Hacking(clearing the misconceptions)

The world was going fine…the people were going on with their daily lives.They used to surf the net and there were some instances,where people were cheated on the net.Someone had his password stolen,someone got an empty bank account.Some disgruntled ex-employee stole the company secrets and sold them to a competitor.All of these were found in some obscure corner of the newspaper,and were the talk only amongst the people actually concerned,and the experts.

All of a sudden,some techy movie was released,which had this evil computer genius as a character,who was a “hacker” and who could create chaos in the entire country just by his computer.He could create viruses,which could blow up the computer,he could take over the control of the nukes.He could even cyber-spy on your girlfriend or money .

This was the time,when suddenly a lot of people came to realize that the reason why they could no longer log into their e-mail accounts was because someone had found out the password of he account and had changed it.This was also the time when the term “hacker” changed from a being a complement to being equivalent to a thief.

The phrase “to hack” means to gain knowledge about a machine.When a person is hacking a computer,it simply means that he his trying to understand his computer better.So,actually,a hacker is simply a person who is trying to gain knowledge about something,without any malicious intent.

Then,who was that evil computer genius with all his knowledge?Ans:He was a “Cracker”.A cracker is a person,who breaks into computer systems without any permissions,with malicious intent.The term “cracker” was probably coined by the “good” hackers,so as to differentiate themselves from the “bad” ones.It’s a cracker,who wants to know your password,or to crash your computer or use your e-mail ID.

I hope this has changed your concepts about the term “hacker” and it would be used much more carefully next time.