Supplement: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/rms-hack.html
What is hacking? Hacking is the use of cleverness to overcome limitations and adversities in engineering. However, with the growth of global networking, it is the use of cleverness to overcome security systems put in place to prevent malicious attacks on computers and servers. In the latter sense, hacking has caused much uproar – social networks, news websites, and businesses have been hacked, to the cost of passwords, emails, phone numbers, credit card numbers, social security numbers, and many more bits of private information. Hacking has brought down numerous government websites and spread countless amounts of illegal software, including botnets that can be used to take down websites with little risk or effort if done with care.
In the article, a famous hacker group, Anonymous, attacked the Syrian government for shutting down the internet, denying their citizens this form of communication. Anonymous took down many government sites, and although some were brought back up, many remain down. Later hacks included breaking into databases and dumping data. Denying communication with the outside world is by many standards a human rights violation. While these hacks usually do not cause permanent damage and only rarely aid a cause, their symbol in the increasingly digital world is clear: those savvy enough to work their way in and out of networks will be able to send political messages from their terminal.
Using this article, I would like to discuss the ethics of hacktivism, or the use of hacking to encourage or create change. Because of the globalization of digital communication, hackers are able to attack any organization in any country as long as they have the know-how. While there are many agencies in almost every government that try to uphold laws against hacking, estimates suggest they are not successful enough to cull even a fraction of malicious attacks. Should the government create and uphold laws against hacking? Is more regulation of the internet necessary to prevent these attacks from occurring? On a more sociological level, should individuals have the power to harass and damage so many important systems in the world, or should such decisions be left to governments and political leaders? Is it ever ethical to hack?
I personally do no have an answer to these questions. While I believe that hacking is not a proper way to exercise a political stance, I do not doubt that there can be many times when it may be considered ethical to break into a system or shutdown a database. The article outlines a good example of this – many consider it incredibly dangerous to allow the Syrian government to disconnect their citizens, and applaud the hacks against this. In your opinion, were these hacks ethical?