Why people become hackers, and why they pick me to hack
How many times have you been hacked, or at least, hustled? A hacker is really good at it, and a hustler is obvious.
A few friends contacted me this weekend and warned me about my Facebook and Messenger accounts being taken over by a hacker assuming my identity. Some of the new posts were obvious that anybody could have written them, but one of them involved knowing something about me. But I still don’t have a clue why it happened. I haven’t had money stolen yet, and I certainly hope I don’t find about it happening later.
It did raise my interest in what’s going on out there — for those us impacted, and to look into the old question: Why would somebody become a hacker?
Mula, money, and more mula: If you’re good at the basics of hacking, what a low-to-no-cost way to make money with little effort. Make sure you protect your own identity, of course, because you don’t want to get caught. It looks like criminal laws are similar for electronic theft versus theft of physical objects. So, if you steal items worth over $1,000 in value it’s a felony, under $1,000 it’s a misdemeanor, according to a state criminal law/penal code.
Of course, the mula can be much bigger. Ransomware is being used by hackers to steal valuable data from corporations — and then to charge them millions of dollars in ransom to get it back. Ransomware will cost its victims more around $265 billion (USD) annually by 2031, according to Cybercrime Magazine.
They love gaming — and winning: Some of the best-known hackers who’ve been arrested — and those who’ve been recruited into high-level security positions by government agencies, corporations, and cybersecurity consultants — have previously been notorious hackers. They might have also been high-scoring gamers who knew everything that was being done “in the shadows” — the secretive intranet spaces that were only visited by friends in the underworld. But they might also be competitive gamers who had fan followings.
It can be a little bit like the glory days of hustlers in golf and shooting pool, when real money was made in private tournaments and an occasional victory round at a national tournament. But they didn’t want to be obvious celebrities in golf, pool, or gambling matches in Las Vegas. They had to fly under the radar if they wanted to sneak in and take over. Video gaming has become very big in America — bringing in more revenue per year than movies for a few years now. If you become a hotshot in gaming and you want to be a hacker, make sure you come up with a good alias. That’s what most gamers do.
Some of them are revolutionaries: Cyberterrorism has been a very big deal for years now. We’ve all been pulled into stories about what can happoen to government, corporate, and banking websites, causing data breaches, information theft, financial theft, and overtaking entire computer systems. First American Financial, Equifax, JPMorgan Chase, Sony Pictures, the U.S. voter database in 2015, Hilton Hotels, and Chipotle, were among them.
Throwing off the world’s energy supply can rattle those hit hardest by it. During 2019, the world’s largest processing plant in Saudi Arabia was hit by drones and missiles. The assault on the Abqaiq plant set off a series of fires that took out about half of that country’s oil production, or about 5% of the global daily output. It also set off an unstable global oil production sector, with uncertainty about the security of the global oil supply.
Hackers aren’t going to be stopping fossil fuels anytime soon, or take over the processing and production plants, or replace them with clean energy and transportation. But they can be disruptive and cause some real chaos — getting their oppositional messages taken very seriously for a while.
They just love to hack: One of my friends has been seriously harrased by a hacker several times over the past two years. He thinks it started because of a “fighting among friends-and family” scenario where he unexpectedly and unintentionally became somebody’s enemy. That somebody was a manager at an IT company who may have set up a way to harass and hack his enemy. In fact, that guy may have assigned an employee to continue the hackathon.
My friend did all the things you’re supposed to do to protect your identity, including leaving traditional email addresses and identities. Eventually, it all came together and he didn’t have to go through an unnerving day once again.
So, I asked him why he thinks it all happened? My friend had a few logical, thoughtful theories on who it might be and why it was carried out like that.
I didn’t agree. This person, or persons, might have started with a legitimate retribution they wanted to pay back. But in the end, I htink the real reason it continued on and off for two solid years:
Somebody loves to hack and get away with it.
Why do they pick me?: I’ve had to deal with internet security issues about five times over the years; more when I count jobs I’ve been in where I had to participate in getting it repaired. Hackers assuming my identity on social media has been the primary tactic used in recent years. But why and how did I get pulled into it? They didn’t make any money, or humiliate a celebrity, or make some loud and offensive statements, or hurt my reputation.
One thing I’ve had to learn about hackers — don’t take things personally. We get chosen for some reason or another, but we get chosen. We’re just there. The more you participate online, especially social media, the more likely you’ll be hacked.
So take all the required security measures — be careful. But it does end up happening to most of us, especially when you include all the lies and manipulation happening these days over SMS text messaging and emails.
Do what you have to do, and let it go.
Jon LeSage is a Southern California-based freelance writer.
