
Adrian Lamo has died - ad_hominem
http://www.zdnet.com/article/adrian-lamo-hacker-dies/
======
whichwalrus
Sorry, this story isn't very interesting, but it really stuck with me
nonetheless, and I wanted to share.

Adrian had a passing romance with a friend of mine, and thus ended up
traveling through the city I grew up in. This was long before Chelsea Manning,
etc.

I was a super shy, rather awkward teenage girl. I suppose the teenage part has
changed.. but I digress. I loved the idea of mischief, but at the same time, I
was a habitual rule-follower. I get nervous walking through the retail store
detectors placed at entrances.. even though I've never stolen anything in my
life. I remember listening to social engineering phone pranks -- the sort
where people would talk their way into being put on the store-wide intercom at
Walmart. At the time, I think I really wanted to be so confident that I could
do such a thing, versus the reality, which was mild anxiety over something so
simple as placing a legit pizza order over the phone.

I knew who Adrian was in a peripheral sense. I was a community leader and
eventual employee on AOL in years prior, and I had an interest in how to break
things as an inverse of being curious how they're built.

I had a car, while my friend did not, and Adrian had traveled via transit, so
I spent the day with them hopping around town. At one point, we were downtown
grabbing food in one of the larger complexes -- Adrian breaks off for a second
and asks a retail store employee a bunch of questions about working there,
saying he was just hired at the cafe. We then ended up going into what was
clearly an employee-only area -- GUYS WE AREN'T SUPPOSED TO BE HERE WHAT IF WE
GET IN TROUBLE OH GOD -- we duck into a fire escape, hike up to the upper
level where he picks the lock to the door with roof access, and there we are,
highest point in the city. After a few minutes of me suggesting that MAYBE we
go back down since this was cool BUT REALLY WE SHOULD GO, Adrian told me I'd
miss the sunset if I kept worrying.

It was dumb. I'm sure I could've been arrested. But watching the sunset with
the two of them from the top of that building remains one of my favorite
memories. It was the first time I'd taken a step out of my shell, I suppose.
Adrian was a troubled guy, and I don't forgive what he did to Manning, but I
appreciated him for that moment in time.

~~~
VectorLock
This is a good description of the kind of hacker Adrian was. He wasn't a write
finely crafted shell code to exploit a buffer overflow in an application or
deep knowledge of the esoterica of how CPUs function Spectre Meltdown kind of
hacker. He'd just try the knob on a door he wasn't supposed to go through and
surprise it was open.

~~~
ZephyrP
well, to be fair, he didn't plenty of that too.

------
dang
At a user's suggestion, we changed the URL from
[https://www.facebook.com/groups/majordomo/permalink/10156204...](https://www.facebook.com/groups/majordomo/permalink/10156204603994522/)
to avoid the painful contrast between an internet forum controversy and a
father's grief over the death of his son.

I've turned off flags on this story because if we don't, the story will be
reposted until we do. In return, here's a request: if you comment here, try to
bring your heart with you a bit more than you usually would.

If we don't do that, a sort of tragedy of the commons kicks in where we each
add a piece that's defensible in itself, but the picture of us that the pieces
add up to is ugly.

------
free2beme66
I know that there has been controversy dealing with Adrian Lamo for a long,
long time, however; my sister was married to him for a short time and I know
he had many mental health issues and demons that he's been dealing with his
entire life. I know she loved him very much at one point and time and she is
sad today because she knows how hard his life was dealing with his issues. I
feel terrible for his parents, family, and friends. This is not the time to
talk badly about him.

~~~
watersb
Thanks for this insight, and blessings to your sister.

------
azinman2
This is somewhat a shock to me, and I’m curious to know what happened.

Adrian and I became friends when we were both about 12. We met at 2600
meetings in the embarcadero in SF. We soon were buddies, going “trashing”
downtown finding all kinds of crazy things corporate SF left out for trash:
working DAT backup drives, 17” view sonics (prized at the time), blueprints
for a bank (!), entire trash bags full of credit card receipts with nothing
redacted, etc.

He was always a mysterious one, and beat to his own drum. I admired his
spirit, and our paths crossed many times including when we both volunteered at
the same queer youth center in SF.

Years later he stayed with me in grad school in Cambridge looking not the
healthiest. I tried to provide food and shelter, not able to figure out why a
guy so talented refused to do anything conventional that would make him good
money. But he didn’t care about such things.

He had his own sense of right and wrong, and was principaled within his own
philosophy — but I never fully understood what philosophy that was. When I
recently was chatting with him, I asked why did was doing something currently
to which he said “why do I ever do anything?”

I’ll deeply miss Adrian.. he was a kind and unique spirit. Some may disagree
with me on that only because they only know him through Manning, but that was
a small sliver of his life (and one I happen to agree with him on, with
additional perspectives I can’t share publicly).

