'Good Hackers' vs 'Evil Hackers'

[13k]

Hello,

What are hackers? What is good, what is evil?
All I know is that:


'Good Hackers' test their own systems.
'Bad Hackers' break into other people's systems.


1)Without 'Evil Hackers' there wouldn't be any 'Good Hackers', or vice-versa.

2)'Evil Hackers' seems to create jobs or even more for 'Good Hackers'

If someone can test their own system and find flaws, they could better break into another person's computer... 'Good and Evil Hackers' all seem the same to me, not sure but just asking.

[13k]

Hello,

What are hackers? What is good, what is evil?
All I know is that:


'Good Hackers' test their own systems.
'Bad Hackers' break into other people's systems.


1)Without 'Evil Hackers' there wouldn't be any 'Good Hackers', or vice-versa.

2)'Evil Hackers' seems to create jobs or even more for 'Good Hackers'

If someone can test their own system and find flaws, they could better break into another person's computer... 'Good and Evil Hackers' all seem the same to me, not sure but just asking.

[13k]

Hello,

What are hackers? What is good, what is evil?
All I know is that:


'Good Hackers' test their own systems.
'Bad Hackers' break into other people's systems.


1)Without 'Evil Hackers' there wouldn't be any 'Good Hackers', or vice-versa.

2)'Evil Hackers' seems to create jobs or even more for 'Good Hackers'

If someone can test their own system and find flaws, they could better break into another person's computer... 'Good and Evil Hackers' all seem the same to me, not sure but just asking.

[lkjoel]

Hackers are people who find things that (usually) are not supposed to know.
Good Hackers are people who help people, or help themselves.
Bad Hackers are people who try to break other peoples computers, or does something else illegal.

[Shazzam6999]

Well, according to RSM a hacker is just someone who messes around with computers (or something like that). I remember some documentary where he was explaining that the first 'hacking' he did was when passwords were first used to log on to the university's computers and he sent an e-mail to everyone asking them to change their pw to nothing, to promote openness. I don't think his definition matches society's though.

Good and evil is up to you.

[tacotime]

Hello,

What are hackers? What is good, what is evil?
All I know is that:


'Good Hackers' test their own systems.
'Bad Hackers' break into other people's systems.


1)Without 'Evil Hackers' there wouldn't be any 'Good Hackers', or vice-versa.

2)'Evil Hackers' seems to create jobs or even more for 'Good Hackers'

If someone can test their own system and find flaws, they could better break into another person's computer... 'Good and Evil Hackers' all seem the same to me, not sure but just asking.
this is best explained with the "hat system"
black hat hackers- they exploit security holes, and either sell them to people who wish to do bad with the security flaw they found, or they exploit it for their own personal gain.
white hat hackers- they try to find security holes, and they either write code to patch the hole, or they inform the writer of the software that has the hole, of the hole.
then again there are gray hats, who are totally unpredictable, they do whatever they want.

[s3MA00RRNY]

Check this out. It will help a lot.

http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html (http://www.catb.org/%7Eesr/faqs/hacker-howto.html)

The hacker mindset is not strictly related to security.

[amauk]

The word "Hacker" is tech slang that came out of MIT
it basically means someone who likes tinkering with technology for the love of it, rather than using it just as a tool

Hackers are people who revel in new and exciting technology

Think of people who tinker with cars for the love of it, as opposed to someone who just wants to use a car to drive to the shops

At least, that was the old definition

Modern usage (largely born out of films, and people who are not tech-savvy) have changed this word to mean "someone who breaks into computer systems"

This was originally refereed to as "cracking", and so you were a "cracker", but today cracker is largely a dead term, replaced by hacker

Now,
the skills, knowledge and tools used to protect and secure a system are exactly the same skills, knowledge and tools used to break into a system
If you know how to protect a system, you know how to break into one. The difference is all down to intent

so, we now have "white hat" and "black hat" hackers
to distinguish between the intent of a "hacker"

[opticyclic]

You might also want to look up the difference between a hacker and a cracker
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=hacker+cracker+difference

[SoFl W]

Back to this ole thread (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1410324).

