What does the word hacker mean? Who are hackers? Hackers in literature

You can find a bunch of definitions for the term " hacker", most of which have to do with technical competence and the enjoyment of solving problems and overcoming obstacles. But if you want to know how to become a hacker, then two aspects are really important.

There is a community, a shared culture of skilled programmers and network wizards, which in turn dates back to the first time-sharing minicomputers and the earliest experiments with the ARPAnet. Members of this culture gave birth to the term “hacker.” Hackers built the Internet. Hackers made the Unix operating system what it is today. Hackers run Usenet. Hackers keep the World Wide Web running. If you are part of this culture, if you have contributed to it, and other members of this culture know who you are and call you a hacker, then you are a hacker.

The hacker view of the world is not limited to the culture of hacker programmers. There are people who apply the hacker approach to other things, like electronics or music. In fact, you can encounter this approach at the highest levels of any science or art. Software hackers recognize such congenial people and may also call them "hackers", some even proclaim that the hacker's nature does not really depend on the environment in which the hacker works.

There is another group of people who loudly call themselves hackers, but they are not. These are the people (mostly young males) who are targeted for hacking computer and telephone systems. Real hackers call such people "crackers" and want nothing to do with them. Real hackers for the most part consider crackers to be lazy, irresponsible and not particularly smart. Just because a person can hack a security system doesn't make him a hacker, just like being able to steal cars doesn't make you a car mechanic. Unfortunately, many journalists and writers are misled and use the word "hacker" to describe crackers, and this irritates real hackers to no end.

The main difference is this: hackers build things, and crackers break them.

If you want to become a hacker, then continue reading. If you want to become a cracker, then prepare to serve five to ten years in prison when you discover that you are not as smart as you thought.

Hackers solve problems and build things, they believe in freedom and voluntary mutual assistance. In order to be perceived as a hacker, you must behave as if it were your own position. And in order to act as if this is your position, you must really believe in this position.

But if you expect to cultivate hackerism just to gain cultural acceptance, then you've missed the point.

Becoming the kind of person who believes in these things is important to you because it will help you learn and keep you motivated. As in any other creative endeavor, the most effective way to become a master is to imitate the worldview of the masters, not only intellectually, but also emotionally.

So if you want to become a hacker, then repeat the following things until you believe in them:

The world is full of fascinating problems waiting to be solved.

Being a hacker is a lot of fun, but it's the kind of fun that requires a lot of effort. Such efforts require motivation. Champion athletes derive their motivation from a kind of physical pleasure derived from pushing their own bodies to perfection, from pushing their own physical limits. Likewise, to be a hacker you should get maximum pleasure from solving problems, from honing your skills, from training your intellect. If you are not one of those people who senses these things naturally, then you will need to become one to become a hacker. Otherwise, you will find that all your hacking energy is depleted by irritants such as sex, money and social success.

You also need to develop some faith in your own learning abilities. The belief that even though you may not know everything that is needed to solve a problem, if you have mastered only a piece and learned from it, you already know enough to solve the next piece - and so on until everything is done made.

No one should ever have to solve a problem twice.

You are not required to believe that you are obligated to give away all the fruits of your creativity, although those hackers who do so are the most respected among other hackers. It is consistent with the values of hackers to sell enough of their creativity to provide you with food, shelter, and computers. This is consistent with using your hacking skills to support your family and even get rich, as long as you don't forget that you are a hacker while doing it.

Boredom and routine are evil. Hackers (and creative people in general) should never get caught up in boring things or get bogged down in boring work, because when that happens, it means they're not doing what only they can do - solving new problems. Such wastefulness harms everyone. Therefore, boredom and routine are not just unpleasant things, they are evil.

To behave like a hacker, you have to believe in it so much that you want to automate all the boring little things as much as possible, not just for yourself, but for everyone (especially other hackers). But sometimes hackers do things that might seem monotonous or boring to an outside observer, either as a brain-clearing exercise or to develop a skill. Or to acquire a special kind of experience that cannot be obtained in any other way. But all this is done by choice; no one who knows how to think should ever be forced to do boring work.

Freedom is a blessing.

Hackers are anti-authoritarian by nature. Anyone who can give you orders can stop you from solving any of the problems that fascinate you. And given the way authoritarian brains think, there will be some stunningly idiotic reasons to do this. So the authoritarian approach should be fought wherever you find it, so that it does not choke you and other hackers.

This is not the same as fighting all authorities. Children need guidance, crime needs to be curbed. A hacker may agree to accept some kind of leadership when he can get what he needs without having to spend too much time following orders. But this is a limited reasonable bargain, a kind of personal concession.

Authoritarianism thrives in conditions of censorship and secrecy. Its adherents do not believe in voluntary cooperation and sharing information; they only like “cooperation” that they lead. Therefore, to behave like a hacker, you must develop an instinctive aversion to censorship, secrecy, and the use of force or lies to coerce responsible adults. And it is necessary to act on the basis of such faith.

Attitude is no substitute for competence.

To be a hacker you must develop some of the following approaches. But just grasping the approaches will make you no more a hacker than a record-breaking athlete or a rock star. Becoming a hacker requires intelligence, practice, dedication and hard work.

Therefore, you will have to learn to be suspicious of the position, but respectful of competence of any kind. Hackers don't let posers waste their time, but they worship competence, especially hacker competence, but competence is good at anything. It is especially valuable to have essential skills that few people have. And the best thing is competence in such skills that require an astute mind, dexterity and concentration.

If you idolize competence, then you take pleasure in developing it in yourself. Hard work and dedication will become an exciting game for you, not a chore. And this is vital to becoming a hacker.

A hacker's outlook on life is important, but skill is much more important. Attitude is no substitute for competence, and there is a certain set of basic skills that you need to have before any hacker would even think of calling you a hacker.

This basic set slowly changes over time as technology creates new skills and makes obsolete ones obsolete. For example, machine language programming was commonly mentioned, but until recently HTML was not included in the mix. However, today's kit definitely includes the following components:

Learn to program.