~~~
VectorLock
Thanks for sharing your connection with Adrian. It was nice hearing some
positive memories about him. I know he did what he did with Manning with much
consternation but out of a moral necessity. It really did weigh on him.

I met Adrian in about 98 in SF and shared many of the same kinds of adventures
with him. He shared a lot of his physical and electronic intrusions with me
and he never did any harm or anything malicious. It was all simple exploration
in the best hacker ethos. He'd usually inform the 'victim' taking nothing for
his services except a Coke while he told them his story.

I'm also curious what happened, morbidly. I haven't heard from him at all in a
few years. An unfortunate addition to the list of young, talented but troubled
hackers I've known who've left us too soon. :(

------
bob_theslob646
For those who do not recognize his name as I did not:

> Lamo first gained media attention for breaking into several high-profile
> computer networks, including those of The New York Times, Yahoo!, and
> Microsoft, culminating in his 2003 arrest.[7]

> In 2010, Lamo indirectly reported U.S. soldier Chelsea Manning to the Army's
> Criminal Investigation Command,[8] claiming that Manning had leaked hundreds
> of thousands of sensitive U.S. government documents to WikiLeaks.

[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_Lamo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_Lamo)]

~~~
incompatible
I first heard of him from the initial version of his Wikipedia entry, and I
wondered if he had written it himself
([https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Adrian_Lamo&oldid...](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Adrian_Lamo&oldid=237418))

Wikipedia was different in those days. A few hours after it was posted, Larry
Sanger himself added a comment to the end saying "Um, can we clean up the
above puff job, please?"

------
tptacek
Reminder: Lamo is a public figure but also a real person with real
relationships with people who will read this thread. You are all commenting on
a Facebook thread written by Lamo's dad about the death of his son.

~~~
Myrmornis
> You are all commenting on a Facebook thread written by Lamo's dad about the
> death of his son.

I think I understand why you wrote that, but I don't agree. Posts here should
be thoughtful and respectful, certainly. But it is not Facebook. I am not an
expert about this person who has died, but it appears his story has a public
interest dimension. HN is an appropriate place for such discussion.
Furthermore, I think you need to remember that this is a global community,
containing many people far away from events in the USA. In the event of any
death, the vast majority of HN readers are not members of the in-crowd who had
some personal connection to that person. This site has a large global
readership; it isn't and cannot be a "community" in the local sense that you
and dang seem to be portraying it as. (Also, friendly reminder, dang is the
moderator but AFAIK you aren't).

~~~
chipotle_coyote
I think the context for dang's comment is that the HN link originally went to
a Facebook thread. I _hope_ nobody from HN showed up on that thread to trash
Lamo in comments that were effectively directed right to his grieving father,
but...

------
aliasnexus0
Definitely check out the documentary Hackers Wanted [1], which follows Adrian.
I found it interesting how he was able to break into some of the "high-profile
computer networks".

[1]
[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2292707/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2292707/)

------
dfsegoat
Adrian and I met back in '97\. He always struck me as ahead of his time, and
was someone who opened my eyes to what "information security" actually was:
The man's natural ability to find his way into places he shouldn't be -
physical or electronic, was simply uncanny and I have never before spoken with
or known of anyone like him.

------
jasmemphis
Rest In Peace: you lived your life the way you believed it mattered ~ and you
had to wade through difficulties with an illnesses. I admire your ability and
your talent . Rest easy .

------
dmix
The directors cut of his documentary voiced by Kevin Spacey, and featuring Woz
and Kevin Rose is available on public Bittorrent sites:

[https://thepiratebay.org/search/Hackers%20Wanted](https://thepiratebay.org/search/Hackers%20Wanted)

[https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Hackers_Wanted](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Hackers_Wanted)

------
eganist
There's merit to discussing whether his actions were beneficial or not. But
for the love of god, if you've got a problem with him as a person, pocket it
unless you know discussion of the specific problem you had with him _will with
certainty_ serve the public good. You've got every right to say what you want,
but think it through.

I didn't know him, but I've known plenty of others with questionable
reputations who've died as a result of mental duress. Before you comment, I'll
ask as a bystander for you to think about whether everyone benefits from
knowing what you wish to share. Otherwise, you'll just out yourself as an
asshole.

Rest in peace, Adrian. Regardless of what you did, beneficial or otherwise, no
one deserves the mind-shackles you had to live with.

------
Grue3
Sad. He did the right thing reporting Manning and I'd do the same thing if I
was him.

~~~
vagif
You would tell nazi patrol which cellar jews are hiding in? You are a good
patriotic boy!

