I rarely get jealous but when I read about this 23-year old tech blogger who hacks code for the love of the scoop, I was pea-green with envy.

 

I felt such a kinship with her. She’s driven by an inexorable passion for getting the “scoop” which as some of you may know is a key driver for me. We also share this hunger for learning which is fed by by the process of getting that elusive scoop – you always learn a ton when you’re sifting through all that information. And, finally, we both got started on this path when we were just kids (she was seven, I was ten).

Where our paths diverge is the level of acclaim she has received for those scoops (and deservedly so). I can’t lie, it makes me a bit glum to realize that level of recognition continues to elude me. And yes, I’ve heard from high-level execs about how much they appreciate my “scoops” on shifts in the culture and how grateful they are for the edge it’s given them in the market. But those private accolades have never made me a superstar. I continue to struggle to connect to a broader audience. Zandl Slant is clearly no Daily Skimm.

But enough bitching about my shortcomings.

I highly recommend you follow Jane Manchun Wong on twitter and read the two fabulous articles I’ve just found on her – one from the BBC, the other from the South China Morning Post.

And if you don’t have the time for an in-depth read, scroll down for my recap of what’s made her so major.

 

In the geeky world of app reverse-engineering, 23-year-old Jane Manchun Wong is a rock star.

• She spends up to 18 hours every weekend combing through code.
• That’s in addition to her paid work as a freelance bug bounty hunter, reporting security flaws to companies before a malicious hacker is able to access their software.

Feature-hunting is a hobby for Ms Wong. She doesn’t profit from her scoops, although she has been offered jobs by media organizations eager for her exclusives.

Some of her scoops are so big, she’s occasionally been accused of insider trading:

• She was the first person to get a detailed look at Facebook’s new dating feature before the designs were released to the public.
• When Facebook announced the feature last spring, the Match Group – which owns the dating app Tindr and website Match.com – saw their stock plunge by more than 20%.
• She discovered that Airbnb was testing a new flight integration feature that alerted hosts on the website when their guests’ planes landed safely.
• And she was the first to point out that Instagram was experimenting with augmented reality profile pictures.

So why does she do it?

A lot of her motivation comes from a love of the apps that she uses on a daily basis, and a desire to understand the changes that are on the way.

• “Once I find a pattern, it will only take five minutes to break the code. But oftentimes in the process I learn something new,” she said.

Despite being a hacker, Ms Wong tries to stay on the right side of trouble. Even as a young child, her tricks tended to delight more than to aggravate.

• One of her earliest hacks was to manipulate a software program that calculated typing speed. By changing the underlying JavaScript code, she hacked her way to first place in a school-wide competition.

How did she get into this?

• At the age of seven, her parents allowed her to go online but strictly monitored her usage, implementing parental controls.
• Wong circumvented those controls by installing the Firefox browser, which prompted her parents to install a password. So she went to the library, borrowed a book on the Linux operating system that came with an installation CD-ROM and figured out how to install the open-source system to replace Windows.

And the rest as they say is history.

The lesson for me is that I need to create more AHA’s for my readers. More “I didn’t know that” moments. I must dial up my game to make it worthier of people’s time. And that is a big challenge.