Stephen Gold, Date of Birth, Date of Death

    

Stephen Gold

British writer

Date of Birth: 15-Jan-1956

Date of Death: 12-Jan-2015

Profession: writer, journalist

Nationality: United Kingdom

Zodiac Sign: Capricorn


Show Famous Birthdays Today, United Kingdom

👉 Worldwide Celebrity Birthdays Today

About Stephen Gold

  • Stephen Gold (15 January 1956 – 12 January 2015) was a skilled hacker and journalist who in the mid-1980s was charged with, convicted and later acquitted of, 'uttering a forgery' in what became known to the popular press of the time as "The Great Prestel Hack".
  • Gold, and fellow hacker Robert Schifreen, were said to have accessed, inter alia, the personal message account of Prince Philip.
  • The facts as outlined in The Hacker's Handbook are that he was 'fitted' up, having tried, repeatedly and unsuccessfully, to warn BT's Prestel via Micronet of the security holes.
  • Gold later became a "respected information security journalist".In 1984, Gold and fellow journalist/hacker Robert Schifreen demonstrated an "ad hoc penetration test" of a Prestel network which, according to the writer Nick Barron, used "a combination of clever shoulder surfing and good old-fashioned hacking skills".
  • An archive telling the story of how the 1980s hack of Prince Philip’s mailbox led to UK anti-hacking legislation is held at The National Museum of Computing in Bletchley.Gold and Schifreen were convicted in 1986, (after a series of pre-'trials') at Southwark Crown Court on a charge of misusing passwords: the actual charge sheet read "uttering a forgery", under the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981.
  • They appealed successfully and were twice acquitted by higher courts on the basis that they had not obtained any material gain from their exploits.
  • The appeals were pursued right up to the House of Lords by BT at taxpayers expense during the Thatcher era.
  • Their case, it has been said, "led directly to the introduction of the 1990 Computer Misuse Act".
  • Gold was 'de facto' author of the forth edition of The Hacker's Handbook, previous editions of which had been completed by "Hugo Cornwall", [now] Professor Peter Sommer.Gold died on 12 January 2015.
  • and is commemorated by webpage Silent Modems created by friends and followers in his memory.

Read more at Wikipedia

See Also