Analysis of 250,000 Hacker Conversations

Orome1 writes "Imperva released a report (PDF) analyzing the content and activities of an online hacker forum with nearly 220,000 registered members, although many are dormant. The forum is used by hackers for training, communications, collaboration, recruitment, commerce and even social interaction. Commercially, this forum serves as a marketplace for selling of stolen data and attack software. The chat rooms are filled with technical subjects ranging from advice on attack planning to solicitations for help with specific campaigns."

Comments

The word 'hacker'

[telekon]

you're using it wrong.

Re:The word 'hacker'

[ackthpt]

you're using it wrong.

I've pretty much given up on it. You can't blame /., it's the Medi-uh who have tarred Hackers with by association with Crackers and criminals.

You start explaining the difference between the two to anyone and they'll think you're some kinda weirdo. You're in luck if their eyes simply glaze over rather than they go call DHS and report you as some sort of undesirable.

Re:The word 'hacker'

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm, you're quite mistaken. It's a much more general racial slur that's often directed at any white person or people, regardless of where they come from and regardless of their opinions of other races.

It's quite often used in predominantly black and Hispanic areas of cities like N.Y.C, L.A. and D.C., where it's often directed at white police officers, white public school teachers, white social workers, and other white people who are often among the most tolerant and supportive of other races.

Re:The word 'hacker'

[Vellmont]

Exactly! Words never change meaning, as we all know!

I'm sure you'll also support my quest against people who use the wrong definition of undertaker (originally meant entrepreneur, not this bastardised meaning of the funeral guy!, and doctor (what as we all know really means teacher, not medical doctor!). I'm always the first to correct people whenever they use the wrong definitions of these words. Long live the originalists!

Re:The word 'hacker'

[pnot]

I entirely agree: I keep telling people that it means "an implement for hacking, chopping wood, or breaking up earth", as it has done since the 1400s, but there's always some twat whining that it's got something to do with computer programming. Don't these people know that once a word is coined, its meaning is set in stone for eternity?

Re:Social Interaction?

[ackthpt]

You mean hackers get dates there?

They try .. all those love letters to Darth Vader, Mal and Tom Servo come back unopened...

No, they aren't.

[FoolishOwl]

In the first place, the meaning of a word is its use. Using "hacker" to mean people who bypass computer security to steal data or sabotage systems has been the overwhelmingly dominant use of the expression for thirty years, well-established in journalism and entertainment. I've read the essays by RMS and ESR describing the "hacker ethic", and I've read Steven Levy's "Hackers", and those are literally the only places I've ever seen "hacker" used with the positive meaning of unorthodox, enthusiastic, and highly skilled programmers, aside from the occasional references to RMS, ESR, and Levy, to complain about the prevailing usage of the term

Second, even from those accounts of the early history of programming at MIT, it was clear that "hacker" had an ambiguous meaning, at best. As I recall, Levy describes "hack" as a slang term in general use at MIT, to mean a clever and well-executed prank, such as disassembling a car and reassembling it in the owner's room. The MIT hackers were notorious for ignoring inconvenient rules governing computer access; Levy mentions how many of them took correspondence courses on locksmithing, so they could bypass locked doors.

Re:No, they aren't.

[interval1066]

The term "hacker" was coined long before computers and had nothing to do with sabotage or bypassing computer security.

Indeed. Unfortunately, the way language works, the popular usage gets dibs. See Oxford's and how they update it every year.