I knew a few security people at Google and frankly, geohot isn't even in their class. He's a smart guy. Did some stuff. isn't particularly special or significantly better than a typical engineer in my experience. Mainly he seems to jump deep into things he doesn't know much about (I'm talking about post-security) and say a bunch of irresponsible things then fail to deliver a complete product, entirely predictably.

He's the sort of person you want to ensconce in a safe place far from others, with the freedom to experiment, to come up with disruptive ideas to influence others.

> I knew a few security people at Google and frankly, geohot isn't even in their class.

This is an exceptional claim, who might these people be and what initiatives do they lead?

The first one I'm thinking of is Michal Zalewski who wrote AFL and is now the VP of Security Engineering at Snap. Also Lea Kissner who implemented security for stubby and now runs Info Security for Twitter (one of the few remaining engineering departments Musk wants to keep) But there were a bunch of folks, most of whom you've never heard of, because they were quietly solving problems behind the scenes. Damien Menscher comes to mind- he was core to Google's DoS blocking which had a massive impact on users for the last decade.

> there were a bunch of folks, most of whom you've never heard of, because they were quietly solving problems

I figured you'd say this. Just had to see you type the words out. Don't be angry when those you seek to refute don't see you worth arguing with when this is the type of rhetoric you have.

Sounds like you're trolling? OK/ If you're operating in good faith, I honestly don't see your point about rhetoric. His performance is not atypical in silicon valley, a place where I have been an engineer and academic for 3 decades. That's all.

This is a lazy troll. Geohot is famous because he used to loudly brag about his achievements.

The people making millions selling exploits to the likes of Vupen/Zerodium have very strong incentive to keep their mouths shut.

> I knew a few security people at Google and frankly, geohot isn't even in their class

Who, exactly, are you talking about here? And what are their track record?

> Or, you have some good examples that the average security researcher have a better track record than that?

Geohot can be simultaneously be significantly above average, and not anywhere near as special as some people on HN like to represent him.

He certainly doesn’t have anywhere near the track record to not seem downright unhinged in the context of this blog post.