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Chapter 2: Cracking the Hacker Mindset
And people wonder why IT doesn’t get the respect it deserves! Perhaps this
group will evolve into a fourth general category of hackers in the coming
years.
Regardless of age and complexion, hackers possess curiosity, bravado, and
often very sharp minds.
Perhaps more important than a hacker’s skill level is his or her motivation:
✓ Hacktivists try to disseminate political or social messages through their
work. A hacktivist wants to raise public awareness of an issue. In many
situations, criminal hackers will try to take you down if you express a
view that’s contrary to theirs. Examples of hacktivism are the websites
that were defaced with the Free Kevin messages that promoted freeing
Kevin Mitnick from prison for his famous hacking escapades. Others
cases of hacktivism include messages about legalizing drugs, protests
against the war in Iraq, protests centered around wealth envy and big
corporations, and just about any other social and political issue you can
think of.
✓ Cyberterrorists (both organized and unorganized) attack government
computers or public utility infrastructures, such as power grids and
air-traffic control towers. They crash critical systems or steal classified
government information. Countries take the threats these cyberterrorists
pose so seriously that many mandate information security controls
in crucial industries, such as the power industry, to protect essential
systems against these attacks.
✓ Hackers for hire are part of organized crime on the Internet. Many of
these hackers hire out themselves or their botnets for money — and lots
of it!
These criminal hackers are in the minority, so don’t think that you’re up
against millions of these villains. Like the spam kings of the world, many of the
nefarious acts from members of collectives that prefer to remain nameless are
carried out by a small number of criminals. Many other hackers just love to
tinker and only seek knowledge of how computer systems work. One of your
greatest threats works inside your building and has an access badge to the
building and a valid network account, so don’t discount the insider threat.
Why They Do It
Hackers hack because they can. Period. Okay, it goes a little deeper than that.
Hacking is a casual hobby for some hackers — they hack just to see what
they can and can’t break into, usually testing only their own systems. These
aren’t the folks I write about in this book. I focus on those hackers who are
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