Hacking, what and why?

Hacking is an interesting subject and when used, should have some sort of context associated with it. Most non technical people believe that hacking is some form of malicious activity. However, that is not is not accurate.  In the words of Richard "hacking means exploring the limits of what is possible, in a spirit of playful cleverness. Activities that display playful cleverness have "hack value". This is a decent and interesting definition. A great example of this are hackathons. Hackathons are where numerous people are invited and attend a coding event to produce new projects.

With that said, there are many different forms of hacking. Particularly where it involves security. However, it is best to remember that hacking and security are two separate functions that have some common ground. With that said, there are a few different common security hacking classifications. 

These include Black hat, White hat, Grey Hat,  Hacktivist and many more. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_(computer_security)). The most common public interpretation of hackers are black hat's. Black hats are hackers that disrupt computer security for personal gain at the expense of another. The hacking community has a group that counter acts Black hats. These hackers are referred to white hat's. Hence WhiteHat security's name(https://www.whitehatsec.com/).

The motivations of each hacker and why they do what they do is complex. It can be as simple as for personal financial gains, to respect and cleverness , to being an activist trying to prove a point(Hacktivist). (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacktivism). Hacking can be a fun and interesting activity, however it has consequence. Whether it is simply playful hacking, for example going to a hackathon and building a neat app and using resources that fall inline with the hack, to hacking a military base. All hacks require the hacker to tonight about potential consequences. Hacking a military base has some very obvious merits and consequences, but the consequences and merits of hacking at a hackathon are not always obvious. For example, if you end up building a hack that you wish to make money off using a library at the hack, who owns the hack and what roll does money play?

Sources / Additional Reading:

http://stallman.org/articles/on-hacking.html

http://stallman.org/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_(computer_security)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacktivism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEF_CON