I don't know if any of you have read the book "The Fugitive Game, Online with Kevin Mitnick" but i definitely recommend that any of you who haven't should pick up a copy. You learn that a lot of the stuff Kevin did, while definitely not ok. Were not anywhere near as bad as the press made them out to be. It has been proven that while in jail, he was kept in solitary confinement for prolonged amounts of time because people were afraid he would get to a pay phone and whistle missle launch codes to NORAD. A lot of the hype around Kevin Mitnick is extremely exaggerated. The author of this book kept contact with Kevin during most of the time that he was on the run so you really get a look into what Kevin was like.

Also, Tsutomo Shimomura (I hope I spelled that right!) The "cyber samurai" who is credited with helping to capture Kevin, could quite possibly have been just as much of a "black hat hacker" kevin. He publicly altered a cell phone to make it work as a reciever so he could drop in on other peoples calls. During the time in which in which Kevin was capture. Tsutomo also brought a long his friend, who was a reporter (John Markoff) which is not allowed. Both of them later denied it but one FBI agent said "At one point, the reporter even had a scanner in his hand, helping to try to locate Kevin"

As Cybr1d also stated, Kevin has been quite helpful to computer security lately and is a leading contact for many people in the security industry. He recently even wrote a great book called "The Art of Deception" which helps companies learn to defend against social engineering attacks.

I am not trying to say in any way that Kevin was innocent, but I think he was, and still is considered to be a lot worse than he really is.