Blog Reveals a Chinese Military Hacker's Life Is One of Boredom and Bitterness 185
Nerval's Lobster writes "People's Liberation Army hackers: they're just like us. As noted by IT security firm Mandiant, and detailed in a new article by The Los Angeles Times, a blogger calling themselves 'Rocy Bird' had posted several hundred blog entries over a three-year period about life as a Chinese military hacker. It wasn't the most exciting existence. He worked a normal workday—8 A.M. until 5:30 P.M., unless some project required late hours—and lived in a dorm. He dined often on instant noodles and enjoyed the television series 'Prison Break.' He spent lots of time online, even when off the clock. And like millions of people all over the world, he disliked many aspects of his job. 'What I can't understand is why all the work units are located in the most remote areas of the city,' the hacker, who the Times identified as having the family name Wang, wrote in a portion of a blog posting reprinted by the paper. 'I really don't get what those old guys are thinking in the beginning. They should at least take us young people into consideration. How can passionate young people like us handle a prison-like environment like this?'"
Attitudinal similarities: screwed by managers (Score:5, Interesting)
Bite the wax tadpole, indeed. I wonder how you translate "Bradley Manning" into Mandarin or Cantonese? Tech workers are pushed around by slave-drivers and middle management everywhere in the world, in all possible environments. Did you catch how his manager was able to expense a $100-equivalent bottle of liquor while the keyboard-combatant couldn't even get $1 reimbursed for bus-ffare to attend a tech conference?
.
How do you translate "Dilbert" into Chinese? No need. It's all the same!
Older (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:what's an "exciting" existence? (Score:5, Interesting)
Most people don't, and I'm pretty sure most people wouldn't want an "exciting" existence. Ever heard the old curse "may you live in interesting times"?
Think about it and you know why it's a curse.
So lets recap shall we? (Score:5, Interesting)
- The Chinese military
- The Chinese leadership
- Hacking techniques
- Hacking targets
- Lifestyles of government employed hackers
And was derisive. The Chinese government didn't happen to notice that one of their military intelligence agents living in a military dorm was regularly posting derisive and secret information for 3 years. Just to state the bleedingly obvious here, but this would never happen in the US and the Chinese are much stricter on information control.
So do you trust the Los Angeles Times and a private security agency pitching for government contracts, or
Take the red pill.
Re:So lets recap shall we? (Score:3, Interesting)
So you're saying Bradley Manning is a fabrication and not a real person?
Re:military life (Score:4, Interesting)
China technically has universal military conscription, it's entirely possible he's not doing it by choice.
Re:Surely There's Something Interesting To Do (Score:4, Interesting)
I think it's pretty easy to fall into dispair when you are young. The truth is that for anyone sane, money does buy happiness. You know what makes you happy and nothing will get you what you need to do that but money...unless your happiness focuses on being a monk.
Of course I'm assuming the western notion of property rights that taunt the people of China...
Re:Not the least bit surprised (Score:5, Interesting)
When I moved to France, I went to a language school and many of the other students were Chinese.
We had to do oral presentations on a subject of our own choosing, and one of the Chinese students explained the system of democracy in China. The local people elect a representative, the representatives elect people further up the chain, congress, deputies, etc, etc, right up to the president.
The Chinese students thought this was perfect democracy in action, and were baffled that the Europeans, Africans and New Worlders couldn't understand how wonderful and flawless the system was. When we pointed out that there was only one party, they indignantly said there were several parties to choose from: more than in France.
On the subject of censorship, they thought it was necessary to protect the country, and made hand-waving explanations that things were different in China.
These kids were the offspring of the kind of Chinese families who could afford to send their children to study in France, so no doubt are not representative of the population as a whole, but it was still a real eye-opener for me, who had kind of assuming that the Chinese would want the same kind of (imperfect) democracy we have in the West.
Personally, I still think it's basically down to indoctrination, but if so, it's evidently pretty effective indoctrination.
Re:The Russians knew (Score:4, Interesting)
I think possibly if conditions in the US were as in USSR and the only penalty for stepping out of line was not to get invited to the swanky interviews, you'd see a lot more critical journalism than now. Also, asking politicians difficult questions is pretty pointless anyway - they have years of training in dodging such questions. What matters is to report on the awkward facts that would inspire such awkward questions and you don't need access to the politicians to do that. You don't need to ask Obama if he orders drone strikes on Americans - you just have to report on the matter. So whether politicians are asked awkward questions is not relevant to how a democracy is doing - what matters is reporting on salient facts.
Re:military life (Score:5, Interesting)
Typical chicom propaganda ..
"genuinely, entirely voluntary"? Only in the same way that foxconn employees "voluntarily" kill themselves.
"China isn't fighting wars with anyone"? Tell that to the philippinos and vietnamese and see how they laugh at claims that china is a peaceful country.
Take your propaganda shill ..
well put up a list of the chinese confrontations where chinese soldiers have kicked the bucket then.
point being, being in the chinese military gives you a leg up so it's a legitimate career choice to volunteer in to increase your quality of life. mostly at the the expense of other chinese but still with little to no danger of actually getting shot in battle.