Hollywood Treats Hackers Pretty Well

angry tapir writes "According to Damian Gordon, a lecturer at the Dublin Institute of Technology, hackers are treated pretty well by movie-makers. Gordon studied 50 movies, produced over five decades, to help write an academic paper for the International Journal of Internet Technology and Secured Transactions. The results amazed him. In the movies, most hackers aren't teenaged whiz-kids. They're professionals, over 30 years old, who work in IT."

Comments

Yes, but

[colmore]

Too bad scenes of someone typing furiously at a computer are boring as hell.

Re:Yes, but

[uberjack]

As are command prompts, apparently. I'm still searching for that elusive hacking app with fancy graphics and controls that's portrayed in all hacking movies.

Re:Yes, but

[rsborg]

Too bad scenes of someone typing furiously at a computer are boring as hell.

You know, I think movies like Wargames, Matrix (and to a smaller extent, Sneakers) did this pretty decently. For example, the scene where Neo is first contacted by Trinity is a great example of how powerful text can be, if used properly.

Re:Yes, but

[Jeffrey_Walsh VA]

check out the "ease-of-use of the Zeus crimeware toolkit":
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/zeus-king-underground-crimeware-toolkits
In the YouTube video at 1:48 you can see the ZuesBuilder gui

You call that well treated?

[Rysc]

The person's themselves may be realistic in terms of age and profession, but nothing else is well treated. Movies continue to routinely portray unrealistic and nonsensical computer interactions and capabilities, which is particularly harmful to a depiction of a hacker.

Re:You call that well treated?

[Manip]

While hackers are often shown to have super-technical abilities that make no sense, so are the "good guys." I think to some degree it kind of counter-balances the whole thing.

Computers/technology isn't accurate in films but that is a small part of a much larger science rant in which all of the fields of science are abused for your viewing pleasure, biology, chemistry, engineering, and psychics.

Heck even psychology is abused in movies and that is borderline pseudoscience anyway....

Re:You call that well treated?

[Em Emalb]

I beg to differ, I'm pretty sure Hugh Jackman's character in Swordfish was treated pretty well...during some of the "hacking" scenes, anyway.

Re:You call that well treated?

[ShiningSomething]

It's the same phenomenon at play in journalism. The more you know about a topic, the more you realize they have no idea what they are talking about.

Re:You call that well treated?

[Xelios]

CSI is particularly bad for this, "see if you can enhance that license plate"

Stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Why did this "study" get funding? Because it would make headlines.

Poor old Professor Knowsmath and his study of non-commutive ring structures in siberian oscillations. He'll have to make do with the money the university raised from raffling off that cat (4 euros).

Re:News Flash!

[0racle]

If they had to stick with real depictions of, well in this case hackers, every movie about it would look like Office Space and Dilbert. We've seen those so apparently no other movie about or related to the subject can ever be made.

Most people in any profession, if they can't let go of their insistence on reality, dislike or down right hate movie portrayals of what they do.

Obligatory

[srussia]

If we are going to stare at a screen for two hours we want eye candy.

I don't even see the code. All I see is blonde, brunette, red-head...

Re:Obligatory

[Sechr Nibw]

No, you need to get one of those matte finish monitors, the anti-glare. You're just seeing your reflection in the monitor. It's been awhile since you showered and shaved, so you probably don't recognize him.

Sneakers

[jgtg32a]

Sneakers is the best hacking movie ever.

Re:Sneakers

[evilviper]

Sneakers is the best hacking movie ever.

"War Games"

Serious subject.
Culturally significant.
Perhaps the most realistic "hacking" in Hollywood history.
All tech involved was just a small step removed from the real thing.
Dated today, but holds up very well.

Re:Sneakers

[sootman]

The best hacking films are...

• 1983 - War Games - realistic depiction of old-school hacking
• 1992 - Sneakers - realistic depiction of social engineering
• 1995 - Hackers - Agelina Jolie briefly topless
• 2001 - Swordfish - long scene of Halle Berry topless

The best hacking film of all time, therefore, is Swordfish, followed by a two-way tie between War Games and Sneakers. Hackers comes in fourth--not even a naked 19-year-old Angelina Jolie could save that piece of shit. :-)