Oct 23, 2026, 3:09 AMhow come hackers never do anything cool like erase debt or steal from the ultra wealthy or completely obliterate the credit reporting agencies
EDIT: turning off notifications. too many boot lickers in my mentions
- Oct 23, 2026, 3:09 AM
Replies
The Lack Thereof :v_bi:lackthereof@beige.partyOct 23, 2026, 4:21 AM@aeva
Hi, backend dev for SEC-compliant enterprise NAT here.Basically because the record keeping laws in place to guard against financial fraud in major institutions also mandate a level of data redundancy and immutability that incidentally guards against such tampering to a level that approaches the US military. Every file creation, update, delete is revision controlled.
Imagine a fictional financial institution, let's call them Jigglypuff's Professional Money Cabal. First, they don't even have root-user access on their own storage. They can't override the legally mandated retention policy -- even in the off-site backup systems -- without a kernel patch that can't be installed unless it's signed with their storage manufacturer's private key. And at the first sign of compromise, the Cabal runbook is to just immediately flatten the whole thing, reinstall a clean system, and restore from the nearest geo.
Even if you go full Fight Club and physically destroy the buildings, in multiple cities, they've got another fully redundant and air gapped disaster recovery storage system literally in a bunker underneath a Colorado mountain.
Nina Felwitch :v_trans: :v_enby:ninafelwitch@tech.lgbtOct 23, 2026, 9:09 AM@lackthereof @aeva I think you're giving banks too much credit here (haha). One bank in my state got robbed because someone drilled through the wall from a parking garage with heavy equipment for several hours and nobody noticed. They got away with everything and it was only noticed, like, two days later or so.
- The Lack Thereof :v_bi:lackthereof@beige.partyOct 23, 2026, 12:57 PM
@ninafelwitch
Oh yeah, taking the physical bills is likely way easier. But the it infrastructure I described, including the Colorado bunker, represents stuff I have actually seen our banking customers doing.
@aeva 
KelvarCherryKelvarCherry@mastodon.gamedev.placeOct 23, 2026, 5:29 AM@aeva Agree with the sentiment; but we can't forget when a transgender catgirl got on the news for leaking the USA's secret No-Fly List.
https://maia.crimew.gay/posts/how-to-hack-an-airline/
Not much of a surprise -- most of the names were Middle Eastern in origin; and there were a few notable scholars and other education figures in the mix, too.
Oct 23, 2026, 5:43 AM@aeva on #DarknetDiaries there's an interview with someone who erased the records of student debt at a uni. https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/139
b3lt3rb3lt3r@mastodon.b3lt3r.comOct 23, 2026, 6:22 AM@aeva or leak the full unredacted Epstein files
Oct 23, 2026, 6:59 AM@aeva they use to? Like in the Hackers movie?
Oct 23, 2026, 8:32 AMdo crimes against the state count for anything?
Sigmasigmasternchen@comfy.socialOct 23, 2026, 6:35 PM@aeva@mastodon.gamedev.place They kind of do though.
Recently some hackers hacked and leaked tens of thousands the emails of the German far-right party. And I recently heard that these could legally be used as evidence to get the party banned - which would be amazing. ^^
ɹ uɐp :antifascism:dannotdaniel@hellions.cloudOct 23, 2026, 10:16 PM@aeva did you just ask why hackers aren't cool because I have terrible news
