R.I.P Barnaby Jack!

It's sad to hear that Barnaby Jack passed away just 35 years old. He was found dead in his apartment in San Francisco on the 25th of July.

 

BJ was to me special in many ways and a person I happily followed in his works as a security expert / white hat hacker and a good source of inspiration. Born on the 22 of November 1977 in New Zealand he became known for many big discoveries in the industry, everything from making an ATM spitting out hundred dollar bills (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwMuMSPW3bU) to how your remotely took over Dlink routers by modifying the binary firmware downloaded and injecting code for remote execution.

 

This was when I first came to meet with him in person. In april 2008 in Mallorca, Spain. We both worked for for a different company at the time, BJ was presenting his latest research on the Dlink router for all the SE's at an European SE conference. Though this was something he discover on his spear time it really illustrated his passion and knowledge that he used in his everyday work trying to make sure that the product shipped was 99,9% secure and did not contain and flows in the hardware or software.

 

For several years he now run his own security research company and focusing on security issues with medical equipment like insulin pumps and pacemakers.

 

This Black Hat was going to be his show…. His latest research work was around pacemakers and their weaknesses. He was going to demonstrate how your remotely within 30 meters could turn one off. It's sad to say that I will not be able to listen to that presentation presented by him but hope his work lives on by someone else.

 

You will be missed by the security community and this Black Hat will probably get dedicated to you at least in my mind.