Ex-Hacker Adrian Lamo Institutionalized for Asperger's

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/05/lamo/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=My+Yahoo

by edw519 • 16 years ago

68 42 16 years ago

wired.com

jrockway5• 16 years ago

Interesting. I clicked through to a related article about this guy, and his last run-in with the law was because he refused to provide his DNA to the federal government. Because apparently hacking web pages leaves a lot of DNA evidence, and they want to get him for sure next time, or something. Frightening.

jacquesm5• 16 years ago

Sounds like he's pretty sane to me.

I'm considering not renewing my passport because they want my fingerprints too, apparently to stop terrorists from getting passports.

Maybe I've got Aspergers?

benologist3• 16 years ago

You should try being a foreigner ... I've had my fingerprints taken 5 times now entering the US.

jrockway5• 16 years ago

No, you just realize that terrorists can get valid passports just as easily as ordinary citizens. If anything, things like biometric passports just make people less safe -- since customs agents will just assume that if your passport is valid you aren't a threat, they won't ask tough questions. Then a terrorist will slip by, and they'll have an excuse to require rectal imaging on the next generation of passports.

The irony is that the terrorists have already won.

rbanffy2• 16 years ago

Is that a Commodore 65 or a 128 Lamo is sitting next to?

hachiya• 16 years ago

Looks like it may be a C64c. That later model was more attractive looking than the first.

rbanffy2• 16 years ago

You are probably right. I forgot completely the 64c existed.

An 8-bit Commodore is something that's missing from my collection.

edit (for the retro-curious):

the 64c http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=998

the 128 http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?st=1&c=...

and the 65 http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?st=1&c=...

milkshakes• 16 years ago

“I have always maintained that what I did isn’t necessarily technical, it’s about seeing things differently"

Him and Michael burry. Who else?

matt12• 16 years ago

You guys might like this autobiographical profile of Adrian's from 2001 when he went by the handle Magus: http://www.mattmazur.com/archive/aol-files/downloads/people/...

Quote: its amazing how many security guards will escort you up to the roof of a skyscraper if you only ask, or won't even stop you if you look like you know where you're going

This is taken from an archive of an AOL hacking website called AOL-Files.com that I ran back in 2000/2001. We had a section called AOL People where the site's visitors could submit profiles on themselves. The full list of profiles is here: http://www.mattmazur.com/archive/aol-files/downloads/people/

Mine, which is hilarious now, is here: http://www.mattmazur.com/archive/aol-files/downloads/people/.... So much for being an astronaut and not sitting in front of a computer all day...

xtac• 16 years ago

tau, go fix mine please

http://www.mattmazur.com/archive/aol-files/downloads/people/...

;(

matt12• 16 years ago

Will do tonight.

davidmathers2• 16 years ago

I didn't know there was such a thing as medication for Asperger's. Does anyone know what it might be?

neurotech13• 16 years ago

There isn't. There is medications that help tangentially only. Antidepressants, Anti-Anxiety & anti-psychotic medications are commonly prescribed to treat the symptoms.

davidmathers2• 16 years ago

I'm just very curious to know which medication is being referenced here:

Now, the new medication prescribed in Woodland has made a positive change in his interactions with other people.

“Talking to strangers was really hard for me,” Lamo says. “I had to script it all in my head and act out normal behaviors in a very conscious way. Essentially, I had to learn how human beings act.”

“Now I no longer feel there’s a surface tension that I have to break through when I talk to somebody, like I’m a fish going after a particularly tasty bug and I have to break through the water to get it,” he continues. “I just talk to somebody, like it’s a natural function.”

Any guesses?

switch007• 16 years ago

Did this not scare anybody else?:

Something about his halting, monotone speech, perhaps slowed by his medication, got the officers’ attention.

An ambulance arrived. “After a few moments of conversation, they just kind of exchanged a look and told me to get on the stretcher,” says Lamo.

We are going to see more of this. The more we label this kind of behaviour, the more people will be institutionalised.

He obviously has the support of his family, so who made this decision?

...where he was placed on a 72-hour involuntary psychiatric hold under a state law allowing the temporary forced hospitalization of those judged dangerous or unable to care for themselves.

devinj2• 16 years ago

It scares me. It reminds me very strongly of the way things worked back in the 50s and 60s. I thought we were past forced institutionalization for disorders that didn't cause serious danger.

akadien• 16 years ago

Give them medicine so they conform. Wouldn't it be beneficial to society to find a way to productively harness the way the brains of those with this condition are differently wired and let them solve problems, rather than killing their natural instinct with drugs?

devinj2• 16 years ago

Drugs don't kill the analytical mind, they just make socializing easier. "Drugs" are not ipso facto bad.

zackattack• 16 years ago

akadien may have been confused by A Beautiful Mind

Ex-Hacker Adrian Lamo Institutionalized for Asperger's

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