History of Ethical Hacking

Many may wonder what is so ethical about hacking. After all most of the cyber crimes are related to hacking. But that is where the general public is committing faux pas (false step, in French). The public has
confused hacking for cracking. The conventional definition for a hacker is "a person who programs enthusiastically or who enjoys programming rather than just theorizing about programming". Another definition given is "a person who enjoys learning the details of computer systems and how to stretch their capabilities—as opposed to most users of computers, who prefer to learn only the minimum amount necessary". As can be clearly seen, hacking, according to the good old definition, is not bad at all. The original hackers had no other option, but to call themselves as "ethical" hackers. Let us see the circumstances that led to the invention of the word "ethical hackers"...

As computers became increasingly available, the user community is not restricted to researchers alone but extended to individuals who viewed computer as a flexible tool to program or to play games or get assistance in their daily work. Because of this increasing popularity of computers and their continued high cost, access to them was usually restricted. When refused access to the computers, some users would challenge the access controls that had been put in place. They would steal passwords or account numbers by looking over someone's shoulder, explore the system for bugs that might get them past the rules, or even take control of the whole system. They would do these things in order to be able to run the programs of their choice, or just to change the limitations under which their programs were running.

In the initial stages, these intrusions were fairly mild with the damage being theft of computer time. But this didn't stay for long and occasionally, some of the naive intruders would accidentally damage files and the administrators would have to invest considerable time in repairing them. Sometimes, the identities of the intruders became known and they were promptly denied services. Some would take this personally and react with destructive actions that brought the systems down. When these destructive actions were identified, it became "news" and the news media, instead of using the word "criminals", used the word "hackers" and it all started from there.

With the advent of Internet, computer security has become a serious issue. Companies wanted to take advantage of Internet for e-commerce, advertising, information sharing, etc but were worried about the possibility of being "hacked". Companies were ready to invest any amount to preserve their secrets. In their search to approach the problem, organizations realized that the best way to deal with "hacking" is to have independent computer security professionals attempt to break into their systems (sounds silly, but that's how the solutions are, most of the times!!). These independent computer security professionals are called "ethical hackers". This scheme is similar to companies having independent auditors check their account books before any IT raids could occur.

That's all from me today but wait for my next blog which deals with the work policies and techniques of ethical hackers. May you live happily till you read my next blog. Goodbye...