Hacking the Hacker

48Profile: Fahmida Y. Rashid

I’ve been a technical computer security journalist for almost 30 years. While I’m not the best writer, I do consider myself one of the better technical writers, in that I live and breathe my subject. When I read other computer security writers’ work, I don’t usually learn much. That changed when I was introduced to a new writer at InfoWorld magazine by our Editor‐in‐Chief, Eric Knorr. Eric was very excited about hiring her and I soon knew why. Like computer security journalist Brian Krebs (profiled in Chapter 29), Fahmida Y. Rashid is an incredible computer security researcher, although in a different way. I’ve yet to read a single article of hers where I do not learn something new. She groks her subject in a way that continues to surprise me for someone who isn’t doing computer security as their day job. She really understands the technical details and is able to ferret out the “BS” better than anyone in the game. She occasionally sends me technical questions about something she doesn’t understand, to which I almost always reply “I don’t know either,” but a few days later after more research, she is publishing an easy‐to‐understand explanation. She finds her answers somewhere.

She is an experienced information security journalist. She has worked at eWeek as the senior technical editor for the CRN Test Center, covered network infrastructure for Forbes.com, served as Editor‐in‐Chief for an RSA Conference, and written for dozens of respected magazines ...