstrafach
The only judgement which should occur at this point is in the courtroom. I am
making no argument beyond a reply to this part of the comment:

> This headline is editorialised.

~~~
ryanlol
>The only judgement which should occur at this point is in the courtroom.

But why? Why can't other people judge him for him previously selling other
malware similar to Kronos under the handles "Gone With The Wind" and "iarkey"
on Hackforums?

Surely it's not for lack of evidence as anyone with access to google can
easily verify this.

If he's being framed, we're talking about at least a 7 year long operation to
do so: [https://i.succ.in/CWcDhXxi.png](https://i.succ.in/CWcDhXxi.png)

~~~
willstrafach
The context was:

> The only thing you can't reasonably argue is what you've tried to argue
> here, which is that we should judge this person by what they were previously
> best known for.

I did not try to argue that at all, so I was clarifying my opinion. Nobody
will stop you if you choose to judge him based on that allegation, I am
choosing to wait on that due to the fact that it will get figured out (with
actual evidence either way) in court.

~~~
tptacek
I don't think I wrote this clearly and so I don't blame you for
misunderstanding what I'm saying.

Judge guilty, judge innocent, don't judge at all: all of those are reasonable
options open to you.

The only option I am pushing back on is the one that says the only reasonable
way to frame somebody is in terms of the good thing they're best known for.
Because, of course, it is in the nature of criminal conspiracies to work hard
_not to be known for them_.

------
hacker_9
You would think the UK government would help him out here, given what he did
for us.

~~~
tptacek
You think the UK government would intervene to stop the trial of someone
accused of operating a conspiracy to spread banking trojans? Why?

~~~
hacker_9
Because he's not just a 'someone', he's a hero for stopping the disgusting
attack on the NHS and letting doctors and nurses get on with their job of
saving lives.

~~~
tptacek
This doesn't make any sense. It's not how justice works. You can't do one
useful thing to excuse a series of grave crimes.

~~~
literallycancer
I know this probably isn't what you meant, but it's actually often the case
that doing useful things helps people get over the other things you did, see
Francis Drake, any number of founders of post-colonial and early 20th century
countries, conquistadors/founding fathers/revolutionaries, etc.

In short, justice is what most other influential people deem just, not some
universal measure of conduct.

Those responsible for the firebombing of Dresden never stood trial, because
the victims belonged to the losing side. The "scientists" of Unit 731 never
stood trial.[1] Only 13 out of 24 directors of IG Farben were found guilty and
all were released early.[2]

The church effectively killed hundreds of thousands (very conservative guess)
by telling people not to use condoms. No one was tried.

1 -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731#Surrender_and_immunit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731#Surrender_and_immunity)

2 -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IG_Farben#IG_Farben_Trial](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IG_Farben#IG_Farben_Trial)

