Hacktivisim
– What is it?
We've all heard the term, but what does it mean? Where did the term
originate? What is the purpose of “Hacktivism?” Well I'm here to
discuss that with you and where “Hacktivism” has been used in
modern history, whether for good or for evil. I will be using the
organization “Anonymous” for my examples to maintain continuity.
Is Hacktivism good or bad? I guess in the end it's up for you to
decide that but I will provide you the information to decide for
yourself. Hacktivism is the term given to “cyber protestors” that
protest things using “hacks” whether this be by stealing
passwords and hacking the person's profile on social media, DDOSing a
website or server, or simply messing with things on the internet that
they aren't supposed to be able to. Essentially, Hacktivism is the
act of hacking into something like a computer system for either
political or socially motivated reasons. Anyone who commits this act
is considered a “Hacktivist” and the maximum penalty for hacking
is 20 years in prison.
Throughout
modern history the term “hacking” has been used a lot. It has
been used in movies and TV shows a lot but rarely to an accurate
degree. Hacking is a term used by laymen for the use of many things
that aren't actually hacking, one of which is “DDOSing” which is
a denial of service attack. This is essentially when one or more
people send a huge amount of information to a server that stops
actual information getting in. The easiest way to think about it is
just imagine a tall building has one elevator, and I went out and
hired 100 people to line up at the elevator and go up and down for no
reason; people who actually needed to use the elevator wouldn't be
able to. That is essentially a real life DDOS. DDOSing has been used
throughout modern history to prevent companies websites or servers
from being online. This has been used on the Church of Scientology,
the American Government, even Sony's PSN network, and many other
controversial companies.
In
the recent history, DDOSing was used against the Church of
Scientology in an attempt to disrupt Scientology at their core. This
was known as Operation Chanology. During this time, 4chan members
noticed that the Church of Scientology were abusing several human
rights. One of which was not allowing people to say anything
constructive or negative about their beliefs or the church itself.
The Church of Scientology members were known for following people
home, banning people from forums and suing any person who “dared”
to speak out against the church. 4Chan took offence to this. Everyone
knows what Anonymous is but before this point, Anonymous was just a
group of 4chan users who trolled on the internet for “lulz”, but
feeling incredibly passionate about how the Church of Scientology was
acting, Anonymous decided that it was time to do something about it.
Starting with DDOSing their website and eventually having thousands
of members around the world leave their homes to protest outside of
Scientology buildings around the world, wearing Guy Fawkes masks.
This is a great example of Hacktivism.
Another
example of Hacktivism is when Hal Turner, an at the time Politician,
a white nationalist Neo Nazi, and a Holocaust denier got on the wrong
side of a 4chan member. Anonymous decided to have some fun with him
to defend said user and upon finding out he was a Neo Nazi, decided
to take it to the next step. Hal's radio station was spammed with
prank calls all day, every day. His home address was ordered pizza to
constantly, his email filled with joke emails, his accounts for
practically everything he had online were hacked and his website was
constantly down due to DDOS, so much so that Hal was eventually
unable to pay for his radio show. This is another example of
Hacktivism but a less heroic example due to Anonymous not being aware
that he was a white nationalist or a Neo Nazi before they started to
annoy him.
A
more recent example of Hacktivism is Operation Tunisia. During the
Tunisian revolution, Anonymous assaulted many Government websites
with DDOS attacks and it wasn't long before many Tunisian websites
were offline. This was originally due to Tunisia blocking WikiLeaks
in the area, along with many other websites. The Government was
always infamous for hacking into it's subjects Facebooks and social
medias and deleting comments, etc. Anon members were always taking
reports from Tunisian citizens and tweeting them out for them due to
them not being able to. Anonymous also provided Tunisian's with a
script that would allow people on the Internet in Tunisia to browse
the internet without being seen by their Government. After this had
gone on for a while, Tunisian's Government made a drastic decision;
it decided to take down the Internet. All of a sudden the internet
was gone. Anonymous users were shocked. Then responded with, “Fine,
if you want to turn off their Internet, we're going to show them how
to turn it back on.” and that's what they did. They sent over
service packages that taught Tunisian's how to fix their internet. A
few weeks later Tunisian's leader, Ben
Ali, stepped down. This particular example is an example of how, I
think, Hacktivism should be used.
Some
of you may remember a few years ago when Anonymous DDOSed Sony's
Playstation Network due to their support for some new anti-internet
privacy laws that were in the process of being passed, the most
notable being SOPA. Anonymous decided it wasn't going to stand for
anyone stomping on their rights so the Playstation Network Servers
were down for almost a month and personal information was released. I
personally disagree with the information being released but at the
same time I can see why it happened; to create doubt in Playstation
Network users. Who's going to purchase something on a network that
can be so easily hacked when it risks their own credit card details.
Not many people.
After
a while, a smaller group of members from Anonymous broke off into a
group called “Lulzsec” which was less about defending people's
rights and more about trolling strangers. They too have hacked Sony
before, and also a CIA website. Although some experts have suggested
that their hacking has drawn attention to insecure systems and hence
helped some of the websites / organizations it has hacked out, that
was not it's intention and it is not designed to be a positive
experience for anyone except the members. Is this causing people to
view Hacktivism as more of a more negative side of the internet? I
wouldn't be surprised.
Do
you think it is a valid form of protest? Should it continue to be
frowned upon. Do you agree with the extremely high sentences given
out to hackers? Do you think it should be judged on a case-to-case
basis, or should all hacking be straight up illegal? Is 20 years for
hacking fair? In my opinion, Hacktivism and all parts of it should be
judged on a case-to-case basis. If a hacker group is only doing
something to prevent abuse of any kind, should they really be
punished for doing so, or should perhaps the reason they are doing it
be looked at more closely? In the end, it's up to you to form your
own opinion and I hope that this speech has at least begun to help
you do so. Thanks for listening!
References:
2011: The Year Anonymous Took On Cops, Dictators and Existential Dread | WIRED. (12, January 9). Retrieved December 9, 2014, from http://www.wired.com/2012/01/anonymous-dicators-existential-dread/
ANONYMOUS - OPERATION TUNISIA - A Press Release. (2011, January 5). Retrieved December 9, 2014, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFLaBRk9wY0
HAROLD C. (n.d.). Retrieved December 9, 2014, from http://dockets.justia.com/docket/new-jersey/njdce/2:2007cv00306/198438
Anonymous posts another video against Scientology - CNET. (n.d.). Retrieved December 9, 2014, from http://www.cnet.com/news/anonymous-posts-another-video-against-scientology/
Northeast Ohio. (n.d.). Retrieved December 9, 2014, from http://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/entertainment-0/1201771820310820.xml
Bartz, D., & Finkle, J. (2011, May 4). Sony says Anonymous set stage for data theft. Retrieved December 9, 2014, from http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/04/us-sony-idUSTRE73R0Q320110504
WebCite query result. (n.d.). Retrieved December 9, 2014, from http://www.webcitation.org/5zMrR1kzh
WebCite query result. (n.d.). Retrieved December 9, 2014, from http://www.webcitation.org/5zRd8wlAR
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