This is, of course, a fundamental hacking skill. If you don’t know any computer language, we recommend starting with Python. It is clearly designed, well documented, and relatively newbie friendly. Although it is good for first language use, it is not just a toy. It is a powerful and flexible language well suited for large objects. But know that you won't become a hacker (or a good programmer) if you only know one programming language. You need to learn to think about programming problems in general, independent of any specific language. To be a real hacker, you need to reach a level where you can learn a new language in a few days by relating the instructions in the manual to what you already know. This means that you should learn several very different languages.

If you're doing serious programming, you'll have to learn C, the main language of the Unix operating system (although it's not the language you should try to learn first). Other languages of prime importance to hackers are Perl and Lisp. Perl makes sense to learn for practical reasons: it is very widely used for active web pages and system administration, so even if you never have to write Perl, you should learn to read it. Lisp is worth learning for the profound enlightenment you'll gain when you finally master it. This knowledge will make you an excellent programmer for the rest of your life, even if you never really use Lisp itself. The best thing to do, in fact, is to learn all four of these languages (Python, C, Perl and Lisp).

Besides being the most important hacking languages, they demonstrate very different approaches to programming and each will teach you valuable things. We cannot give detailed instructions here on how to learn to program - it is a complex art. But we can tell you that books and courses will not teach you this (many, perhaps most, hackers are self-taught). What teaches this is reading codes and writing codes.

Learning to program is like learning to write in good natural language. The best way to do this is to read something written by the masters, then write a little yourself; read a little more, write a little more; read more, write more... And repeat this process until your programs evolve into something powerful and cost-effective.

Finding good code to read used to be difficult because there were very few large programs available in source code for young hackers to learn and tinker with. Now the situation has changed dramatically: source code programs, programming tools and operating systems are now widely available.

Get one of the Unix variants in source code, learn how to use it and work with it.

We assume that you have a personal computer or can access it.

The single most important step any beginner can take to acquire hacking skills is to get a copy of Linux or one of the versions of BSD-Unix, install it on a personal machine and run it.

Yes, there are other operating systems in the world besides Unix. But they are distributed in binary form - you will not be able to read the codes and you will not be able to modify them. Learning to hack on DOS, Windows or MacOS machines is like learning to dance while wearing a full cast.

Additionally, Unix is the Internet operating system. While you can learn to use the Internet without knowing Unix, you can't be an Internet hacker without understanding Unix. For this very reason, today's hacker culture is very Unix-centric. (This wasn't always the case, and some of the old hackers weren't too happy about it, but the symbiosis between Unix and the Internet has become so strong that even Microsoft isn't strong enough to make much of a difference.)

So get yourself Unix, Linux is best, but there are other options (you can run both Linux and DOS/Windows on the same machine). Learn this OS. Work with her. Fiddle with it. Communicate through it with the Internet. Read the codes. Modify them. You'll get programming tools (including C, Lisp, and Perl) that any Microsoft OS has never dreamed of. You'll have fun, and you'll learn more than you thought you would during the learning process when you look back on the process as a master hacker.

Learn to use the World Wide Web and write HTML. Most of the things created by hacker culture do their work invisibly, keeping factories, institutions and universities running without any noticeable impact on the lives of non-hackers. The WWW is one big exception, a giant shiny hacking toy that even politicians admit is changing the world.

For this reason alone (and many other good reasons) you should learn how to use the Web.

This does not mean that you just need to learn how to operate a browser (anyone can do this), but also learn to write in HTML, the markup language for Web documents. If you don't know how to program yet, writing HTML will teach your mind some useful habits that will come in handy when mastering programming languages. So make a home page. But simply having a home page will not get you anywhere close to becoming a hacker. The Web is full of home pages. Most of them are meaningless, useless junk. Extremely flashy and attractively designed trash, no doubt, but trash nonetheless. To be worthwhile, your page must have "content" - content. It should be interesting and/or useful to other hackers.

Like most cultures without a monetary economy, Hackerland is built on reputation. You're trying to solve interesting problems, but how interesting they are, and how good your solutions are, is something that can usually only be judged by (in a technical sense) your peers or superiors.

So, when you play hacking games, you learn to score mainly by what others think of your skill (which is why you won't be a hacker until other hackers call you that). This fact is obscured by both the image of the lone hacker and certain taboos in hacker culture that do not allow someone’s ego or external recognition to be a motivation for a hacker at all.

Hackerlandia in particular is what anthropologists call a “gift culture.” You earn status and reputation not by leading other people, or by being beautiful, or by having things that others desire.

But rather by giving things away. In particular, giving away your time, your skill and the results of your creativity.

There are five main types of things you can do to make hackers respect you.

Write open source programs.

The first is to write programs that other hackers find funny or useful, and give away the source code for the programs for use by the entire hacker culture.

This work has been called "free software", but this confuses some people who don't exactly understand what is meant by the word "freely available". Nowadays, many people prefer to use the term "open source" or "open-source software" for such software. The most revered demigods of Hackerland are the people who wrote large and talented programs that meet the widest needs, and who distributed them to everyone, so that everyone now uses them.

Help test and debug open source programs.

Those who test and debug open source programs are also revered. In this imperfect world, we inevitably spend the largest portion of program development time in the debugging phase. This is why any thoughtful open source author will tell you that good beta testers (who know how to clearly describe symptoms, are good at localizing problems, can correct typos, and use a few simple diagnostic routines) are worth their weight in gold. Just one person like that can turn the debugging phase from a long, exhausting nightmare into just a useful delay.

If you are a beginner, try to find a program in development that interests you and become a good beta tester. There is a very natural progression from helping to test programs to helping to debug them and then to helping to modify them. You will learn a lot this way and generate good karma in your relationships with people who will help you later.

Post useful information.

Another good thing is to select and accumulate useful and interesting information on Web pages or documents such as FAQ (frequently asked questions and answers), and make them publicly available.

The hosts of major technical FAQs are almost as respected as the authors of open source software.

Help keep infrastructure running.

