Legendary Vietnamese Black Hat Hacker Becomes a Government Cyber Agent

A well-known Vietnamese hacker, Ngo Minh Hieu from Ho Chi Minh city who excels in his scandalous hacking activities has transformed to being a Government cyber agent.

He was recruited by the Vietnamese government to educate the people on how to protect themselves against the sort of crime that he committed. Hieu said he has peace of mind and is happy to work legitimately even though he does not earn much.

The Vietnamese Hacking Spells

He was infamous for his campaign in the United States. In his late teens at Nile University, he discovered a vulnerability and exposed credit cards on the school website and was able to exploit this website by getting access to their credential information.

He was able to obtain a huge amount of money which he used to buy concert and event tickets. In his 20s, he made US$100,000 a month hacking and selling about 200 million US social security numbers.

Being an administrator of a dark web forum, Ngo Minh Hieu became the perpetrator of a massive theft scheme. He stole card credentials and social security numbers by hacking companies’ websites and penetrating their databases. Thus he proceeds to make sales of this data to cybercriminals.

Hieu was Arrested

In February 2013, this hacker’s legendary activity diminished when he was deceived in a sting operation by the United States, which led to his arrest. He was given a sentence of 45 years which was later reduced to 13.

During this period, he felt compassionate about the notorious threat operation he has done in the past. But he struggled through and to get by these days. The hacker was then released in 2019 and returned to Vietnam in 2020.

Following this ordeal, Ngo Minh Hieu was recruited by his authoritarian government to halt cyber-criminal scandals. He disclosed how his new job involved hosting consecutive enlightenment programs to create awareness among Vietnamese citizens about the implications of the same sort of hacking operations he perpetrated.

Hieu was persistent in his new cyber agent role in tracking cybercriminals who plan to get access to Vietnamese data. He disclosed his hacking life in a good manner to black hat hackers online.