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| The word 'Hacker' refers to any of the following people: Simon Fields | |||
| {{dablink|This article is about computer hacking. For other uses, see ] and ].}} | |||
| '''Hacker''' has several common meanings, the unifying characteristic of which is only that it refers to a person who is an avid computer ]. It is most commonly used as a ] by the ] to refer to a person who engages in illegal ] remotely via some sort of communications network (e.g., the Internet, a ] or a dial-up network); its original meaning referred to an unauthorized user of the telephone company network (now called a ]) but it can also refer to people engaged in ethical computer hacking (e.g., debugging or fixing security problems), to the members of the open source and free software community, or to home computer hobbyists.<ref name="shapiro">Fred Shapiro: . ''American Dialect Society Mailing List'' (13. Juni 2003)</ref> | |||
| Simon is the world's foremost hacker, and only allows others to call him 'The Grand Hackmaster'. While this is a source of contention for those around him, they should know their place. While not hacking shit up, Simon likes to spend his time <CENSORED FOR BEING TOO FUCKING AWESOME> | |||
| ==Overview== | |||
| At least three major hacker subcultures, characterized by their largely distinct historical development, use the term 'Hacker' in their ] for self-identification.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://webzone.k3.mah.se/k3jolo/HackerCultures/origins.htm|title=webzone.k3.mah.se/k3jolo/HackerCultures/origins.htm<!--INSERT TITLE-->}}</ref> They are centered around different, but partially overlapping aspects of computers and have conflicting ideas about who may legitimately be called a hacker (see ]). | |||
| Most know Simon's hacks, or 'Shacks' as he calls them, as they are quite famous. For instance, Simon once hacked every computer in the fucking world, leaving only this message: | |||
| In computer security, a hacker is someone who focuses on security mechanisms. In common use, which was popularized by the mass media, that refers to someone who illegally breaks into computer and network systems. That is, the media portrays the 'hacker' as a villain. Nevertheless, parts of the subculture see their aim in correcting security problems and use the word in a positive sense. They operate under a code of the ], in which it's acknowledged that breaking into other people's computers is bad, but that discovering and exploiting security mechanisms and breaking into computers is nevertheless an interesting aspect that can be done in an ethical and legal way. | |||
| System.out.println("THE SLIMINISTER STRIKES AGAIN!"); | |||
| This use is contrasted by the different understanding of the word as a person who follows a spirit of playful cleverness and loves programming. It is found in an originally academic movement unrelated to computer security and most visibly associated with ] and ]. It also has a ], based on the idea that writing software and sharing the result is a good idea, but only on a voluntary basis, and that information should be free, but that it's not up to the hacker to make it free by breaking into private computer systems. Academic hackers disassociate from the mass media's pejorative use of the word 'hacker' referring to computer security, and usually prefer the term 'cracker' for that meaning. In a third meaning, the term refers to computer hobbyists who push the limits of their software or hardware. | |||
| You may also remember another of Simon's hacks: He hacked into town dullard and rumored drunk David Janociak's laptop, virusing the shit out of it and such. | |||
| ==Computer security hackers== | |||
| {{main|Hacker (computer security)}} | |||
| His heightened coding ability most likely resulted from years of being superior to everyone else in almost every way. (He is sadly only mediocre at checkers. Simon once is quoted as saying, "Checkers fucking blows, who invented that stupid fucking game.") | |||
| ], author of ]]] | |||
| Simon taught the art of hacking for a short while, but had to stop after the class could not stop staring at his impressive member long enough to practice their newly learned hacks. Why he taught the class naked and with a full, lustrous erection has yet to be determined. | |||
| In ], a hacker is a person who specializes in work with the security mechanisms for computer and network systems. The subculture around such hackers is termed network hacker subculture, hacker scene or computer underground. While including those who endeavor to strengthen such mechanisms, it is more often used by the ] and popular culture to refer to those who seek access despite these security measures. Accordingly, the term bears strong connotations that may be favorable or pejorative. | |||
| The network hacker subculture initially developed in the context of ] during the 1960s and the microcomputer ] of the 1980s. It is implicated with '']'' and the '']'' newsgroup. | |||