Hacker culture (and Internet engineering) is volunteer-based. There is a lot of necessary but not particularly effective work that needs to be done to maintain the process, administering mailing lists, moderating newsgroups, managing large software archives, developing RFCs and other technical standards.

People who do this kind of thing well are highly respected, because everyone knows that this kind of work takes a lot of time and is not as fun as playing with codes. This work shows dedication.

Serve the hacker culture itself.

Finally, you can serve and spread the culture itself. But you shouldn't do this until you've been at it for a long time and become well known for one of the first four things.

There are no clear leaders in hacker culture, but there are "culture heroes", "tribal elders", historians and speakers. When you live in these trenches long enough, you can grow into one of these people. But beware: hackers are wary of their loud-mouthed tribal elders, so the apparent achievement of this kind of glory is fraught with danger. Instead of striving for this, you better not care about it and then it will fall to your knees, and only then you can become humble and gracious in your status.

Is a hacker a "moron"?

Contrary to popular myth, you don't have to be a jerk to be a hacker. It does help, however, and many hackers really are "jerks." Being a social outcast helps you stay focused on the things that really matter, like thinking and hacking.

It is for this reason that many hackers are labeled "moron" and even use the cruder term "nerd" as a badge of valor - it is their way of declaring their independence from generally accepted social judgments.

If you can focus enough on hacking, achieve significant results here, and still have a personal life, well, great. Today it is much easier. The cultural mainstream is now much friendlier to techno-jerks. There are even a growing number of people discovering that hackers can often make quite good lovers and spouses.

If the reason you're drawn to hacking is because you don't have a personal life, well, that's not a bad thing. At least you won't have problems concentrating. And personal life, who knows, maybe it will come later.

Answers to questions on how to become a hacker

Hello friends! Today we will look at an equally interesting question: how to become a hacker. And if you are reading this article, then you will find interesting information that I have prepared for you. But I want to say right away that under no circumstances will I teach you coding, hacking, or anything like that.

In this article we will look at the basic and main points. You will find out who a hacker is, what he does, what skills he must have, what disciplines he must know, and if he doesn’t know, then study it as soon as possible, and also, we will consider the issue of the legality of this activity and what penalties follow for it.

Who is a hacker and what does he do?

A hacker is a person who is professionally equipped with knowledge of programming, managing operating systems, bypassing security system algorithms in order to increase security, a designer of the protection of personal and confidential information within companies and enterprises, a software developer.

Some people consider themselves hackers, but in fact they do not have the knowledge and skills that they should have. Such people do more harm than good. There are also people who try to use their knowledge and skills for personal gain. What are we talking about?

The fact is that having certain knowledge in the field of programming and decryption of systems, a person sees the vulnerabilities of a system and tries to bypass its security algorithms in order to get some benefit from it. In most cases, this benefit is cash. Such people, who are accustomed to hacking various systems and stealing digital information as part of their activities, are called crackers.

A cracker, also known as a “hacker,” is a person who is professionally equipped with personal equipment, as well as knowledge in the field of programming, and is exclusively engaged in hacking software products, websites, stealing information, and writing virus programs.

This is where some confusion arises. Nowadays it is customary to call people who engage in hacking or theft – hackers. But this is a misconception for many. And this article was written so that you understand the difference between a “bad” and a “good” programmer and developer. To consolidate: tech steals and breaks - crackers, those who develop and protect are hackers. For information, our entire Internet, also known as the World Wide Web, was developed by hackers, as well as network systems.

But crackers can also develop protection. After all, they write bypasses for security algorithms, which means it won’t be difficult for them to write their own security system, or a system that will confuse the traces of a hack in order to make it as difficult as possible to detect the location of the hack, i.e. where the system was attacked from.

In order to understand how to become a hacker, you need to dedicate some time and understanding to this section. To become a hacker and be a professional in your field, you need to have certain qualities, without which it will be very difficult for you. If you decide to choose this direction, then I recommend that you take my recommendations, which I will write to you later, very seriously.

The most important skill is analytical thinking. If back in your school years you were inclined towards mathematics, towards solving complex equations and problems, then in order to follow the path of programming and become a hacker you need to go to college at the Faculty of Applied Mathematics. This will help you gain a strong foundation and strengthen your analytical skills. Here you need to learn, if you plan to “sit on a stump”, then it’s better not to.

Self-education is the main, and in my opinion, key skill. You will need to study many disciplines on your own. For example, English. You need to know it as native, or at least technical English. The structure of computer networks, the basics of operating systems, or better yet, read books on in-depth study of operating systems, as well as their programming. Books on security and software design, as well as cryptography.

You also need to master encryption methods for various systems at a professional level, and simultaneously study programming languages, but only for the area in which you plan to work. If time permits, you can study the programming languages that are used to create websites. I think this skill will also be useful.

Always on trend. Read the latest news in the world of information technology and the blogosphere, topical books and magazines, constantly update your software, visit forums and sites for hackers, chat live with other hackers and programmers, share your thoughts and listen to what others say, but Don't always use advice in your work.

I hope I was able to give you the answer to the question of how to become a hacker, but I would like to add a little. You will have to constantly study, for a very long time. It can take years, 5 to 10 years, to become a professional in this field. Everyone develops differently. But the poem does not end there either. In order not to lose your grip, you will constantly need to feed your knowledge with new ones. I have already spoken about this.

To appear in the eyes of people as who you think you are, you must believe in what you do, in who you are. This must be your attitude in life, otherwise people will not take you seriously. Faith generates self-motivation.

Value your time and the time of other people. There is no need to invent another round wheel to solve any problem; the solutions already exist, they just need to be found. On forums and during live communication, do not ask stupid questions, only ask essentially ones if you seriously cannot cope with resolving the issue.

Don't waste time solving simple and monotonous problems. Design systems that will help you solve them. There is neither the desire nor the time to get bogged down in boring, monotonous events. Do what you are meant to do - solve new complex problems in order to develop in this direction.

Share your experience. Try to write open source software solutions. So that your colleagues and other hackers can use them, read them, see how the logic is structured, take something into their arsenal, somewhere tell you how to do it better. Also take part in testing already written programs by hackers just like you. Help them and don't be left out. This will affect your overall reputation.

