If his success was dependent upon the goodwill of some mysterious organisation, why not give them a share of the credit too, even if just anonymously?
I think maybe the HN community is so heavily open source/software oriented that it's hard to realise that most complex, long term efforts in the world do need funding, even if they aren't full time. Even most artists need some sort of funding, hence why his photography was commercial. Passports, even quite old passports, have all sorts of anti-forging techniques that take time to overcome. I think the book mentions the invention of watermarking ... and that's really just the start. Here's an article on US Passports:
Kaminsky also forged French currency, which is also rather non-trivial and has been so for a long time. This isn't open source where you can buy a thousand dollars worth of equipment and the rest is just your free time, donated to the world. Obtaining the specialised equipment, building up a network capable of securely and anonymously routing forged documents across the world, training new generations of forgers - all this takes a lot of time and effort.
I think maybe the HN community is so heavily open source/software oriented that it's hard to realise that most complex, long term efforts in the world do need funding, even if they aren't full time. Even most artists need some sort of funding, hence why his photography was commercial. Passports, even quite old passports, have all sorts of anti-forging techniques that take time to overcome. I think the book mentions the invention of watermarking ... and that's really just the start. Here's an article on US Passports:
http://gizmodo.com/your-passports-complex-security-tech-expl...
Kaminsky also forged French currency, which is also rather non-trivial and has been so for a long time. This isn't open source where you can buy a thousand dollars worth of equipment and the rest is just your free time, donated to the world. Obtaining the specialised equipment, building up a network capable of securely and anonymously routing forged documents across the world, training new generations of forgers - all this takes a lot of time and effort.