| By ], hacking in the sense of breaking computer security had already been in use as computer jargon,<ref>See the , entry "hacker", last meaning.</ref> but there was no public awareness about such activities.<ref>{{cite paper|title=Computer hacking: Where did it begin and how did it grow?|publisher=WindowSecurity.com|date=October 16, 2002|url=http://www.windowsecurity.com/whitepapers/Computer_hacking_Where_did_it_begin_and_how_did_it_grow_.html}}</ref> However, the release of the movie '']'' that year raised the public belief that computer security hackers (especially teenagers) could be a threat to national security. This concern became real when a gang of teenage ] in ] known as ] broke into computer systems throughout the ] and ], including those of ], ] and ]. The case quickly grew media attention,<ref>{{Citation|newspaper=]|year=1983|date=September 27, 1983}}</ref><ref>{{Citation|last=Elmer-DeWitt|first=Philip|title=The 414 Gang Strikes Again|newspaper=]|pages=p. 75|year=1983|date=Aug. 29, 1983|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,949797,00.html}}</ref> and 17-year-old Neal Patrick emerged as the spokesman for the gang, including a cover story in '']'' entitled "Beware: Hackers at play", with Patrick's photograph on the cover.<ref>{{Citation|title=Beware: Hackers at play|newspaper=]|pages=pp. 42-46,48|year=1983|date=September 5, 1983}}</ref> The Newsweek article appears to be the first use of the word ''hacker'' by the mainstream media in the pejorative sense. | |||
| As a result of news coverage, congressman ] called for an investigation and new laws about computer hacking.<ref>{{cite web|publisher=Washington Post|url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50606-2002Jun26.html|year=2002|accessdate=2006-04-14|title=Timeline: The U.S. Government and Cybersecurity}}</ref> | |||
| Neal Patrick testified before the ] on ] ] about the dangers of computer hacking, and six bills concerning computer crime were introduced in the House that year.<ref>David Bailey, "Attacks on Computers: Congressional Hearings and Pending Legislation," sp, p. 180, 1984 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy, 1984.</ref> As a result of these laws against computer criminality, ], ] and ] hackers try to distinguish themselves from each other, depending on the legality of their activities. | |||
| ==Open Source and Free Software hackers== | |||
| {{main|Hacker (academia)}} | |||
| In the Open Source and Free Software hacker culture, a computer hacker is a person who enjoys designing software and building programs with a sense for aesthetics and playful cleverness. | |||
| According to ],<ref>Eric S. Raymond: (2000)</ref> the Open source and Free Software hacker subculture developed in the 1960s among ‘academic hackers’<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.faqs.org/docs/artu/ch20s06.html|title=www.faqs.org/docs/artu/ch20s06.html<!--INSERT TITLE-->}}</ref> working on early ]s in ] environments. After 1969 it fused with the technical culture of the pioneers of the ]. The ] machine AI at ], which was running the ] operating system and was connected to the Arpanet, provided an early hacker meeting point. After 1980 the subculture coalesced with the culture of ], and after 1987 with elements of the early ] hobbyists that themselves had connections to radio amateurs in the 1920s. Since the mid-1990s, it has been largely coincident with what is now called the ] and ]. | |||
| Many programmers have been labeled "great hackers,"<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.paulgraham.com/gh.html | title=Great Hackers | author=] | year=2004}}</ref> but the specifics of who that label applies to is a matter of opinion. Certainly major contributors to ] such as ] and ], as well as the inventors of popular software such as ] (]), and ] and ] (the ]) are likely to be included in any such list; see also ]. People primarily known for their contributions to the consciousness of the academic hacker culture include ], the founder of the free software movement and the ], president of the ] and author of the famous ] text editor as well as the ], and ], one of the founders of the ] and writer of the famous text ] and many other essays, maintainer of the ] (which was previously maintained by ]). | |||
| Within the academic hacker culture, the term hacker is also used for a programmer who reaches a goal by employing a series of modifications to extend existing ] or resources. In this sense, it can have a negative connotation of using ]s to accomplish programming tasks that are ugly, inelegant, and inefficient. This derogatory form of the noun "]" is even used among users of the positive sense of "hacker" (some argue that it should not be, due to this negative meaning; others argue that some kludges can, for all their ugliness and imperfection, still have "hack value"). In a very universal sense, a hacker also means someone who makes things work beyond perceived limits in a clever way in general, for example ]s.<ref>See for example the </ref> | |||
