Hacking

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=Hacking Defined=

The invention of computers and the Internet gave rise to Internet crimes such as **hacking** – defined as the ability to access a file in a computer or a network illegally or without permission (Dictionary.com).

In the 1960s, hacking was practiced by a small group of gifted individuals who lacked most social graces (Forester and Morrison 42). To these select few, hacking was a challenge to their intellects. Their goal was never to cause serious damage. This was the “golden era of hacking” (Forester and Morrison 42). During this time, "hacking was a positive term for a person with a mastery of computers who could push the program beyond what it was designed to do" (Trigaux). With today's worldwide networks, hacking can cause massive destruction, even to the point of endangering the lives of others. Hackers are now seen as troublemakers and criminals, breaking into computer systems and modifying or stealing information.

=Hackers=

As cited from Himanen, hackers are people who enjoy programming profoundly, and believe that people should share information for the common good (vii).

=Crackers=

Many people beleive that all hackers are criminals who maliciously break into computers in order to steal or destroy information. This is not the case, and hackers have gone to great lengths to seperate their activities from those types of people, referred to more properly as "Crackers". Hackers, on the other hand, are trying to learn more about the systems they use and digital world they interact with. Hackers may serve as aids to companies that want to increase the security level of their networks.

=Hacker's Ethics=

1. It is a Hacker's belief that knowledge and information sharing is nessesary for the good of mankind (The New Hacker's Dictionary). It is thus a hacker’s ethical duty to share their knowledge by writing open-source code to open the doors for others to information and computing resources (The New Hacker's Dictionary). Releasing code to break electronic protection coincidently infringes upon the DMCA.

2. It is okay to crack and explore systems as long as no breach of confidentiality, theft or vandalism is committed (The New Hacker's Dictionary).

=Crimes Performed by Hackers=

Hackers often perform crimes such as the creation of **malware**, **web site defacements**, various **crimes against intellectual property**, **against persons** or **businesses**, and even **against governments** (Ferrera, et al, 412-413).
 * **Malware** is defined as any software that facilitates virus writing, worn transmission, Web site defacements and the like. (Ferrera, et al, 425).
 * **Viruses** are programs that can replicate by “attaching themselves to a host/another program and get onto another system” (Ferrera, et al, 425). Aside from replication, these programs can be very deadly or completely innocuous. The Melissa virus, for example, attached itself to a message and sent itself to the victim’s first fifty email addresses. Once the recipient opened the attachment, it would replicate and transmit itself to the next fifty addresses on the victim’s email (Ferrera, et al, 425). This cost North America alone some $80 million in bandwidth usage and downed networks (Kizza 102). Worms can also self-replicate, but require no user action to infect and propigate.
 * **Data manipulation** involves modifying information, ranging from school grades to medical records.
 * **Web site defacement** occurs when a hacker gains access to a Web server and changes the content on the site's page(s) (Ferrera, et al, 426). A good example can be found in the case of U.S vs. Racine. Racine learnt that the Al Jazeera Web site showed images of American prisoners of war who were captured and killed in Iraq during “Operation Iraqi Freedom”. He took control of the Al Jazeera web server and diverted the web site to his own, showing “an American flag in the shape of the continental United States and the words 'Let Freedom Reign'” (qtd. In CCIPS 2005). He also intercepted e-mails that were meant for Aljazeera.net and diverted them to his own e-mail account (CCIPS 2005).

=Laws Pertaining to Hacking=

As new technologies become available, new laws have to be created in order to prevent any wrong doing. The Internet has forced many old laws to be modified and entirely new ones to be created in order to prevent hackers from getting away with unethical activities.

FCFAA
In 1986, Congress passed a law called the Federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (FCFAA). According to the FCFAA, a person is considered to have committed a crime if he or she "knowingly accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access, and by means of such conduct obtains information that requires protection against unauthorized disclosure" (Trigaux).

Computer Misuse
In May 1999, a report on Computer Misuse outlined the various forms of illegal hacking:
 * 1) Interception: "where a person eaves drops so as to pick up information in the course of being transmitted to or received by a computer" (Law Commission).
 * 2) Access: "where a person without authority, whether through physical or electronic means, accesses data stored on a computer" (Law Commission). Examples of access include identity theft, where a person pretends to be someome they are not in order to login to a system, and password cracking, which is where a person attempts to guess the password in order to gain access into a system.
 * 3) Use: "where a person without authority gains access to data stored on a computer and then goes on to use that data in an unauthorized way" Law Commission).
 * 4) Damage: divided into direct and indirect damage. Hacking is considered to damage directly if data is deleted from a system.

Harsher Penalities
New laws were put into effect in November 2004. "Instead of the common probation sentence, hackers could get 20 years to life in prison" (Laws Fines). Under new guidelines, "hackers will face a 25% increase in their sentence if they steal personal information and a 50% increase if they share stolen information" (Laws Fines).

=Cyber Ethics=

Some people consider the act of hacking itself to be unethical, an act of breaking and entering. As Dr. Phil often says, opinions are like bums, everyone has one. Hacking is nothing like breaking and entering. There's no physical entry, only the intrusion of a digital space. The terrain for expanding ones knowledge in a non destructive way is continually being stamped upon by the long arm of the law, and it has to stop. If someone breaks into your house, they hold your life in their hands: they often beat the owner and steal their possessions; if caught they face several months, perhaps a year in prison. If a hacker breaks into a computer, deletes nothing, and warns the company about the problem, they face 20 years in jail if they live in the USA. That is not justice, that is a travesty. The arguement here is perhaps that someone's "life" is in their computer. Lets forget for a minute that if someone has their life on a computer, they should probably get outside. If someone is hacking into a personal computer for that person's credit card information or malicious reasons, by definition they are not a hacker. So we are left with businesses. A business that leaves its doors open at night and returns to find that all of its wares have been stolen will also find that insurance will not cover them: they did not use due diligence in keeping their store secure. The onus is on the business. If a business uses bad software, and then repeatedly fails to update it, the hacker who exploits them is blamed, as if that business should not have used the same diligence they use in a physical location. Businesses (many of whom lobby the government for laws involving 20 year hacking sentences) want to have it both ways: they want to be able to report to the consumer that it's safe to use the internet for business, use bad software and unknowledgable administrators, and then blame the people who have only one recourse in pointing this out by compromising servers to tell the world. No, hacking by definition is not unethical, however the current laws against hacking are.

=**Sources**=

__Dictionary.com__. 2006. Lexico Publishing Group, LLC. Feb. 26th 2006. . Forester, Tom, and Perry Morrison. __Computer Ethics: Cautionary__ __Tales and Ethical__ __Dilemmas in Computing__. U.K.: Basil Blackwell, 1990. "H." __The New Hacker's Dictionary__. 2006. Feb. 26th 2006. 

Ferrera, Gerald, Lichtenstein Stephen D., Reder, Margo E. K., Bird, Robert C. and William T. Schiano. __Cyberlaw, Text__ __and Cases__. U.S.A.: Thomson, 2004. “Juvenile Sentenced for Releasing Worm That Attacked Microsoft Web Site.” __Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section (CCIPS)__. 11th Feb. 2005. United States Department of Justice. 26th Feb. 2006. . Kizza, Joseph M. __Computer Network Security and Cyber Ethics__. North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2002.

Trigaux, Robert. "A History of Hacking." __St. Petersburg Times Online.__ 2000 

Law Commission. __Computer Misuse.__ Report 54. Wellington, New Zealand. May 1999.

"Laws Fines Penalites Hackers." __Mainstream Security Services, LLC.__ 2005. 

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