Hacking
Hacking is a term that encompasses various strategies aimed at exploiting security vulnerabilities in computer systems to access, alter, or destroy sensitive information. It is a phenomenon that has evolved alongside the advancement of technology and the global interconnectedness of data. Hacking can be categorized into two main groups: black hat hackers, who engage in criminal activities for personal gain or disruption, and white hat hackers, who use their skills to improve system security, often working with organizations to protect against threats.
Historically, hacking began as a means for early computer enthusiasts to demonstrate their technical skills and challenge security measures, often viewed as harmless pranks. However, as the complexity and sensitivity of data storage increased, hacking became a serious concern, leading to a growing demand for white hat hackers who could outsmart malicious actors. In the modern era, black hat hackers pose significant risks by targeting networks to commit fraud, identity theft, and disrupt critical services, leveraging sophisticated techniques to bypass security systems.
The landscape of hacking continues to evolve, presenting ongoing challenges for cybersecurity in a world where data protection is paramount. As such, understanding the nuances between different types of hackers and their motivations is essential for navigating this complex digital age.
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Hacking
In a world increasingly dependent on the secure storage and transmission of large amounts of sensitive data across a growing interconnected global network, hacking is a term broadly used to describe strategies designed to exploit security vulnerabilities in those systems and, in turn, access restricted information, distort it, or even destroy it. Computer experts bent on criminal trespass (commonly termed black hat hackers) represent a significant menace to any protected information system. Other hackers are computer enthusiasts savvy in the elaborate security systems set in place to thwart intrusion who apply these skills to the identification of vulnerabilities and risks (commonly termed white hat hackers). Hacking has emerged as a formidable reality in the computer age, despite the unlikely elevation, in some cases, of hackers into underground heroes for their technological abilities and their rogue personas.
Overview
The calculated interruption of the transmission of sensitive information is as old as electronic communications itself, dating back to wireless telegraphy more than 150 years ago. Thus, hacking into computer systems is as old as computer systems themselves. Initially, hacking was just about demonstrating proficiency and technical know-how. Indeed, the first generation of hackers was the first generation of computer software engineers, university students who were part of the post-Sputnik, Cold War embrace of technology. They regarded infiltrating new, supposedly protected data reservoirs as a challenge, a kind of harmless prank. Over the years, these hackers dropped millions of bogus emails into systems, interrupted website business with crude animations, disrupted telephone service, and cut into the communication networks of television and radio stations. As information systems grew more complex and stored data became more sensitive, even this type of hacking became more than an annoyance. It got to the point that global companies would hire such individuals, who became known as white hat hackers, to help them identify vulnerabilities and devise programs that would remain one step ahead of the more malicious hackers. Many of these hackers went on to form lucrative security firms that work with networks and even maintain websites with useful insider information. In the twenty-first century, however, the strategy of staying ahead of each generation of hackers has become, despite government crackdowns and network sophistication, increasingly challenging given the interconnected global reach of data in vulnerable storage as well as the proliferation of the Internet of Things, which saw a larger number of objects and devices equipped with "smart" digital capabilities.
Black hat hackers target networks with the intention to cause havoc, destroy records, steal data, engage in massive identity theft rings, and enact elaborate computer fraud schemes. By launching self-replicating worms and viruses into global networks, hackers can bring down the entire systems of banks, hospitals, credit agencies, school systems and universities, and government agencies. Black hat hackers represent the potential for widespread catastrophe because, motivated by mercenary interests (they have been known to bargain in return for not launching an attack) or in some cases by radical sociopolitical activism (in which case they are dubbed hacktivists), their endeavors are extreme and calculated, using increasingly sophisticated techniques to access information, bypass system administrators, and fool elaborate, multileveled in-system security programs. In addition to leveraging advancing technology like artificial intelligence (AI), hackers have employed methods such as social engineering, in which they rely upon psychological manipulation of users to gain access to information and systems.
Hacker Culture
Gabriella Coleman, an associate professor at New York University studying and teaching courses on the anthropology of hacker culture, wrote for the Atlantic in 2010 that a hacker can be defined as a “technologist with a love for computing” who tends to embrace freedom, free speech, privacy, access, meritocracy, and the idea that computers are beautiful and beneficial. At the same time, she cautioned against the simplistic and wholesale application of this definition to categorize hackers as a whole. In the tech community, hacking is the “rapid prototyping and quick learning and iteration from failures,” and “emphasizes the sense of creativity in solving problems in unconventional ways,” according to Siya Raj Purohit, Udacity project manager, writing for the Huffington Post in 2014. She described 2013 as the year of the hackathons, events that bring programmers together to collaboratively code and build products. Such events continued into the 2020s and have gone on to yield new start-ups, platforms, and applications. As hackathons and hacking have become more mainstream, more companies have sponsored and participated in hackathons to leverage their benefits.
Bibliography
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Engebretson, Patrick. The Basics of Hacking and Penetration Testing: Ethical Hacking and Penetration Testing Made Easy. Syngress, 2011.
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Granville, Johanna. “Dot.Con: The Dangers of Cybercrime and a Call for Proactive Solutions.” Australian Journal of Politics and History, vol. 49, no. 1, 2003, pp. 102–09.
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