Ethickerd/Englisch

Ethickerd is a synonym for hackers, who follow ethical principles.

This is a English translation of the German original. Copyleft: The article may be copied, adapted and published without restrictions.

Ethickerd-Symbol

The Ethickerd-Initiative

The vain attempt to establish the notion of “true hacker” in the context of “hacker are not cracker”:

The term "hacker" exists since the 1950's and its usage has been the matter of a long controversy among the hacker cultures. The root of the conflict goes back to the year 1983. At this time, media started to use the word "hacker" to characterize people who took part in the intrusion of other people's computers. As described in the “Jargon-File 2.1.1” (1990), especially the members of the academic hacker culture were displeased by this usage. Since 1985, they tried to establish a classification by introducing the notion of "cracker" as a backlash. The published distinction was simple: One who overrides security barriers is - regardless of his motivation - not a hacker but a cracker. The demand to use another word wasn't perceived or ignored extensively by the press.

Countercurrents amongst the descendants of the phreaking-culture gave birth to a new culture: There is a hacker culture in the area of network and computer security. The supporters of the latter still claim the use of the term "hacker", but today they choose another path to antagonize its negative connotation. The dividing line to the cracker is defined by the hacker's motivation. Only the destructive elements of the scene are named "cracker". To put it simply, you can say that hackers solve problems and create something, whereas crackers cause problems and destroy things. In the detail, hackers set up information networks and point out security vulnerabilities (in order to fix them). They write free software or act constructively on other fields that fit into the numerous definitions of the word "hacker". Crackers on the other hand paralyze computer- and telephone-networks, delete or modify important data, enrich themselves in a criminal way or initiate intentional crashes of computers. Occasionally there are aspirations to set a clear delimitation between hacker and cracker. But at the latest when it comes to politically motivated actions, it becomes obvious that there is no clear distinction between "good" and "evil". This makes such an absolute classification impractical.

In contrast, most people still use "hacker" as a generic term. In the context of computer security it both includes the ("good") hackers and the ("evil") crackers. That's how the usage by general public dominates its colloquial meaning. Related to IT-security it became a basic concept already a long time ago.

The new way:

After decades of vain efforts of the hacker community to fundemantally change the general use of the term "hacker", the time to rethink has come: Without binding the hacker definition to a moral doctrine, the notion of "hacker" should be uniformly accepted as an umbrella term. It is meant to enclose all hacker cultures and within these cultures also unite all the constructive and destructive facings of hacking. Only the acceptance of the colloquial definition of "hacker" allows the community to explain itself to a general public in a way that can be understood by everyone. Only then, the term "hacker" will be usable for both the assertors of the hacker cultures and the general public. The hacker community symbol stands for the objectives of this movement.

The use of the term "ethickerd" constitutes a consequence of the initiative. It encloses hackers who follow ethical principles and serves to obtain an acceptance for the initiative. That's how this term shall serve as an alternative to those who want to distance themselves, under the mentioned conditions, from the destructive elements amongst the hackers. Opposite to the old strategy it offers the opportunity to do this in a way that is understandable to the general public, without perpetually having to invert the hacker definition in the population's mind. It is fundamental for the initiative that henceforth ethical ideologies are able to become manifest outside the general hacker definition.

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You can support the initiative by putting the community- or ethickerd-symbol on your website respectively by publishing it otherwise. Multiplying the article is explicitly desired as well.

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Ethickerds within computer security

Within the field of computer security, ethickerds unite white- and grey-hat hackers, whose concern it is to call attention to deficiencies in the privacy of companies and public authorities and to point out existing security vulnerabilities and to close it. Among their activities they count the execution of pen tests (penetration tests) and an outreaching analysis of soft- and hardware products.

The attempt of equating an ethickerd with a cracker is comparable to a locksmith being called a burglar, just because both of them use the same tools. Admittedly, the legal clearance for such analysis diminuates with the accentuation of the legislation. Once upon a time, hackers were proud when they found a security vulnarability and signaled it, whereas nowadays they have to worry about legal consequences from the manufacturers, if reverse engineering of their products is prohibited. Depending on the character of the analysis and the local legislation, ethickerds act in a grey zone of the legislator. The term consequently cannot claim to set a clear dividing line between "good" and "evil".

Moreover you don't necessarily find the intentions of a hacker in a higher moral purpose. Some of them merely share the affection of turning systems deemed secure upside down by which they show how fallible the infallibility is. Nevertheless, "ethickerd" characterizes a direction of hacking which follows ethical principles.

As long as crackers analyse products and exploit security vulnerabilities, it still seems to be important that ethickerds call attention to security relevant failures. Otherwise some manufactures wouldn't ever know about their products' vulnerabilities. Other manufactorers don't see themselves in the responsibility of investing funds in the dispatching of security vulnerabilities. Often it's hardly possible for the customer to prove a failure by his own ressources, respecting the manufacturer's guidelines, in a case of loss.

Every now and then those hackers reveal hidden activities of the products, which shouldn't be noticed by the customer (e.g. phone home routines). By that, they counterbalance manufacturers in matters of privacy or other unpopular, sometimes even illegal activities.

Ethickerds beyond the computer security

Beyond the computer security, the term "ethickerd" encloses hackers from all hacker cultures who also neither follow a racist, nor a vandalistic motivation and who don't enrich themselves illegally by their activities. They constitute among others a group of talented software engineers or hardware-designers or -tuners or dedicate themselves to an ingenious way of dealing with technologies of all kind.

Weblinks

• XCP is part of a very aggressive copyright protection campaign by Sony BMG and a good example to clarify how important it is to look upon the manufacturers' fingers. Without the customer's knowledge, Sony's malware installs itself stealthily on the system and hides itself while a legally purchased CD that is equipped with XCP plays. Based on a rootkit-technology, it manipulates important parts of the OS (Operating System) without being asked, gathers information about the user and sends it to the company via the internet. By this manipulation, it creates new security vulnerabilities and slows down the system even if there's no CD playing, because of a design weakness. In addition, the corresponding filter driver can cause the computer to crash under certain circumstances. The renowned system specialist Mark Russinovich detected Sony's malware.