Vinnie Liu was recruited by the NSA when he was just 17 years old. He is now the CEO of Bishop Fox.
He says little about his work at the NSA, only that “My first year was on the red team, and in the second year, it was more externally facing.”
He had been recommended to the NSA by an Air Force guy he never met face-to-face and whose ‘handle’ he no longer remembers. But being recruited by such an organization in such a manner at such an early age would indicate a prodigious hacker. This is not the image he projects.
“I hadn’t been engaged in hacking in anything like a grand scale, like some scattered spider. But I spent a lot of time learning how systems worked and figuring out how to set systems up and take them down. I’ve always been more on the white hat side. I think that’s probably what caught their attention – I wasn’t trying to break into things for the thrill of it; I was just trying to learn.”
His earlier understanding of computers and programming came from an older sister who was away at college. “She would come home from college every now and then with books or materials, and I would just devour them. I found them fascinating. She’d come home with these various programming books, and I would just think ‘Oh, what’s that?’ So, I’d try to figure it out.”
He was less than 10 years old and already displaying some of the key characteristics of a hacker: an intense curiosity and desire to understand. But he had no concept of hacking or hackers. His motivation was simply to do what he enjoyed and have fun doing it – a motivation that has stayed with him through life.
Later, in high school, he started to learn about computers and computing. He clearly excelled since he was recruited by the NSA before even working toward a degree. He understood the concept of hacking, and obviously dabbled, but solely out of curiosity and the desire to have fun. “I had been spending a lot of time on IRC,” he explains, and it was here that he met the Air Force guy who recommended him to the NSA.
Asked if he did anything ‘shady’ with his growing knowledge, he said ‘No’. Pressed on the subject (‘What – not even breaking into the school’s computer network?’), he simply replied, “I don’t think that’s shady – it’s just de rigueur if you’re into programming and at school.”
He doesn’t say he did do this, but clearly implies he did this or similar.
“My definition of a hacker is somebody who likes to find a way around a control or a security system to get things to behave in ways that were unintended.” Note that he doesn’t specify any motivating purpose for hacking. For Liu, the act of hacking stands alone. It is the purpose of the hacker that differentiates between black and white hat hacking.
“I think intent is really important. There’s exploring, and then there’s exploring for the purpose of destroying or hurting or harming. There’s a distinction between those two things.” Liu liked to explore constantly, freely, for fun – but never harm. It is perhaps this total absence of any malicious intent from Liu that makes him reticent about his own hacking career.