A computer or laptop is your tool, which sometimes becomes dull and needs to be sharpened or repaired. Based on this metaphor, I want to say that your computer needs proper care, otherwise you can become a master without a tool. And your knowledge will be useless. Purge, replace hardware and software in a timely manner, and keep an eye on its appearance.

Don't hack for fun. You shouldn’t cause people such inconvenience just because you want to prove your superiority to others or to yourself. You need to clearly understand why you are doing this, and that for such things you face serious punishment, such as imprisonment. It’s better to hack the system and inform its author about this vulnerability and the possibility of eliminating its causes.

So that you understand that all this is for a reason, that all this is not a joke, and you may be punished for hacking and unauthorized possession of information or causing harm. Let's look at articles that may not be in your favor, and for which you may receive time.

The most popular article is 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, fraud. Yes, you can be accused of fraud if you in any way deceive people, the system for the sake of profit and obtaining a financial and information component. Punishment: 120 thousand rubles, or the amount of wages for a year, compulsory work for up to 360 hours, correctional labor for a year, or imprisonment for two years.

Article 165 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation: property damage, abuse of human trust. Punishment: 300 thousand rubles, or the amount of wages for two years, or arrest for two years plus a fine of 80 thousand rubles, and there is a lot more, you can read it.

Article 183 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation - collection of confidential information that has any commercial secret, as well as banking or tax secrets: theft, bribery, threats. Punishment: 500t.r. or wages for 1 year, correctional labor for two years or forced labor for one year. The article has several points, I will not describe them all here. I think that's enough.

Article 187 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation: counterfeiting and sale of credit and payment cards in general, unauthorized transfer of funds, documents, production of programs for the purpose of stealing funds and information. Punishment: forced labor for five years or imprisonment for six years and a fine of 100 to 300 rubles.

Article 272 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation - unauthorized access to information stored on a computer. Punishment: 200t.r. or wages for one and a half years, or imprisonment for two years or correctional labor for a year.

Article 273 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation is the creation, use and distribution of software created for the purpose of blocking, destroying, modifying and copying information located on a computer, as well as aimed at bypassing or destroying computer security systems. Punishment: imprisonment for four years or forced labor for the same period, or imprisonment for 4 years and a fine in the amount of 200 rubles.

These are just some of the articles that you can receive for “bad behavior” or excessive curiosity, or for your courage in which you will be during the hacking of any system or computer. So think about whether it's worth engaging in illegal activities, or being a law-abiding hacker who does good and helps people instead of harming them.

Believe me, your knowledge can be useful to attackers who can pay you a substantial amount for certain actions. But you can also earn the same money by testing, fixing errors, and searching for vulnerabilities in systems. Your knowledge will not go unnoticed. Therefore, it's up to you. You already roughly understand how to become a hacker, but what path to choose after that is up to you to decide, and a lot will depend on this decision, including your life.

The concept of hacker is characterized by two definitions, one of which is the most popular and therefore more truthful. For most people, a hacker is an attacker who is trying in one way or another to find out confidential information stored on a personal computer, cause a system failure, or simply download a virus. Such people are characterized by a different definition, namely “crackers” - people who hack a computer. As an example, a person being able to hack a computer's security system does not make him a hacker, in essence the same as being able to open cars does not make him a car mechanic. Another definition of the word hacker is programmers who essentially created the Internet, the Unix operating system, namely what it is today, they ensure the operation of the World Wide Web. As a result, one word has two different definitions, the main difference between which is that hackers build things, and crackers break them.

How to become a hacker

It turns out that people trying to become hackers can either deceive and steal information from other people, or they are really trying to become a programmer who is well versed in their field of activity, help other people, etc. Being just such a hacker is undoubtedly a pleasure, but it requires a lot of money effort. Such people enjoy solving various kinds of problems that come their way, honing their skills to perfection, etc. Otherwise, if a person does not want to improve himself in this way, then, most likely, the philistine definition of this term is inherent in him.

Of course, in order for a person to become at least a “cracker,” he will need certain knowledge in the field of automation of information processes, programming in basic languages, knowledge of information security, and many others. Do not forget that if you are not able to think logically or If you just don’t like solving complex problems that stand in your way, then it’s better to give up the idea of becoming a hacker, since this type of activity mainly requires logical thinking, and only then perseverance and other character traits. Sometimes it may seem that what a hacker does is monotonous and boring work, which is why a person who does not have perseverance is unlikely to become a hacker.

Who is a hacker and what can he do?

We have all heard about hackers: in TV series, films, news, from friends, acquaintances, and so on. But who exactly are hackers? Is it true that these are computer hackers?

Hacker is a person who enjoys studying the functioning of various programmable objects, mainly computer systems, a person who expands functionality and finds vulnerabilities in these objects. What distinguishes a hacker from an ordinary user is knowledge, a pronounced desire or fanaticism in studying systems.

In the beginning, the word “hacker” was used to refer to programmers who fixed “bugs” in any available, but very fast way. Because of such “clumsy” work, the name “hack” came from (translated as “hack”).

The main task The (job) of a hacker is to study a computer (or other programmable) system, search for vulnerabilities, inform developers about vulnerabilities, formulate requirements and conditions for improving the security of the system.

Hackers today.

It also happened that, having learned about vulnerabilities, hackers used them for their own benefit, but this does not apply to all specialists. Therefore, the statement that a hacker is a computer hacker is incorrect.

Computer hackers are crackers. However, in all films and media, crackers are persistently called hackers. But this is understandable, because the word “hacker” has long been associated with hacking.

So in the modern understanding: a hacker is a cracker who is highly qualified in the field of security and has sufficient skills to penetrate various protected computer systems. Typically, such “hackers” use special hardware and specialized software.