| ==Home computer hackers== | |||
| {{Expand-section|date=August 2007}} | |||
| {{main|Hacker (hobbyist)}} | |||
| The home computer hacking subculture relates to the hobbyist home computing of the late 1970s, beginning with the availability of ]. An influential organization was the ]. | |||
| The areas that did not fit together with the academic hacker subculture focus mainly on commercial ], ] and exceptional computer programming (]), but also to the modification of computer hardware and other electronic devices, see ]. | |||
| == Overlaps and differences == | |||
| The main basic difference between academic and computer security hackers is their mostly separate historical origin and development. However, the ''Jargon File'' reports that considerable overlap existed for the early phreaking at the beginning of the 1970s. An article from MIT's student paper ''The Tech'' used the term hacker in this context already in 1963 in its pejorative meaning for someone messing with the phone system.<ref name=shapiro/> The overlap quickly started to break when people joined in the activity who did it in a less responsible way.<ref>http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/P/phreaking.html</ref> This was the case after the publication of an article exposing the activities of Draper and Engressias. | |||
| Academic hackers usually work openly and use their real name, while computer security hackers prefer secretive groups and identity-concealing aliases. Also, their activities in practice are largely distinct. The former focus on creating new and improving existing infrastructure (especially the software environment they work with), while the latter primarily and strongly emphasize the general act of circumvention of security measures, with the effective use of the knowledge (which can be to report and help fixing the security bugs, or exploitation for criminal purpose) being only rather secondary. The most visible difference in these views was in the design of the MIT hackers' ], which deliberately didn't have any security measures. | |||
| There are some subtle overlaps, however, since basic knowledge about computer security is also common within the academic hacker community. For example, Ken Thompson noted during his 1983 ] lecture that it is possible to add code to the ] "login" command that would accept either the intended encrypted ] or a particular known password, allowing a back door into the system with the latter password. He named his invention the "]." Furthermore, Thompson argued, the ] itself could be modified to automatically generate the rogue code, to make detecting the modification even harder. Because the compiler is itself a program generated from a compiler, the Trojan horse could also be automatically installed in a new compiler program, without any detectable modification to the source of the new compiler. However, Thompson disassociated himself strictly from the computer security hackers: "I would like to criticize the press in its handling of the 'hackers,' the 414 gang, the Dalton gang, etc. The acts performed by these kids are vandalism at best and probably trespass and theft at worst. ... I have watched kids testifying before Congress. It is clear that they are completely unaware of the seriousness of their acts." <ref>{{cite journal|first=Ken|last=Thompson|title=Reflections on Trusting Trust|journal=Communications of the ACM|volume=27|issue=8|date=August 1984|url=http://www.ece.cmu.edu/~ganger/712.fall02/papers/p761-thompson.pdf}}</ref> | |||
| The academic hacker community sees secondary circumvention of security mechanisms as legitimate if it is done to get practical barriers out of the way for doing actual work. In special forms, that can even be an expression of playful cleverness.<ref>http://gnu.mirrorspace.org/philosophy/rms-hack.html</ref> However, the systematic and primary engagement in such activities is not one of the actual interests of the academic hacker subculture and it doesn't have significance in its actual activities, either.<ref>http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/C/cracker.html</ref> A further difference is that, historically, academic hackers were working at academic institutions and used the computing environment there. In contrast, the prototypical computer security hacker had access exclusively to a home computer and a modem. However since the mid-1990s, with home computers that could run Unix-like operating systems and with inexpensive internet home access being available for the first time, many people from outside of the academic world started to take part in the academic hacking subculture. | |||
