Reuters reports on the death of legendary hacker Barnaby Jack, who was found dead a week before he was to make a high-profile presentation at the Black Hat hacking convention in Las Vegas.
Stuart McClure, described as a longtime security industry executive, gave Jack one of his first jobs and worked with him at Intel Corp's McAfee, a computer security company. "He was one of those people who was put on this earth to find vulnerabilities that can be exploited in a malicious way to hurt people," McClure said.
Jack became one of the world's most famous hackers after a 2010 demonstration of "Jackpotting" — getting ATMs to spew out bills. Two years ago, Jack turned his attention to medical devices, while working on a team at McAfee that engineered methods for attacking insulin pumps. Their research prompted medical device maker Medtronic Inc. to revamp the way it designs its products.