Material from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia

Hacker(originally someone who makes furniture with an axe):

A person who is keen on studying the details of programmable systems, studying the issue of increasing their capabilities, as opposed to the majority of users who prefer to limit themselves to studying the required minimum. RFC 1983 strengthens this definition as follows: "A person who enjoys a thorough understanding of the internal workings of systems, computers, and computer networks in particular."
Someone who programs with enthusiasm (even obsessively) or enjoys programming rather than just theorizing about programming.
A person who can appreciate and understand hacker values.
A person who is good at fast programming.
An expert on a particular computer program or someone who frequently works with it; example: "Unix hacker". (Definitions 1-5 are interrelated, so one person may fall under more than one of them.)
Expert or enthusiast of any kind. Someone might be considered an "astronomy hacker", for example.
Someone who enjoys intellectual challenges involving creatively overcoming or working around limitations.
(disapproving) An attacker who obtains confidential information by bypassing security systems (for example, “password hacker”, “network hacker”). The correct term is cracker, cracker. cracker).

Historically, the word is now often used in the latter meaning - “computer attacker.” Moreover, in movies, a hacker is usually presented as a person who is able to “hack” any system right away, which in fact is impossible in principle. For example, in the movie “Swordfish Password,” the programmer cracks the Vernam cipher, the only existing encryption system for which absolute cryptographic strength has been theoretically proven.

Recently, the word “hacker” is often used to describe everyone network hackers, computer virus creators and other computer criminals such as carders, crackers, script kiddies. Many computer crackers can rightfully be called hackers, because they really correspond to all (or almost all) of the above definitions of the word “hacker”.

Types of Hackers

Hackers' values

Among hackers, it is customary to value the time of oneself and other hackers (“not to reinvent the wheel”), which, in particular, implies the need to share one’s achievements by creating free and/or open source programs.

Computer security: legal aspects

In Russia, Europe and America, computer hacking, destruction of information, creation and distribution of computer viruses and malware are punishable by law. Malicious hackers are subject to extradition under international cybercrime laws, similar to war criminals.

“The new capabilities available to U.S. troops allow them to engage the enemy and change the tide of battle from a remote location. Unfortunately, there were no awards that such people could receive for their services.”
- US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta

Historical reasons for the differences in meaning of the word "hacker"

The original meaning of the word "hacker" probably originated within the walls of the 1960s, long before the widespread use of computers. Then it was part of the local slang and could mean a simple but crude solution to a problem; a damn cunning trick by students (usually the author was called a hacker). Until that time, the words “hack” and “hacker” were used for various reasons, regardless of computer technology in general.

Initially, the slang word “to hack” appeared. It meant the process of making changes “on the fly” to one’s own or someone else’s program (it was assumed that the source code of the program was available). The verbal noun “hack” meant the results of such a change. It was considered a very useful and worthy thing not only to inform the author of the program about an error, but to immediately offer him a hack that would correct it. The word “hacker” originally came from here.

The hack, however, was not always intended to correct errors - it could change the behavior of the program against the will of its author. It was precisely such scandalous incidents that mainly became public, and the understanding of hacking as active feedback between the authors and users of programs was never of interest to journalists. Then came the era of closed source code, the source codes of many programs became unavailable, and the positive role of hacking began to fade away - the enormous time spent on hacking closed source code could only be justified by very strong motivations, such as the desire to make money or scandalous popularity.

As a result, a new distorted understanding of the word “hacker”: it means an attacker who uses extensive computer knowledge to carry out unauthorized, sometimes malicious actions on a computer - hacking computers, writing and distributing computer viruses. The word “hacker” was first used in this meaning by Clifford Stoll in his book “The Cuckoo’s Egg,” and the Hollywood movie “Hackers” greatly contributed to its popularization. In such computer slang, the words “hack” or “hack” usually refer to breaking the security of computer networks, web servers, and the like.

An echo of the negative perception of the concept of “hacker” is the word "kulhatsker"(from English cool hacker), which became widespread in the domestic computer environment almost with the growing popularity of the original word. This term is usually used to describe an amateur who tries to look like a professional at least externally - by using supposedly “professional” hacker terms and jargon, using “hacker-type” programs without trying to understand their work, etc. The name “kulhatsker” is ironic about the fact , what kind of person considers himself a cool hacker (eng. cool hacker), is so illiterate that he cannot even read correctly in English what he calls himself. In the English-speaking environment, such people are called “script kiddies”.

Some of the personalities known as champions of free and open source software - such as Richard Stallman - call for the use of the word "hacker" only in its original sense.

A very detailed explanation of the term in its original sense is given in Eric Raymond's article How to Become a Hacker. Eric Raymond also proposed in October 2003 an emblem for the hacker community - the “glider” symbol from the game “Life”. Since the hacker community does not have a single center or official structure, the proposed symbol cannot be considered official symbol of the hacker movement. For the same reasons, it is impossible to judge the prevalence of this symbolism among hackers - although it is likely that some part of the hacker community adopted it.

Hackers in literature

Hackers in movies

Virtual Reality / VR.5 (1995)
Master of the Network / Skyggen (1998)
Antitrust / Antitrust (2001)
Code Hunter / Storm Watch (Code Hunter) (2001)
Network 2.0 / The Net 2.0 (2006)
Bloody Monday (2008) - drama based on the manga of the same name
Seventh (2015)
CSI: Cyber (2015)
Citizen Four (2015)

Famous people

Known burglars

Robert Morris is the author of the 1988 Morris Worm. (In fact, the Morris worm was a laboratory experiment, so it can be considered a cracker.)
Adrian Lamo - known for hacking Yahoo, Citigroup, Bank of America and Cingular.
Jonathan James, an American hacker, became the first minor to be convicted of hacking. His foreign accomplice, nicknamed “xmolnia,” was never caught.
John Draper is one of the first hackers in the history of the computer world.
Kevin Poulsen - hacked into the FBI database and gained access to classified information regarding wiretapping. Poulsen hid for a long time, changing addresses and even appearance, but in the end he was caught and sentenced to 5 years. After leaving prison he worked as a journalist, then became editor-in-chief of Wired News. His most popular article describes the process of identifying 744 sexual predators from their MySpace profiles.
Gary McKinnon - accused of hacking 53 Pentagon and NASA computers in 2001-2002 in search of information about UFOs.
Edward Snowden - at the beginning of June 2013, Snowden gave the newspapers The Guardian and The Washington Post classified NSA information regarding the total surveillance of American intelligence services over information communications between citizens of many countries around the world.

