Are Hacktivists Bad For The Tech World?

Featured article by Dylan Chadwick, content writer and marketer at Fueled

Socially conscious and active individuals have been around for a long time, possibly even longer than politics. However, as the world changes and new means of social activism are placed within their reach, subsequent generations adapt, taking the established methods of activism onto new forums and stages of public life, such as hashtag campaigns on Twitter, mobile apps and special interest groups on Facebook. Old-fashioned, traditional demonstrations,  like rallies, protests, petitions, and marches, are still the most common and effective forms of activism, but a new branch – hacktivism – has been steadily gathering momentum and gaining relevance.

According to Wikipedia, hacktivism “is the subversive use of computers and computer networks to promote a political agenda.” Practical examples of this are the appropriation or leaks of information from governments, which have become increasingly popular in news cycles, especially since the  WikiLeaks scandal broke out.

While the term was coined roughly 20 years ago, the subject of hacktivism causes a lot of confusion and controversy, because “hackers” (a loaded term with a negative connotation) and “hacktivists” tend to be one and the same. While some hacktivists are genuinely well-intentioned, others certainly use the large umbrella of hacktivism to perform acts which are less than honorable and even illegal, not to mention harmful to society.

Hacking into someone else’s website or computer is a crime, no matter what the reasoning behind the attack is, and that is something which governments and international organizations tend to hold on to and make sure the media tells their readers and viewers when reporting on major hacktivism actions.

The fact is not all hacktivists are actually hackers, and many of them interfere in conflicts in a number of other ways, like attacking one of the parties on social media, boycotting them, or something similar. This was the case in Egypt during the Arab Spring, when the government tried to shut down the Internet, and a number of the web’s giants created a service which allowed messages to be posted to Twitter via phone, as Computer Weekly reminds us in a very compelling article about hacktivism.

But while the actions of the case above were supported, even performed by very high-profile organizations and sanctioned by authorities, in other situations hacktivists can actually cross the line into terrorism, at least in the legal spectrum. One such case was observed when Anonymous, the infamous international Internet vigilante group, defended Hamas in a ‘cyberwar’ against Israel. As Dr. Clint Arizmendi points out in his Blogs Of War article, the members of the group could actually be prosecuted for their association with a terrorist group if found, since they likely lived in a country which deems Hamas as terrorists and has anti-terrorism laws in place.

Furthermore, NATO is echoing this position, as it launched a ‘Manual of Cyber Warfare’ which states that “An act of direct participation in hostilities by civilians renders them liable to be attacked, by cyber or other legal means,”, according to an article in the Washington Times.

If this ‘terrorist’ label wasn’t debilitating enough to hacktivists’ image among the public, the fact that hacktivism by groups, such as Anonymous, accounted for 58% of stolen information in 2011, according to a report by Verizon, and that their activity seems to be more prominent in difficult times for the economy, according to experts cited by PC Pro, certainly is. These reports don’t paint a favorable picture of such groups, as they are thought to be trying to ‘make a point’ by any means, even putting other civilians at risk.

At the end of the day, it is still hard to answer the question of whether hacktivism is good or bad for the tech world and the world in general, as the free flow of information causes vulnerability and puts civilians at risk, not to mention that it does give hackers, and tech geniuses in general a really bad reputation in the eyes of the public as well as official organizations, thus creating friction in the cyber world.

Dylan Chadwick is a content writer and marketer at Fueled, an award-winning mobile app design and development house based in New York, Chicago and London. At Fueled, we don’t just build apps; with teams of designers, developers and strategists, we create visually stunning products that redefine the technical boundaries of today’s mobile development standards. We’ve built award-winning iPhone, iPad and Android apps used by millions of people for clients ranging from Fortune 100 companies to up and coming startups including Barney’s, Coca Cola, UrbanDaddy, JackThreads and MTV. We hold ourselves to the highest standard of usability, stability and design in every project that we touch.