CAP AND FRAUD

HAVE COMPUTER HACKS, BOMB THREATS, IDENTITY THEFT, AND OTHER CRIMES STYMIED THE WORLD’S BEST HOPE TO STOP CLIMATE CHANGE?

MCKENZIE FUNK

The client wanted carbon credits: tradable serial numbers that confer the right to pollute the Earth with invisible, odorless gas. Jugga, as the client called himself, planned to steal the credits, quickly resell them, and become rich overnight—but he needed the Black Dragon to hack into a computer system to help him do it. The Dragon, who in online forums advertised his services as a corporate spy, was sure he could hack anything. But when Jugga contacted him in June 2011, the hacker had no idea what carbon credits even were. “I didn’t think anyone would be stupid enough to come up with that,” the Dragon says of the concept. The two men communicated via secure online chats, using their pseudonyms. In real life, the Dragon was 31-year-old Matthew Beddoes, a…

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Foreign Policy (Digital) - 1 Issue, January - February 2015

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