| Since the mid-1980s, there are some overlaps in ideas and members with the computer security hacking community. The most prominent case is Robert T. Morris, who was a user of MIT-AI, yet wrote the ]. The ''Jargon File'' hence calls him "a true hacker who blundered".<ref>http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/pt03.html#bibliography</ref> Nevertheless, members of the academic subculture have a tendency to look down on and disassociate from these overlaps. They commonly refer disparagingly to people in the computer security subculture as crackers, and refuse to accept any definition of hacker that encompasses such activities (see the ]). The computer security hacking subculture on the other hand tends not to distinguish between the two subcultures as harshly, instead acknowledging that they have much in common including many members, political and social goals, and a love of learning about technology. They restrict the use of the term cracker to their categories of ]s and ] hackers instead. | |||
| All three subcultures have relations to hardware modifications. In the early days of network hacking, phreaks were building ]es and various variants. The academic hacker culture has stories about several hardware hacks in its folklore, such as a mysterious 'magic' switch attached to a PDP-10 computer in MIT's AI lab, that, when turned off, crashed the computer.<ref>http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/magic-story.html</ref> The early hobbyist hackers built their home computers themselves, from construction kits. However, all these activities have died out during the 1980s, when the phone network switched to digitally controlled switchboards, causing network hacking to shift to dialling remote computers with modems, when preassembled inexpensive home computers were available, and when academic institutions started to give individual mass-produced workstation computers to scientists instead of using a central timesharing system. The only kind of widespread hardware modification nowadays is ]. | |||
| An encounter of the academic and the computer security hacker subculture occurred at the end of the 1980s, when a group of computer security hackers, sympathizing with the Chaos Computer Club (who disclaimed any knowledge in these activities), broke into computers of American military organizations and academic institutions. They sold data from these machines to the Soviet secret service, one of them in order to fund his drug addiction. The case could be solved when scientists from the environment of the academic hacker subculture found ways to log the attacks and to trace them back. '']'', a German film adaption with fictional elements, shows the events from the attackers' perspective. ], one of the system administrators who helped to catch them, described the case in his book '']'' and in the TV documentary ''The KGB, the Computer, and Me''<ref>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NbURDW6CZY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qZCzcGLNN8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qV-HJDTifGQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnjAm17IfCA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8FgvjkmkSQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJKyHNgrLNw</ref> from the other perspective. | |||
| Often hackers with similar interests join groups and collaborate their intuitive minds to achieve often extraordinary results. They develop jargon which is "incomprehensible to outsiders" (Levy 1984, p.9). The academic text 'Hackers: Heroes of the computer revolution' author Stephen Levy writes about a group of university student hackers which use their own terms to conceal their works. In this group's case 'losing' is "when a piece of equipment is not working" (Levy 1984, p.9) and 'munged' is "when a piece of equipment is ruined" (Levy 1984, p.9). | |||
| Hackers of the computer security sort are forever attempting to impress or shock. They may be impressing their fellow hackers or shocking the administrators of the program they have just successfully hacked by cracking what was once considered to be the 'uncrackable'. | |||
| The term ] can be coined to many different meanings however it can be traced back to "describe the elaborate college pranks that...students would regularly devise" (Levy, 1984 p.10. To be considered a 'hack' was an honour among like-minded peers as "to qualify as a hack, the feat must be imbued with innovation, style and technical virtuosity" (levy, 1984 p.10. Many of these talented college students choose to follow their hobby to either become an academic hacker and go on to work for large companies maintaining and continually protecting their highly secretive data. Constantly attempting to 'crack' the security barriers of the company they work for before external threats can. Once they have found the crack they then work to rectify the potential security breach. Due to the dynamic nature of the internet this is a never-ending task which requires great skill and talent. There is always a way around even the latest and most advance internet or ] security system. Corporations spend large amounts of money protecting their data, however often the best money spent is on the staff hired to constantly challenge their systems and therefore improving its security. | |||
