wnyc.org / 93.9fm / am 820

In 2000, Michael Calce, known as Mafiaboy, brought down the websites of Amazon, CNN, Dell, E-TRADE, eBay, and Yahoo!, inciting panic from Silicon Valley to the White House. He served eight months in open custody for the 56 charges on which he was convicted. In Mafiaboy: A Portrait of the Hacker as a Young Man, written with Craig Silverman, he gives a tour of the fast-evolving 21st-century world of hacking—from disruptions caused by teens like Calce, to organized crime and other efforts with potentially catastrophic results—and explains how to protect yourself online.