The term "hacker" should not have negative connotations associated with it. Thanks to
Hollywood's persistent misuse of the term, the
populace now have a misconception of what a "hacker" really is. If you intend to talk
about someone that is breaking laws and
entering systems illegally, a better term is "cracker", or "pirate". If illegally
abusing telco systems "phreaker" would be a better
term.
After spending 22 years in Electronics and Computers (embedded systems engineering,
programming, systems, networking, security
etc.), I consider myself a "hacker/tinker" and a professional engineer, as many of my
co-workers are. It is offensive to people like
myself to be lumped into groups that are ethically challenged, or just johnny come
lately script kiddies that know about
rootshell.com and think they have the right to ride our coat-tails..
If you remember when Doctor Dobbs Joural was good, or couldn't wait for the next
Ciarcia Circuit Cellar article, or used the Small C
compiler to bootstrap a fully compliant ANSI-C compiler, actually know who Kernighan,
Ritchie and Stroustrup are, have gone to bed
reading the "Dragon Book" or the Stevens/Wright books, have personally operated a FIDO
node or owned a 3B2, are familiar with
machine code or assembly language on several processors, or soldered up your first
Bell103a modem and have continued your
knowledge/studies incessantly then I would classify you as a "hacker" in my book.
To associate a "hacker" with one of these punk information age criminals is a mistake
on your part, and shows your lack of knowledge
in this area.
http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/Lamer-speak.html
>From the Jargon File:
Crackers, Phreaks, and Lamers
>From the early 1980s onward, a flourishing culture of local, MS-DOS-based bulletin
>boards developed separately from Internet
hackerdom. The BBS culture has, as its seamy underside, a stratum of `pirate boards'
inhabited by crackers, phone phreaks, and warez
d00dz. These people (mostly teenagers running IBM-PC clones from their bedrooms) have
developed their own characteristic jargon,
heavily influenced by skateboard lingo and underground-rock slang.
Though crackers often call themselves `hackers', they aren't (they typically have
neither significant programming ability, nor
Internet expertise, nor experience with UNIX or other true multi-user systems). Their
vocabulary has little overlap with
hackerdom's. Nevertheless, this lexicon covers much of it so the reader will be able
to understand what goes by on bulletin-board
systems.
Here is a brief guide to cracker and warez d00dz usage:
a.. Misspell frequently. The substitutions
phone => fone
freak => phreak
are obligatory.
b.. Always substitute `z's for `s's. (i.e. "codes" -> "codez"). The substitution of
'z' for 's' has evolved so that a 'z' is now
systematically put at the end of words to denote an illegal or cracking connection.
Examples : Appz, passwordz, passez, utilz, MP3z,
distroz, pornz, sitez, gamez, crackz, serialz, downloadz, FTPz, etc.
c.. Type random emphasis characters after a post line (i.e. "Hey Dudes!#!$#$!#!$").
d.. Use the emphatic `k' prefix ("k-kool", "k-rad", "k-awesome") frequently.
e.. Abbreviate compulsively ("I got lotsa warez w/ docs").
f.. Substitute `0' for `o' ("r0dent", "l0zer").
g.. TYPE ALL IN CAPS LOCK, SO IT LOOKS LIKE YOU'RE YELLING ALL THE TIME.
These traits are similar to those of B1FF, who originated as a parody of naive BBS
users; also of his latter-day equivalent Jeff K..
Occasionally, this sort of distortion may be used as heavy sarcasm by a real hacker,
as in:
> I got X Windows running under Linux!
d00d! u R an 31337 hax0r
The only practice resembling this in actual hacker usage is the substitution of a
dollar sign of `s' in names of products or service
felt to be excessively expensive, e.g. Compu$erve, Micro$oft.
For further discussion of the pirate-board subculture, see lamer, elite, leech, poser,
cracker, and especially warez d00dz, banner
site, ratio site, leech mode.
cracker n.
One who breaks security on a system. Coined ca. 1985 by hackers in defense against
journalistic misuse of hacker (q.v., sense 8). An
earlier attempt to establish `worm' in this sense around 1981-82 on Usenet was largely
a failure.
