HACKER VS CRACKER
Report of the article page 106 from the book.
The article talks about the meaning of the term hacker. It is said that hackers are people who use
computers, networking and other skills to overcome problems. A hacker is able to, using their IT
knowledge, modify a computer system’s features and use technology for purposes other than what it
was meant for. It is also said that there are hackers who work with different motives: the hacking
community works with ethical codes and has a moral duty to share information and give solutions to
help other people. They use English as their working language and they don’t hide their identity with
a fake screen name.
The mass media turned hacking into a bad word and people associate the hacker activity with an
illegal one. Actually, people who use their skills for breaking into computers, making jokes and
stealing information are called crackers.
In order to describe the hacker’s features, the article said that a hacker has to do lots of different things
whose mix allows the development of reason.
Merging play, work, science and art they are able to build new horizons and innovative points of view.
Questions page 107.
1. Do you think hacking is a good way to use computer skills?
2. How can technology be mixed with art and music to produce something new?
3. Do you think sensitive information should be available to everybody? Why/ why not?
1. In my opinion, hacking is a good way to use computer skills because it can solve daily
problems. For example, companies may need hackers that are able to find flaws in the
software for a company by hacking it with their authorization.
2. If we are talking about art and technology then we can talk about the actual arts that are mixed
with technology. For example, in the music field, there is an entire genre called Tecno that
uses some sound modifications that with the traditional instruments are impossible to obtain.
Or maybe in sculpting now we can move some pieces giving them a different meaning by
changing the position. Or maybe we can talk about 3d computer modeling that allows
everyone to sculpt and publish their work.
3. Obviously, sensitive information shouldn’t be available to everybody. Sensitive data must be
protected against external people who don’t have authorization. The loss, modification, or
unauthorized access to sensitive data may damage a business or personal security. Sensitive
information like health data, financial information, phone number and home address are
things that mustn’t be accessible to everyone. Therefore to help this, the evolution of
technology led to the creation of more efficient security measures like passwords and data
encryption.
