The True Hacker A Distortion Of Reality

The True Hacker: A Distortion Of Reality Essay, Research Paper Over the years, to this date, the media has distorted the definition of a hacker. It has been morphed and demonized to someone who terrorizes cyberspace. However, the true hacker is someone who seeks knowledge and information. When hackers hack into systems or networks, it is to explore an operating system that is foreign to them. The younger generations have bred a new philosophy of hacking. Wannabe hackers who do not deserve the title ?hacker? use simple utilities available over the Internet to hack into personal computers or banks and cause havoc. This is due because they have no respect for the unwritten hacker code and ethics. Those superficial hackers who use their knowledge to harm other operating systems

or use their experience to gain material wealth have blemished the integrity of the hackers of the world. A true hacker is not like your ordinary person. Hackers are distinctively different than your average and boring citizen. They do not settle for what the rest of the world is following or brainwashed into doing. Hackers thrive off curiosity, and have an unsatisfying hunger for knowledge. The word impossible or access denied does not exist in a hacker?s vocabulary. They can access anything and everything that is kept in a computer; particularly when a price has been placed on knowledge and information. Why should only a select few have leisure of knowing what the rest of the public does not? Knowledge is and should always remain free. A hacker will share his knowledge,

encourage it to be reproduced and distributed. Hacking is a skill that takes years and years and tons of practice to achieve. A hacker?s qualifications are based on qualifications and performance. Prejudice is non-existent, a person?s title such as degree or position means nothing over the Internet. Discrimination is impossible, hackers are judged on how much they achieved in the quest for knowledge. Hackers have ethics, contrary to what the media has portrayed. Hackers do not plant viruses, (biggest myth) they do not steal. However certain hackers who misuse their abilities to steal are not classified as true hackers, because knowledge in itself is its own reward. Hackers do not cause corruption nor destroy systems or networks. A real hacker?s purpose is to explore foreign

material. The most common clich? is ?Using your knowledge to increase your knowledge.? But nowhere in the process is it said to gain material wealth or harm other computer systems. Hackers are the ones that should be helped and assisted because of their sheer intellectual capacity, and their ability to solve the everyday problems of the rapid advancement in modern technology. But is hacking really a crime? Is there a line between harmful and harmless hacking? ?Hacking is a state of mind, not just the activity of breaking into computer systems. It can mean sitting up behind a computer all night to make a clever program to perform some useful or useless program.? (Hayward) Hackers have been deemed with malicious acts and criminal activity, irredeemable to society. But, hackers say

that unauthorized entry to a network does not have to involve harming that network or stealing intellectual property. The only purpose the true hacker when making an unauthorized entry is to explore the depths of a computing system. In short, the dividing line comes when hackers damage or corrupt the person?s uses of a computing system. Okay, but if hacking is a crime, should it be considered a civil or criminal offense? True hackers argue that zero-impact (harmless) hacking should be treated as a civil offence. ?Crimes with no ill intent and crimes of curiosity should be treated as such. In regular society, when a crime is committed by a first-time offender or by someone not considered a threat, oftentimes punishment is suspended or very light. But computer crimes are quite