[s3MA00RRNY]

Hacker is still a good word in my book. If you use it in the Linux community, people are likely to recognize the good definition.

[GO%)$@*1]

Hello,

What are hackers? What is good, what is evil?
All I know is that:


'Good Hackers' test their own systems.
'Bad Hackers' break into other people's systems.


1)Without 'Evil Hackers' there wouldn't be any 'Good Hackers', or vice-versa.

2)'Evil Hackers' seems to create jobs or even more for 'Good Hackers'

If someone can test their own system and find flaws, they could better break into another person's computer... 'Good and Evil Hackers' all seem the same to me, not sure but just asking.
Good hackers have ethics. Bad hackers are don't have ethics.
I disagree with "Bad hackers break into other people's systems". Some people hack into other systems for a living; finding flaws in software ,etc.

Does this thread belong in Absolute Beginner Talk? I think it belongs somewhere else.

[Rasa1111]

Good Hackers~ People like Julian Assange who create things like WikiLeaks.
and people like Kevin Mitnick. :KS

Bad hackers ~ people like adrian lamo with lame-O skills who just screw with other peoples things, and rats people out.
and people like tsutomu shimomura, who sell out to "the man" and go all out corruption. :mad:

[k3lt01]

Does this thread belong in Absolute Beginner Talk? I think it belongs somewhere else.It belongs in the exact same place as the other thread of the same title which the OP started.

[Temposs]

Most generally, a hacker is someone who sees their environment and wants to modify or explore it in a way that is interesting and unexpected.

So, this is how a hacker thinks: For a hacker, it makes him very curious when there is some locked computer system, or when there is a new technology with some very arrogant DRM waiting to be cracked. These are new environments waiting to be explored and played with, and it can be an interesting challenge to break complex security, and then see what interesting things wait inside.

He may also want to play with unlocked systems just as well, such as when Google releases a new API like Android, he may want to get an Android developer phone and mess around with making programs and making funky and unexpected things happen on the Android phone.

You can definitely hack non-computer things too, like with sugru, which has as its slogan "Hack Things Better": http://sugru.com/

Or you can hack your life: http://lifehacker.com/

Being a hacker is all about curiosity. It is simply about never being content with leaving your environment like it is. People's actions are 'good' or 'bad', but hacking is neither.

[McRat]

There was a news item where a cracker who had 50,000 webbots got hacked by a fellow crook and the guy stole all his webbots.

It appears he didn't use the latest patches for his malware server. It pays to stay updated I suppose.

[TriBlox6432]

Please don't duplicate threads...

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1515168

[amauk]

It belongs in the exact same place as the other thread of the same title which the OP started.
forums went haywire about an hour ago
there's double posts all over the place

[cariboo]

Please don't create multiple threads on the same subject, I have merged your three threads.

[bigseb]

Well, according to RSM a hacker is just someone who messes around with computers (or something like that). I remember some documentary where he was explaining that the first 'hacking' he did was when passwords were first used to log on to the university's computers and he sent an e-mail to everyone asking them to change their pw to nothing, to promote openness. I don't think his definition matches society's though.

Good and evil is up to you.

Don't you mean RMS?

[Frak]

White Hats: They want to keep market hackism.
Black Hats: They believe people can hack just as well without oversight.
Red Hats: They use phrases such as "hackers of teh intarwebz unite!" For half of a computer-century, they lived under the SCO regime. Even post-Red Hat times, many Red Hat Hackers long for their past Red Hat strength.

I'm totally serious, not really, but seriously I am.

[Primefalcon]

I'm one of the people who doesn't like the term hackers being used to describe crackers

[Rasa1111]

you guys might like this.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1511713
:o
O:)

[wojox]

I'm one of the people who doesn't like the term hackers being used to describe crackers

Same Here

[13k]

Please don't create multiple threads on the same subject, I have merged your three threads.

sorry lag