Jim Christy – The Pentagon’s Internet Crime Fighter and Matt Cutts – Google’s Search Spam Crime Fighter
While reading Wired’s recent article about Jim Christy – the “government’s original geek with a gun,” I couldn’t help but be stunned by the similarities to one of our industry’s own members.. yes, search blogger of the year, and BFF of Rebecca, Matt Cutts. Judge for yourself.
From the Wired piece:
“You know, sometimes I become aware of botnets running on DOD networks,” the maybe-ex-intelligence agent says. “It would be nice to have someone to contact.” Christy says he’d be happy to oblige.
Bingo: another node in the Jim Christy network. That’s why he comes to DefCon, to extend his already vast informal intelligence web of hackers, security professionals, and computer geeks. He’s also here to pick up tips, of course. And to try to recruit a few of the blackhats to the side of justice – or at least to scare them straight. “We’re appealing to their patriotism,” he says. “And if that doesn’t work, then fear works, too.”
and this:
The hackers start to ask questions of their own. One guy says he’s in a band called Preteen Porn Star, and he wants to know what to do with the creepy inquiries that come in through its Web site. Others want to talk about the government’s support of open source. But the paycheck Christy hinted at is what really gets their attention.
“So,” says an attendee in de rigueur black, “a few youthful indiscretions – will they disqualify you from jobs at a federal agency?”
“Not forever,” Christy says. “But if you were doing it last week, you’d probably be ineligible.”
It’s practically a piece about Matt – just swap out “government” for “Google” and “dangerous hackers” for “MFA spammers” and you’ve got our man. Fancy that, even the resemblance is striking:
Jim Christy pictured with his left-hand man
Matt Cutts with his left-hand lady
Just go read the piece.
