This year, federal agents were not welcome at the DEF CON , and Black Hat, attended by the head of the US National Security Agency, was booed by the public.
It was known, but now it's clear that hackers don't get along with the feds. But that probably goes both ways.
An interesting story that happened to Violet of ZDNetpresents the other side of the same coin. Violet took a taxi to attend DEF CON and the driver told the reporter that he had another run-in with some “FBI kids” who were also going to the conference.
The FBI agents allegedly told the driver that they were going to the conference because they wanted to hire hackers.
But another agent said, "I don't want to give them jobs, I want to catch them and teach them a lesson," the taxi driver told Violet.
This particular issue is well known to us and we have mentioned the cat and mouse game many times. Both sides of course have their reasons to defend what they are doing. However, public opinion has believed very romantically for so many years that the law is the law.
A few days ago, we learned that the FBI is using hacking tools against organized crime groups and terrorist groups. It is the point where we discover how close the law is to cybercrime. Of course, the end justifies the means, you might say… Some of these tools have been developed by the agency itself and others by someone like those who attended the DEF CON and Black Hat conferences.
If you think about it more closely, the reason for the conflict is the knowledge and skills that stem from it.
However, this rivalry has been fueling courtrooms and the entire US state apparatus in general for several years.