| - Computer security hackers are the opposite of the academic hacker in that these are exactly who companies are attempting to prevent. They work covertly forever attempting to conceal one's identity and enter another's database. Mostly such hackers are merely 'proving a point' by showing they are able to enter a system that they are not authorised to do so. This may be simply for the reason of impressing their fellow hacker counterparts. Others operate with the intention of severe criminal activity, perhaps entering a bank's highly secretive data system and transferring money out of one's account without even leaving their home PC. This action is just like physically robbing a bank though all performed through a computer. Thankfully examples such as this are becoming very infrequent as companies quickly improve their systems. | |||
| == See also == | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| == References == | |||
| {{reflist}} | |||
| == Related books == | |||
| <div class="references-small"> | |||
| * Michael Hasse: (1994). | |||
| </div> | |||
| {{wikibooks|Hacking}} | |||
| === Computer security hacking books === | |||
| <div class="references-small"> | |||
| * Logik Bomb: (1997) | |||
| * Katie Hafner & John Markoff: ''Cyberpunk: Outlaws and Hackers on the Computer Frontier'' (Simon & Schuster, 1991), ISBN 0-671-68322-5. | |||
| * {{cite book | authorlink = Bruce Sterling | last = Sterling | first = Bruce | url = http://www.mit.edu/hacker/hacker.html | title = The Hacker Crackdown | year = 1992 | id = ISBN 0-553-08058-X | publisher = Bantam }} | |||
| * {{cite book | last = Slatalla | first = Michelle | coauthors = Joshua Quittner | title = ]: The Gang That Ruled Cyberspace | year = 1995 | id = ISBN 0-06-017030-1 | publisher = HarperCollins }} | |||
| * {{cite book | last = Dreyfus | first = Suelette | title = ] | year = 1997 | id = ISBN 1-86330-595-5 | publisher = Mandarin }} | |||
| * {{cite book | last = Verton | first = Dan | title = The Hacker Diaries : Confessions of Teenage Hackers | year = 2002 | id = ISBN 0-07-222364-2 | publisher = McGraw-Hill Osborne Media }} | |||
| </div> | |||
| === Free Software/Open Source hacking books === | |||
| <div class="references-small"> | |||
| * Eric S. Raymond, Guy L. Steele (Eds.): '']'' (The MIT Press, 1996), ISBN 0262680920 | |||
| * {{cite book | first = Eric S. | last = Raymond | title = ] | publisher = Prentice Hall International | year = 2003 | id = ISBN 0131429019}} | |||
| * {{cite book | authorlink = Steven Levy | last = Levy | first = Steven | title = ] | year = 1984 | id = ISBN 0-385-19195-2 | publisher = Doubleday }} | |||
| *] (1984),''The Second Self: Computers and the Human Spirit'' , New Edition: MIT Press 2005, ISBN 0262701111 | |||
| * {{cite book | authorlink = Paul Graham | last = Graham | first = Paul | title = ] | year = 2004 | id = ISBN 0-59-600662-4 }} | |||
| * Karim R. Lakhani, Robert G Wolf: . In J. Feller, B. Fitzgerald, S. Hissam, and K. R. Lakhani(Eds.): ''Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software'' (MIT Press, 2005) | |||
| </div> | |||
| ==External links== | |||
| {{Sisterlinks|Hacker}} | |||
| * : About the different hacker subcultures and their relations. | |||
| * | |||
| === Computer security hacking weblinks === | |||
| * | |||
| * , by Doug Mclean. | |||
| * , by Gary D. Robson. | |||
| === Free Software/Open Source hacking weblinks === | |||
| * | |||
| * by ], open source perspective | |||
| *, Free Software perspective | |||
| *: An interview with ], 2002 | |||
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Revision as of 05:54, 30 December 2007
The word 'Hacker' refers to any of the following people: Simon Fields
Simon is the world's foremost hacker, and only allows others to call him 'The Grand Hackmaster'. While this is a source of contention for those around him, they should know their place. While not hacking shit up, Simon likes to spend his time <CENSORED FOR BEING TOO FUCKING AWESOME>
Most know Simon's hacks, or 'Shacks' as he calls them, as they are quite famous. For instance, Simon once hacked every computer in the fucking world, leaving only this message:
System.out.println("THE SLIMINISTER STRIKES AGAIN!");
You may also remember another of Simon's hacks: He hacked into town dullard and rumored drunk David Janociak's laptop, virusing the shit out of it and such.
His heightened coding ability most likely resulted from years of being superior to everyone else in almost every way. (He is sadly only mediocre at checkers. Simon once is quoted as saying, "Checkers fucking blows, who invented that stupid fucking game.")
Simon taught the art of hacking for a short while, but had to stop after the class could not stop staring at his impressive member long enough to practice their newly learned hacks. Why he taught the class naked and with a full, lustrous erection has yet to be determined.