Famous hacker writers

Julian Assange - in 1997, co-authored with Seulette Dreyfus, a book about hackers “Underground”.
Chris Kaspersky is the author of popular books and articles on computer topics.
Kevin Mitnick is the most famous computer hacker, now a writer and information security specialist.
Bruce Schneier is an American cryptographer, writer, and computer security specialist.

Ideologists of hacker ethics

Famous hackers and programmers

Linus Torvalds - created the free Linux operating system, which became an alternative to Windows.

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Notes

Footnotes

Literature

Ivan Sklyarov. Puzzles for a hacker. - St. Petersburg. : BHV-Petersburg, 2005. - P. 320. - ISBN 5-94175-562-9.
Maxim Kuznetsov, Igor Simdyanov. Puzzles in PHP for a hacker. - 2nd ed. - St. Petersburg. : BHV-Petersburg, 2008. - P. 554. - ISBN 978-5-9775-0204-7.
Joel Scambray, Stuart McClar. Secrets of hackers. Security of Microsoft Windows Server 2003 - ready-made solutions = Hacking Exposed Windows® Server 2003. - M.: Williams, 2004. - P. 512. - ISBN 0-07-223061-4.
Stuart McClure, Joel Scambray, George Kurtz. Secrets of hackers. Network security - ready-made solutions = Hacking Exposed: Network Security Secrets & Solutions. - M.: Williams, 2004. - P. 656. - ISBN 0-07-222742-7.
Mike Shiffman. Protection from hackers. Analysis of 20 hacking scenarios = Hacker's Challenge: Test Your Incident Response Skills Using 20 Scenarios. - M.: Williams, 2002. - P. 304. - ISBN 0-07-219384-0.
Steven Levy. Hackers, Heroes of the computer revolution = Hackers, Heroes of the computer revolution. - A Penguin Book Technology, 2002. - P. 337. - ISBN 0-14-100051-1.
Skorodumova O. B.// Knowledge. Understanding. Skill: Journal. - M., 2005. - No. 4. - pp. 159-161.
Savchuk I. S.// Computer news: newspaper. - 2010.

Excerpt characterizing Hacker

Finally, the sovereign stopped next to his last lady (he was dancing with three), the music stopped; the preoccupied adjutant ran towards the Rostovs, asking them to step aside somewhere else, although they were standing against the wall, and the distinct, cautious and fascinatingly measured sounds of a waltz were heard from the choir. The Emperor looked at the audience with a smile. A minute passed and no one had started yet. The adjutant manager approached Countess Bezukhova and invited her. She raised her hand, smiling, and placed it, without looking at him, on the adjutant’s shoulder. The adjutant manager, a master of his craft, confidently, slowly and measuredly, hugging his lady tightly, set off with her first on a glide path, along the edge of the circle, at the corner of the hall, he picked up her left hand, turned it, and because of the ever-accelerating sounds of the music, only measured ones were heard the clicks of the spurs of the adjutant’s quick and dexterous legs, and every three beats at the turn, his lady’s fluttering velvet dress seemed to flare up. Natasha looked at them and was ready to cry that it was not she who was dancing this first round of the waltz.
Prince Andrei, in his colonel's white (cavalry) uniform, in stockings and shoes, lively and cheerful, stood in the front rows of the circle, not far from the Rostovs. Baron Firgof spoke with him about tomorrow's supposed first meeting of the State Council. Prince Andrei, as a person close to Speransky and participating in the work of the legislative commission, could give correct information about the meeting tomorrow, about which there were various rumors. But he did not listen to what Firgof told him, and looked first at the sovereign, then at the gentlemen who were getting ready to dance, who did not dare to join the circle.
Prince Andrei observed these gentlemen and ladies timid in the presence of the sovereign, dying with desire to be invited.
Pierre walked up to Prince Andrei and grabbed his hand.
– You always dance. There is my protegee [favorite], young Rostova, invite her,” he said.
- Where? – asked Bolkonsky. “Sorry,” he said, turning to the baron, “we’ll finish this conversation somewhere else, but we have to dance at the ball.” “He stepped forward in the direction that Pierre pointed out to him. Natasha’s desperate, frozen face caught the eye of Prince Andrei. He recognized her, guessed her feeling, realized that she was a beginner, remembered her conversation at the window and with a cheerful expression on his face approached Countess Rostova.
“Let me introduce you to my daughter,” said the countess, blushing.
“I have the pleasure of being an acquaintance, if the countess remembers me,” said Prince Andrei with a polite and low bow, completely contradicting Peronskaya’s remarks about his rudeness, approaching Natasha and raising his hand to hug her waist even before he finished the invitation to dance. He suggested a waltz tour. That frozen expression on Natasha’s face, ready for despair and delight, suddenly lit up with a happy, grateful, childish smile.
“I’ve been waiting for you for a long time,” as if this frightened and happy girl said, with her smile that appeared behind the ready tears, raising her hand on Prince Andrei’s shoulder. They were the second couple to enter the circle. Prince Andrey was one of the best dancers of his time. Natasha danced superbly. Her feet in ballroom satin shoes quickly, easily and independently of her did their job, and her face shone with the delight of happiness. Her bare neck and arms were thin and ugly. Compared to Helen's shoulders, her shoulders were thin, her breasts were vague, her arms were thin; but Helen already seemed to have a varnish on from all the thousands of glances sliding over her body, and Natasha seemed like a girl who had been exposed for the first time, and who would have been very ashamed of it if she had not been assured that it was so necessary.
Prince Andrei loved to dance, and wanting to quickly get rid of the political and intelligent conversations with which everyone turned to him, and wanting to quickly break this annoying circle of embarrassment formed by the presence of the sovereign, he went to dance and chose Natasha, because Pierre pointed him out to her and because she was the first of the pretty women to come into his sight; but as soon as he embraced this thin, mobile figure, and she moved so close to him and smiled so close to him, the wine of her charm went to his head: he felt revived and rejuvenated when, catching his breath and leaving her, he stopped and began to look on the dancers.

