Kevin Mitnick, Once The World’s Most Wanted Hacker, Died Peacefully At 59

Kevin Mitnick, who was once the most wanted computer hacker in the world turned security consultant, has died at the age of 59. Per his obituary, he passed away peacefully after a 14-month battle with pancreatic cancer.

In the mid to late 1990s, Kevin Mitnick went on what was called a “countrywide hacking spree” by then-U.S. Attorney Christopher Painter, breaking into government systems, potentially even NORAD, as well as private sector organizations like Sun Microsystems or Motorola. After being placed on the FBI’s most wanted list, this spree earned him 25 cybercrime charges and jail time, leading to the “FREE KEVIN” movement, further spurring his cyberspace fame or infamy, depending on how you look at it.

With all these hi-jinks, Mitnick inspired movies such as War Games, which helped to propel cybersecurity to where it is today. He has also written several books about his various phreaking, social engineering, and hacking escapades, such as the New York Times bestselling The Ghost in the Wires: My Adventures as the World’s Most Wanted Hacker. However, after his life of crime concluded with his final prison term, which he deemed a ‘vacation,’ he turned to white hat hacking, security consulting, public speaking, and more.

For example, in 2011, he became the Chief Hacking Officer and part owner of KnowBe4, a security awareness training company founded by Stu Sjouwerman. More recently, he appeared across our desk after he and the team at KnowBe4 built out a password-cracking rig filled with dozens of NVIDIA RTX 4090 GPUs. That, sadly, would be one of the last times we heard from Mitnick, though. He leaves behind a wife, Kimberly Mitnick, and their first unborn child.

From us at HotHardware, our deepest condolences go out to the Mitnick family, and we raise a glass to Kevin, who helped make the security field what it is today.

(Images courtesy of Mitnick Security)