Canadian hacker dupes Wal-Mart to win Def Con prize

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://www.thestar.com/business/article/1239150--canadian-hacker-dupes-wal-mart-to-win-def-con-prize

By Jessica McDiarmid
Staff Reporter
TheStar.com
August 8, 2012

It was an elaborate yarn, weeks in the making.

"Gary Darnell" from Wal-Mart's home office in Bentonville, Ark., called 
a store in Western Canada. He lamented having to work the weekend.

He explained that NATO was shopping around for a private retailer who 
could serve as part of its supply chain in the event of a pandemic.

"Or at least that's what they say it’s about," Darnell cracked with the 
store manager. "Who knows, maybe they’re practising for an alien 
invasion -- don’t know, don’t care -- all I know is that the company can 
make a ton of cash off it."

Darnell told the manager he’d be coming up to Canada to help plan the 
exercise, which would see NATO types coming in to survey products and 
later, to buy them in a hurry, as they would in an emergency.

He just needed a little information first.

That’s all from the script written by Canadian Shane MacDougall, a 
hacker/security consultant, for a social engineering contest at the Def 
Con Hacking Conference held each summer in Las Vegas.

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