ARGH!!!

IT’S NOT A HACK PEOPLE!

“Hacking” = Exploiting technical weaknesses in a computer or electronic system to gain access, OR finding inventive ways to use a physical, electronic or virtual system to do something or create something unintended by the original inventors of the system.

THIS is “password guessing”. NOT hacking.

As a Geek, I find the amazing lack of knowledge about what hacking is and is not to be incredibly frustrating. This kid is NOT a “hacker.” He was barely a Script Kiddie. (a Script Kiddie is a punk who takes hacking and security tools invented by REAL hackers, and uses them to perpetrate mischief.)

Most REAL Hackers are actually nice guys. They aren’t crooks and bad actors. The majority of them are simply interested in computer, electronic and social systems and the security (or INsecurity) inherent in them. The VAST majority of them have great concerns over the extreme LACK of security of many of our modern systems of communication and business, and the ease with which one can break in and steal from those systems. These types are often referred to as “White Hat” Hackers. These hackers will attempt to contact and work with those whom they find with critical security flaws in their systems, in an attempt to try and help them improve.

Unfortunately, many ignorant business and governmental types have attacked the White Hat Hackers responsible for discovering the security flaws. This has resulted in the second class of hackers, known as the Grey Hats.

These guys have the same concerns as the White hats, but having been burned by ignorance, are content to simply discover a problem, and then anonymously release it to the world, consequences be damned.

Ironically, while this does result in SOME loss to innocent parties, it tends to get the problem fixed faster. Thus perpetrating and extending the Grey Hat phenomena. Many Grey Hats also hack for notoriety as well, irrespective of whether they assist in fixing a problem or not.

Lastly, there is the smallest group, the “Black Hats”. (Incidentally, NO direct connection with the “Black hat conference” held each year for hackers.) The Black Hats are, simply put, criminals. They hack systems for fun and profit. But mostly Profit. Most of them work for foreign interests, of which a large contingent is the Russian Mafia. These guys are the ones responsible for the major financial and trading institute break-ins you hear about on the news. They are small, but organized , and hooked in with some of the largest criminal organizations in the world. These are the guys the White Hats are trying to help protect against.

Ok, that’s a general overview and description of what hackers are and are not. It’s not a perfect description, and a tad simplistic, but it’s enough to give you a functional understanding of the hacker community.

The punk that gained access to Sarah Palin’s yahoo account was absolutely NOT a hacker. Password guessing is a trivial task if you just spend some time thinking about and gathering readily available public info on the person’s who’s email you want access to. MOST people use crappy, easy to guess passwords. Sarah Palin is apparently no different in that respect than almost any other non-technical person.

In regards to Anonymous, Michelle has a GREAT description of who they are. It’s not a hacker group people, it’s a nebulous, random group of people that hang out on the various *chan boards and IRC channels. Heck, I am a sometime member of Anonymous! (I watched, lent moral support and advice to Anonymous’ crusade against the horrible cult of Scientology. Which, as most things Anonymous does, fizzled.)

So it’s not some mysterious cabal of criminals, it’s just a random bunch of people from the Internet who like to do sometimes clever, sometimes stupid, sometimes cruel things. In this case, ONE of them took it WAY too far, and thankfully, a more responsible member of Anonymous took action and tried to stop it.

I’m sure the bad actor here will be outed by “Mookie” (The guy that runs 4chan. He and the FBI work closely together on cases like these.) and crook will soon be V&. (IE: “Vanned”. Meaning, hauled off to prison in an FBI black van.)

As far as Sarah Palin is concerned, while I’m sure she is upset about it, I’m guessing she will be much more security conscious in the future. Also, since there really was NOTHING bad in her personal e-mail, this ONLY speaks well to her as an Honest and forthright candidate. I suspect this will give her and McCain a bump in the polls.

wearyman on September 18, 2008 at 8:27 AM