Law enforcement officials didn't see it so benignly, though, and Mitnick was caught in 1988 and sent to prison for a year on a computer-fraud charge. Prosecutors alleged that Mitnick could somehow start a nuclear war by hacking into the NORAD computer system and whistling into the phone - a charge Mitnick calls laughable - so he wasn't allowed to use the prison telephone, and he was placed in solitary confinement. After he was released, Mitnick learned that the government was planning to charge him with supervised-­release violations, so he fled
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Mitnick managed to elude his pursuers for three years. He moved across the country - sometimes under the alias Eric Weiss, a variation on Houdini's real name - and chose his new homes based on Money's rankings of the best places to live. Eventually,­ he was caught in North Carolina, where he copped a plea deal and was put back in prison­ for five years, from 1995 to 2000.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Mitnick admitted that he broke into computer systems and stole proprietary software. As part of his scheme, the Department of Justice said in its news release announcing the plea deal, Mitnick acknowledged that he tampered with college computer systems, stole e-mails, monitored computer systems, and tried to obtain software by posing as a company employee. The Department of Justice said the victims of Mitnick's hacking lost millions of dollars in damages from lost licensing fees, marketing delays, lost research and development, and repairs made to compromised computer systems.

Government Payback