After Prince Andrei, Boris approached Natasha, inviting her to dance, and the adjutant dancer who started the ball, and more young people, and Natasha, handing over her excess gentlemen to Sonya, happy and flushed, did not stop dancing the whole evening. She did not notice anything and did not see anything that occupied everyone at this ball. She not only did not notice how the sovereign spoke for a long time with the French envoy, how he spoke especially graciously to such and such a lady, how prince such and such did and said this, how Helen was a great success and received special attention from such and such; she did not even see the sovereign and noticed that he left only because after his departure the ball became more lively. One of the merry cotillions, before dinner, Prince Andrei danced with Natasha again. He reminded her of their first date in the Otradnensky alley and how she could not sleep on a moonlit night, and how he involuntarily heard her. Natasha blushed at this reminder and tried to justify herself, as if there was something shameful in the feeling in which Prince Andrei involuntarily overheard her.
Prince Andrei, like all people who grew up in the world, loved to meet in the world that which did not have a common secular imprint on it. And such was Natasha, with her surprise, joy and timidity and even mistakes in the French language. He treated and spoke to her especially tenderly and carefully. Sitting next to her, talking with her about the simplest and most insignificant subjects, Prince Andrei admired the joyful sparkle of her eyes and smile, which related not to the speeches spoken, but to her inner happiness. While Natasha was being chosen and she stood up with a smile and danced around the hall, Prince Andrei especially admired her timid grace. In the middle of the cotillion, Natasha, having completed her figure, still breathing heavily, approached her place. The new gentleman invited her again. She was tired and out of breath, and apparently thought of refusing, but immediately again cheerfully raised her hand on the gentleman’s shoulder and smiled at Prince Andrey.
“I would be glad to rest and sit with you, I’m tired; but you see how they choose me, and I’m glad about it, and I’m happy, and I love everyone, and you and I understand all this,” and that smile said a lot more. When the gentleman left her, Natasha ran across the hall to take two ladies for the figures.
“If she approaches her cousin first, and then another lady, then she will be my wife,” Prince Andrei said to himself quite unexpectedly, looking at her. She approached her cousin first.
“What nonsense sometimes comes to mind! thought Prince Andrey; but the only thing that is true is that this girl is so sweet, so special, that she won’t dance here for a month and get married... This is a rarity here,” he thought when Natasha, straightening the rose that had fallen back from her bodice, sat down next to him.
At the end of the cotillion, the old count approached the dancers in his blue tailcoat. He invited Prince Andrei to his place and asked his daughter if she was having fun? Natasha did not answer and only smiled a smile that reproachfully said: “How could you ask about this?”
- More fun than ever in my life! - she said, and Prince Andrei noticed how quickly her thin arms rose to hug her father and immediately fell. Natasha was as happy as she had never been in her life. She was at that highest level of happiness when a person becomes completely trusting and does not believe in the possibility of evil, misfortune and grief.

At this ball, Pierre for the first time felt insulted by the position that his wife occupied in the highest spheres. He was gloomy and absent-minded. There was a wide crease across his forehead, and he, standing at the window, looked through his glasses, not seeing anyone.
Natasha, heading to dinner, passed him.
Pierre's gloomy, unhappy face struck her. She stopped in front of him. She wanted to help him, to convey to him the excess of her happiness.
“How fun, Count,” she said, “isn’t it?”
Pierre smiled absently, obviously not understanding what was being said to him.
“Yes, I’m very glad,” he said.
“How can they be unhappy with something,” Natasha thought. Especially one as good as this Bezukhov?” In Natasha’s eyes, everyone at the ball were equally kind, sweet, wonderful people who loved each other: no one could offend each other, and therefore everyone should be happy.

