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How Crackers View Themselves
prostoalex writes "Dr. Orly Turgeman Goldschmidt from Hebrew University of Jerusalem conducted a research to figure out if there any any differences between the classic computer vandal stereotypes and the real life. After surveying 54 Israeli repondents and using the term hacker gratuitously, Goldshmidt found out many computer vandals to be "young, well-educated men without a
criminal record, who belong to the middle or
upper class." 3 out of 54 respondents were women, some of the respondents were married and had children. Goldschmidt's survey seemed to include somewhat low-life representatives of computer security community, the type who goes on shopping sprees on stolen credit cards, so take the findings with a grain of salt."
(it's a shame this story got rejected by
Is this truly the only Earth I can live on?
Many words, like "hacker", have more than one meaning. Just because you don't like one of its meanings doesn't make it wrong.
hacker
gratuitously
There are plenty of articles claiming that most digital attacks come from Brazil. The URL below is just one of them. http://www.securesynergy.com/securitynews/newsitem s/2003/sep-03/290903-07.htm
Crackers don't see themselves as trailer trash, and their mullet is the most stylish way to cut their hair.
They think having the rusty cars in the front yard is useful, because one day you might just need an '84 Trans Am transmission.
They also create websites like this, which was featured on the Cruel site of the day blog.
What's the big hang up of hacker vs cracker? I understand both meaning of hacker and the definition of cracker. So why the persistence with insisting hackers should be called crackers?
...".
In this case the article doesn't even make a distinction between good hackers and bad hackers. It assumes that, by definition, "hacker" means someone who carries out illegal acts.
In the case of Yaron, 39, a former hacker who now owns an information security company...
Whoever wrote this article does equate "hacker" with criminal. Why else label someone who sets up an information security company as a "former hacker"?
The researcher obviously isn't much better. The paper the reporter has used for this piece comes from the "Understanding and Controlling Cybercrime in the 21st Century" session given to/at the American Society of Criminology. Other papers include "Exploring Criminal Traits of Online Offenders", and ""Hardening the Target" in Cyberspace: Assessing Technology, Methods, and Information for Committing and Combating Cyber Crime".
From the latter...
"The presence of new computer technology aids cybercriminals from hackers to cyberterrorists, offenders who, to a great degree, depend upon the lack of technological skills of law enforcement
From this I conclude that all the attendees, including the reporter, left that little session assuming "to hack" meant "to commit an illegal act with a computer". Is that really the idea you want the police to have when, if casually asked, your brother/sister/parents might respond that you "work with computers and are a bit of a hacker"?
I hope not!
Where's the Kaboom?
There's supposed to be an Earth-shattering Kaboom.
Actualy, one of the nice things about the english language is that words can have multiple meanings. I agree that the term "hacker" dosn't really apply to programmers, but generaly the 'benevolent' version applies to someone who plays around with computers a lot. The 'malign' version has always applied to people who break into computer systems.
Cracker always meant breaking copy protection.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Same with hacker. There are people who've called themselfs "Hacker" longer than the word was used to refer to a criminal activity and it would be very sad if people reviewing those documents started using that as an admittion of guilt.
The word "hacker" doesn't necessarily mean criminal- it only means "unauthorized", which frequently overlaps with illegality.
However, "unauthorized computer use" has ALWAYS been part of the definition of hacker.
Do you know who was the first person to call himself a "computer hacker"? It was Pete Samson who in 1958 snuck through a basement window to feed his own punchcard stack into MIT's computer.
People who claim hacker means "extremely skilled computer programmer" are actually the ones trying to redefine existing words. (This is similar to the way some people today want to redefine "witch" as a practitioner of Wicca).
It is likewise incorrect to claim that "cracker" is an acceptable word for "computer vandals". Cracker means someone who penetrates a security device to access something he shouldn't. Vandalism like DOS is usually accomplished without any security breaches.
Well, that's still the wrong usage, geeks hack into people's computers, nerds just watch Star Trek and... um... eat crackers, I guess.
That's precisely backwards. For some reason, in the past 5-7 years, internet-based communities decided to swap the definition of nerd and geek.
The original definition of geek came from a professional carnival performer who ate live animals. It evolved to mean anyone who was a complete social outcast.
Nerd is a re-spelling of nurd, which is a word used in the 40s to indicate a student whose courseload was so overwhelming that he had no time left for routine hygiene. It came to mean someone whose social incompatiblity was compensated for by superior mental qualities in some fields.
Nerd is a mixed positive/negative term; geek is strictly negative. At least you got freak right. (Geeks are asocial because of inability; nerds because of no desire; freaks could be sociable, but willingly are not)
- NBC Dateline was successfully sued by GM after they admitted placing incindiery devices in the gas tanks of trucks. NBC was trying to show that the trucks were dangerous in side impacts; when the demonstrations failed to produce a fire, the crew placed igniters in (or near) the gas tank to produce the desired effect.
- On a Veteran's day special, Jessica Lynch told Barbara Walters she never fired her weapon in combat. Numerous news agencies reported that she had been shot and went down shooting, in spite of the fact that her fellow soldiers said otherwise. Apparently, the idea of a soldier being captured after being knocked unconscious by a vehicle accident wasn't juicy enough for them.
- In the late 90's, the "black church burnings in the South" scandal made the news, and several prominent celebrities called for the FBI to investigate the matter. The media neglected to report that church arson in the South had been on the deline for several years. Perhaps they felt that the South was starting to lose its racist image, so they "corrected" it by making up a story with no basis in fact.
- The supposed "sex scandal" in the Catholic Church. The popular media listed names of accused priests, in spite of the fact that many already had their names cleared! In some cases, the accusers admitted publicly that they made up the stories, yet the media failed to report this. The others who had actually been convicted had been defrocked and barred from ministry, in some cases as long as 20 years ago. By the time the story broke, the so-called "needed reforms" in the Diocesan structure had been implemented for 10 years!
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And let's not forget about that New York Times reporter who faked almost half of his articles over the course of a year or so.
I could go on, but I'll spare you. These stories were carried by major news agencies, some by the AP. This is not simply a matter of a someone making a mistake - this is routine practice for journalists. Granted, they might teach ethics in school, but there's a de facto assumption among journalists that they'll get a controversial story whether or not one exists.The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.