------
phusion
here's a documentary featuring Adrian prominently. This is the best you'll see
Adrian, because some time after this film he went on (or off?) his meds,
betrayed Chelsea Manning and various other things shitty humans do.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYN6JuQGGX0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYN6JuQGGX0)

Hackers Wanted.

~~~
fjsolwmv
Taking medicine and not taking medicine are both things shitty humans do, as
is refusing to join a criminal conspiracy?

------
alafazam
I have read almost all his answers on quora. And from all that, one thing is
there which i know for sure, that he was a good man. Rip.

------
engi_nerd
I hope that he found peace, somehow.

------
VectorLock
Inexplicably this post just disappeared off the very top of HN... Edit:
appearing now as flagged.

~~~
dang
Users explicably flagged it.

~~~
VectorLock
Wasn't showing up as flagged when it disappeared.

It is now, though.

~~~
dang
Flags affect story ranking before the [flagged] tag appears. The tag appears
when the effect of the flags exceeds a certain threshold.

Since "flagged" isn't a binary state that's the only easy way to do it, but it
does mean that a story's rank is sometimes affected by user flags without that
being visually displayed yet. Usually it shows up after a while.

~~~
VectorLock
Good to know.

------
Kip9000
lama of winamp?

------
amyjess
Wow. I remember, long before he became famous (I think he went by _ill_ at the
time), discovering his Inside-AOL site that delved into the workings of AOL.
It was really fascinating to me to find out how so much of it worked (that was
the first place I heard of Rainman). I've always loved reading about how
complex systems work, and that site was like crack to me.

I know that most people here will probably remember him mostly for what
happened between him and Chelsea Manning (and, quite frankly, I automatically
like anyone who makes an enemy of Julian Assange), but I want to remember him
for his early work more than anything.

~~~
loggedinmyphone
He was Magus on aol [https://mattmazur.com/2010/06/26/adrian-lamo-aol-files-
profi...](https://mattmazur.com/2010/06/26/adrian-lamo-aol-files-profile/)

~~~
patorjk
That page isn't loading for me, but he was not the Magus behind the famous
Fate X AOL prog. I actually talked to that Magus and several of his friends a
few years ago [1]. I'd heard Lamo claimed to be Magus, and maybe he went by
that handle in some cases, but he was not the author of Fate X.

[1] [http://patorjk.com/blog/2012/05/03/cracking-magus-fate-
zero-...](http://patorjk.com/blog/2012/05/03/cracking-magus-fate-zero-
encryption/)

~~~
loggedinmyphone
He also went by Line Trace. AMP link:
[https://www.google.com/amp/s/mattmazur.com/2010/06/26/adrian...](https://www.google.com/amp/s/mattmazur.com/2010/06/26/adrian-
lamo-aol-files-profile/amp/)

------
VonGuard
So, I'm gonna lay it out here as I am having a bad day and don't feel like
censoring myself. I'd known Adrian since 1998. He came to 2600 meetings in SF
and was a fixture there. In that time, he generally didn't make any friends.
While he was gay, he was also stalking a lady at the meetings, and being super
creepy about it. Eventually, he left SF and was homeless. He got in trouble
for hacking the NYT and making himself some Lexis Nexis accounts. He then
reported Chelsea Manning to the authorities when she reached out to him,
connected because of their shared LGBTQ background.

Lamo screwed Manning big time, but when he did, none of us who knew him were
surprised. He was never a happy person, and never friendly to anyone I knew. I
think his folks threw him out of the house in his teens.

Kind of a tragic figure, but also not really someone you could ever trust or
even invite to parties. When anyone dies, it's sad. But with Adrian, he had
already basically removed himself from the groups who knew him long ago. He
was just seemingly not comfortable being in society and making friends.

~~~
jsmthrowaway
Come on, man. His body's not even cold and it was well-known that he was
experiencing mental health issues, potentially his entire life, including
discovering he suffered from Asperger's after an involuntary hold (that he
described himself). Your venting isn't actually far from that diagnosis making
sense. Is this really the time and place for this?

~~~
VonGuard
Actually, I feel my comment is about as even handed as I could muster.
Aspergers or not, he hurt a lot of people.

~~~
eganist
Serious question: what's the public benefit afforded by your comment?

~~~
arbitrage
What's the public benefit of hanging around on hacker news and chatting about
things in general? Why would this be any different?

~~~
eganist
Hackernews discussion is intended to be productively informative. Knowingly
putting someone down on a public forum does not make anyone better for it
except maybe to educate the person making the mistake and others performing in
an equal manner. Considering what Adrian was dealing with, any others like him
might not even benefit from reading such things; this delivery method is more
likely to fail than to succeed.

It's fine to constructively criticize. But it's inherently impossible to do
that with someone who's died because _they 're dead._ And with disorders which
risk social impairment, public shaming isn't the solution either; it just
drives people who don't understand how to address their challenges further and
further into a hole.

I figure your question was intended as both maieutic and rhetorical, but
please take into account what I'm sharing with you here.

People are expected in some capacity to grow on hackernews. This comment
contributed no growth value to anyone.