The next day, Prince Andrei remembered yesterday's ball, but did not dwell on it for long. “Yes, it was a very brilliant ball. And also... yes, Rostova is very nice. There is something fresh, special, not St. Petersburg, that distinguishes her.” That's all he thought about yesterday's ball, and after drinking tea, he sat down to work.
But from fatigue or insomnia (the day was not a good one for studying, and Prince Andrei could not do anything), he kept criticizing his own work, as often happened to him, and was glad when he heard that someone had arrived.
The visitor was Bitsky, who served on various commissions, visited all the societies of St. Petersburg, a passionate admirer of new ideas and Speransky and a concerned messenger of St. Petersburg, one of those people who choose a direction like a dress - according to fashion, but who for this reason seem to be the most ardent partisans of directions . He worriedly, barely having time to take off his hat, ran to Prince Andrei and immediately began to speak. He had just learned the details of the meeting of the State Council this morning, opened by the sovereign, and was talking about it with delight. The sovereign's speech was extraordinary. It was one of those speeches that are given only by constitutional monarchs. “The Emperor directly said that the council and the senate are state estates; he said that government should not be based on arbitrariness, but on solid principles. The Emperor said that finances should be transformed and reports should be made public,” said Bitsky, emphasizing well-known words and significantly opening his eyes.
“Yes, the current event is an era, the greatest era in our history,” he concluded.
Prince Andrei listened to the story about the opening of the State Council, which he expected with such impatience and to which he attributed such importance, and was surprised that this event, now that it had happened, not only did not touch him, but seemed to him more than insignificant. He listened to Bitsky's enthusiastic story with quiet mockery. The simplest thought came to his mind: “What does it matter to me and Bitsky, what do we care about what the sovereign was pleased to say in council! Can all this make me happier and better?”
And this simple reasoning suddenly destroyed for Prince Andrei all the previous interest in the transformations being carried out. On the same day, Prince Andrei was supposed to dine at Speransky’s “en petit comite,” [in a small meeting], as the owner told him, inviting him. This dinner in the family and friendly circle of a man whom he admired so much had previously greatly interested Prince Andrei, especially since until now he had not seen Speransky in his home life; but now he didn’t want to go.
At the appointed hour of lunch, however, Prince Andrei was already entering Speransky’s own small house near the Tauride Garden. In the parquet dining room of a small house, distinguished by its extraordinary cleanliness (reminiscent of monastic purity), Prince Andrei, who was somewhat late, already found at five o’clock the entire company of this petit comite, Speransky’s intimate acquaintances, gathered. There were no ladies except Speransky's little daughter (with a long face similar to her father) and her governess. The guests were Gervais, Magnitsky and Stolypin. From the hallway, Prince Andrei heard loud voices and clear, clear laughter - laughter similar to the one they laugh on stage. Someone in a voice similar to Speransky’s voice distinctly chimed: ha... ha... ha... Prince Andrei had never heard Speransky’s laughter, and this ringing, subtle laughter of a statesman strangely struck him.
Prince Andrei entered the dining room. The whole company stood between two windows at a small table with snacks. Speransky, in a gray tailcoat with a star, obviously still wearing the white vest and high white tie he wore at the famous meeting of the State Council, stood at the table with a cheerful face. Guests surrounded him. Magnitsky, addressing Mikhail Mikhailovich, told an anecdote. Speransky listened, laughing ahead at what Magnitsky would say. As Prince Andrei entered the room, Magnitsky’s words were again drowned out by laughter. Stolypin boomed loudly, chewing a piece of bread with cheese; Gervais hissed with a quiet laugh, and Speransky laughed subtly, distinctly.
Speransky, still laughing, gave Prince Andrei his white, tender hand.
“I’m very glad to see you, prince,” he said. - Just a minute... he turned to Magnitsky, interrupting his story. “We have an agreement today: dinner of pleasure, and not a word about business.” - And he turned to the narrator again, and laughed again.
Prince Andrei listened to his laughter with surprise and sadness of disappointment and looked at the laughing Speransky. It was not Speransky, but another person, it seemed to Prince Andrei. Everything that had previously seemed mysterious and attractive to Prince Andrei in Speransky suddenly became clear and unattractive to him.
At the table the conversation did not stop for a moment and seemed to consist of a collection of funny anecdotes. Magnitsky had not yet finished his story when someone else declared his readiness to tell something that was even funnier. The anecdotes mostly concerned, if not the official world itself, then the official persons. It seemed that in this society the insignificance of these persons was so finally decided that the only attitude towards them could only be good-naturedly comic. Speransky told how at the council this morning, when asked by a deaf dignitary about his opinion, this dignitary answered that he was of the same opinion. Gervais told a whole story about the audit, remarkable for the nonsense of all the characters. Stolypin stutteringly intervened in the conversation and began to speak passionately about the abuses of the previous order of things, threatening to turn the conversation into a serious one. Magnitsky began to mock Stolypin’s ardor, Gervais inserted a joke and the conversation again took its previous, cheerful direction.
Obviously, after work, Speransky loved to relax and have fun in a circle of friends, and all his guests, understanding his desire, tried to amuse him and have fun themselves. But this fun seemed heavy and sad to Prince Andrei. The thin sound of Speransky’s voice struck him unpleasantly, and the incessant laughter, with its false note, for some reason offended the feelings of Prince Andrei. Prince Andrei did not laugh and was afraid that he would be difficult for this society. But no one noticed his inconsistency with the general mood. Everyone seemed to be having a lot of fun.
Several times he wanted to enter into conversation, but each time his word was thrown out like a cork out of water; and he could not joke with them together.
There was nothing bad or inappropriate in what they said, everything was witty and could have been funny; but something, the very thing that is the essence of fun, not only did not exist, but they did not even know that it existed.
After dinner, Speransky’s daughter and her governess got up. Speransky caressed his daughter with his white hand and kissed her. And this gesture seemed unnatural to Prince Andrei.
The men, in English, remained at the table and drinking port. In the middle of the conversation that began about Napoleon's Spanish affairs, which everyone was of the same opinion approving, Prince Andrei began to contradict them. Speransky smiled and, obviously wanting to divert the conversation from the accepted direction, told an anecdote that had nothing to do with the conversation. For a few moments everyone fell silent.
After sitting at the table, Speransky corked a bottle of wine and said: “nowadays good wine goes in boots,” gave it to the servant and stood up. Everyone got up and, also talking noisily, went into the living room. Speransky was given two envelopes brought by a courier. He took them and went into the office. As soon as he left, the general fun fell silent and the guests began to talk to each other judiciously and quietly.
- Well, now the recitation! - said Speransky, leaving the office. - Amazing talent! - he turned to Prince Andrei. Magnitsky immediately struck a pose and began to speak French humorous poems that he had composed for some famous people in St. Petersburg, and was interrupted several times by applause. Prince Andrei, at the end of the poems, approached Speransky, saying goodbye to him.
-Where are you going so early? - said Speransky.
- I promised for the evening...
They were silent. Prince Andrei looked closely into those mirrored, impenetrable eyes and it became funny to him how he could expect anything from Speransky and from all his activities associated with him, and how he could attribute importance to what Speransky did. This neat, cheerless laughter did not stop ringing in the ears of Prince Andrei for a long time after he left Speransky.
Returning home, Prince Andrei began to remember his life in St. Petersburg during these four months, as if it were something new. He recalled his efforts, searches, the history of his draft military regulations, which were taken into account and about which they tried to keep silent only because other work, very bad, had already been done and presented to the sovereign; remembered the meetings of the committee of which Berg was a member; I remembered how in these meetings everything related to the form and process of the committee meetings was carefully and lengthily discussed, and how carefully and briefly everything related to the essence of the matter was discussed. He remembered his legislative work, how he anxiously translated articles from the Roman and French codes into Russian, and he felt ashamed of himself. Then he vividly imagined Bogucharovo, his activities in the village, his trip to Ryazan, he remembered the peasants, Drona the headman, and attaching to them the rights of persons, which he distributed in paragraphs, it became surprising to him how he could engage in such idle work for so long.