Use of both these neologisms reflects a strong revulsion against the theft and
vandalism perpetrated by cracking rings. While it is
expected that any real hacker will have done some playful cracking and knows many of
the basic techniques, anyone past larval stage
is expected to have outgrown the desire to do so except for immediate, benign,
practical reasons (for example, if it's necessary to
get around some security in order to get some work done).
Thus, there is far less overlap between hackerdom and crackerdom than the mundane
reader misled by sensationalistic journalism might
expect. Crackers tend to gather in small, tight-knit, very secretive groups that have
little overlap with the huge, open
poly-culture this lexicon describes; though crackers often like to describe themselves
as hackers, most true hackers consider them a
separate and lower form of life.
Ethical considerations aside, hackers figure that anyone who can't imagine a more
interesting way to play with their computers than
breaking into someone else's has to be pretty losing. Some other reasons crackers are
looked down on are discussed in the entries on
cracking and phreaking. See also samurai, dark-side hacker, and hacker ethic. For a
portrait of the typical teenage cracker, see
warez d00dz.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Graham, Randy (RAW) " <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Steven Pierce'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "Gaute Gullesen"
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "mht" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Cc: "Frederick M Avolio" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "Hartley, Earl" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>;
"Jose Nazario" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>;
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "Crumrine, Gary L" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Monday, March 12, 2001 10:19 AM
Subject: RE: Re[2]: Licensing Information Security Professionals story
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> I'm always concerned by people hiring "hackers" as security experts,
> simply because they are, or were, "hackers." I feel this is
> equivalent to hiring a former arsonist to be fire chief, or a
> hijacker to be an airport security inspector. Knowing how to find
> one or two holes in a system and exploiting them does not necessarily
> mean one knows how to harden and test a system, nor does breaking in
> to many IIS 4.0 machines make one qualified to protect a corporate
> network. My personal view is that having a "hacker" past should not
> automatically disqualify a person from a position in information
> security, but it should not make them a sure hire either. Of course,
> since I don't do hiring, my opinion doesn't matter much in this
> regard.
>
> Randy Graham
>
> - -----Original Message-----
> From: Steven Pierce [SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Saturday, March 10, 2001 10:44 PM
> To: Gaute Gullesen; mht
> Cc: Frederick M Avolio; Hartley, Earl; Jose Nazario;
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Crumrine, Gary L
> Subject: Re: Re[2]: Licensing Information Security Professionals
> story
>
>
>
> I agree 100%. Who said that the information crime is something
> that is dangerous? I have read more then one story that business
> are hiring ex hackers for their business to help with security
> issues.
> Who better to know if there is a security hole, but for someone to
> that has been in to play (Defeat) with them...
>
> If they can pass a background, and the like I have no problem with
> it.
> Now they might have a little shorter leash then someone that has not
> been convicted. That would also only be until they proved
> themselves.
> I could bet they would be a better employee then someone that has not
> been into the system.
> *********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********
>
> On 3/10/2001 at 13:56 Gaute Gullesen wrote:
>
> >On Saturday, March 10, 2001, 3:56:31 AM, mht wrote:
> >> Why would anyone want to hire someone who has actually been
> >> convicted/charged with an Information Security crime. It seems if
> >> they were smart enough to get caught they are truly not the best
> >> security personnel out there. Even testifying in front of
> >> Congress using one's hacker nom de plume doesn't help one's
> >> career either, although there has been notable exceptions over
> >> the last couple of years -:)
> >
> >i prefer judging people myself when it comes to who i'm gonna
> >trust. giving your authorities that power is just scary!
> >
> >================================================================
> > Gaute Gullesen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> phone: +47 922 48 107
> > Fingerprint: AF90 7B96 9835 AA26 4DCC D4F7 1B82 110C B5DF 00B1
> > Support the antiSecurity movement!: http://anti.security.is/
> >================================================================
> >
> >
> >-
> >[To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with
> >"unsubscribe firewalls" in the body of the message.]
>
>
>
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