Hacktivism: Examining Its Impact

This assignment delves into the phenomenon of hacktivism, a contemporary form of protest utilizing hacking techniques to advance social or political causes. It encourages students to analyze the motivations, methods, and historical examples of hacktivism. The assignment also requires an examination of the ethical dilemmas and legal ramifications associated with this practice. Students are expected to critically evaluate the impact of hacktivism on society, considering both its potential benefits and drawbacks.

0Running head: CYBER CRIME, TERRORISM AND ACTIVISM
Emerging Technologies

1CYBER CRIME, TERRORISM AND ACTIVISM
Thesis Statement
The popularity of internet protest or Hacktivism is growing significantly; many
peoples oppose this form of protest because it is difficult to control and supervise but the
popularity of the internet has made it inevitable to stop Hacktivism; Instead, the government
should focus on properly regulating the Hacktivism protests.
Introduction
Hacktivism is a new form of protesting against social change or political agendas
which are performed by using computer or internet based devices to hack or access the data
of organisations or individuals. There are several hacktivists association which has attacked
large corporations and governments for various political and social causes such as Wikileaks
and Anonymous. Most notable attacks of Hacktivism include Ashley Madison, Sony, Panama
Papers and others. Many peoples debate whether Hacktivism should be justified or not, and
should government create laws for regulating hacktivists activities. This report will focus on
analysing the meaning of Hacktivism and other related terms and discuss various examples of
Hacktivism attacks. Further, the report will evaluate whether the Hacktivism should be
justified and if yes than what laws should be applied by the government to regulate its actions
properly.

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Cyber Crime, Cyber Terrorism, and Cyber Activism
Cybercrimes define such illegal acts which involve a computer or any other devices
that are connected through the internet, it is also called computer crimes. Cyber terrorism
referred to illegal actions that are conducted using internet with a motive to threaten, achieve
political gain or cause bodily harm through intimidation. Cyberactivism is the process using
internet-based services such as social media, podcasts or email as a mode of communication
to share information regarding citizen movement and providing specific details or
coordination regarding any activism action (McCaughey & Ayers, 2013). Hacktivism is
defined as the act of breaking into, hacking or using a computer or network-based device to
promote a social change or political agenda (Hampson, 2012). The hacktivist groups usually
hack organisations or individuals’ computer for political or social causes rather than personal
benefits, the peoples who perform these actions are known as hacktivists.
The term hacktivism was first provided by a Cult of Dead Cow member called Omega
in 1994; the CDC is a computer hacking organisation and its motto is worldwide domination
through media saturation. Hacktivism is a form of activism, and they perform different acts
through a network of hacktivists by collaborating on different projects to achieve a common
objective (Busch, 2008). Many experts have provided different definitions of hacktivism,
therefore, it is difficult to track specific activities that are included in hacktivism. Hacktivism
is considered as a controversial term because many of its actions are related to cyber
terrorism but the primary difference is that Hacktivism is related to social and political
agendas. The hacktivists believe that information should be accessible to each individual and
they focus on revealing illegal secrets of governments, organisations or peoples (Kelly,
2012).
Many experts argue that Hacktivism shows how technology can be utilised while
taking actions for social change, and others describe it a malicious, illegal, and destructive
acts that concentrates on undermining the securities of the internet. Primarily, the controversy
of Hacktivism is divided into two parts; one side believes that activist movements should be
peaceful and they should not be destructive. And other side thinks that malicious cyber-
attacks should be acceptable if they are conducted for the welfare of society by revealing
illegal activities that affect a large number of peoples. According to Lohrmann (2017), the

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number of hacktivists acts has proliferated in 2016. The hacktivists started to attack peoples
personally instead of corporations since 2015.
Hackers mostly target wealthy peoples with high incomes to reveal their illegal
sources of income, for example, Panama Papers is considered as history’s biggest data leak
ever by many experts. The hack reveals 11.5 million files relating to the database of Mossack
Fonseca, which is world’s fourth-biggest law firm. The papers reveal offshore tax regimes of
many political leaders, celebrities, and businesses men. For example, a 2 billion dollar tax
fraud trails led to Vladimir Putin, president of Russia (Harding, 2016). The data breach of
Ashley Madison is another example in which a data of 25 gigabytes was revealed by the
hackers which included personal information of 30 million users of the website.
Anonymous is one of the most notable group of activists that consists of various
international hackers and hacktivist entities; it originated in 2003 on popular website 4chan.
The group's website describes them as a loose association that operates on new ideas rather
than directives. They become popular after using distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks
on various entities including government, corporate websites and religious group and they
publicised it for the entire world (Sauter, 2014). The members and supporter of the
Anonymous group wear Guy Fawkes Masks however that may not always be the case, and
they use other popular masks to hide their identity. Firstly that caught attention in 2008 when
they decided to attack and show the world how dangerous Church of Scientology is and how
they are violating free speech right of peoples (Vamosi, 2008).
Since then, Anonymous has involved in many incidents relating to Wall Street,
government and large corporation. One of their biggest attacks was on Sony Corporation
during the NBA session. Sony filed a suit against George Hotz for producing and selling
software that allows people to install third party software on PlayStation, Anonymous
attacked the PlayStation network and shut down the Sony’s website during the second half of
NBA season (Mansfield-Devine, 2011). Another good example of Hacktivism group is
Wikileaks; it is a non-profit organisation that uploads classified media, news leaks and secret
information on their website through anonymous sources. The website was first started in
2006 in Iceland, and their biggest ever attack was on CIA documents which revealed
information relating to secrets of CIA, their headquarters, and how that uses television and
other gadgets to monitor their suspects (MacAskill, Thielman & Oltermann, 2017).

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Hacktivism is a process of using computer hacking collect illegal secrets of
corporations and individuals both of them has a different meaning. Hacking is mostly done
by people to gain an unfair advantage of other peoples or access their personal data; many
peoples do hacking for fun as well. Hacktivism, on the other hand, is completely different; it
is a tool for hacktivists to bring a change in social or political conditions. Mostly Hacktivism
is used to reveal secret information regarding political figure or organisation. Hacking is
dividing into two types, general hacking and ethical hacking (Wazid, Katal, Goudar & Rao,
2013). General hacking means normal hacking which is conducted to gain access to personal
data of another person or just for fun. Most of the peoples who do general hacking have a
motive to blackmail or earn unfair profits. Ethical hacking on the other hand is conducted by
government or other organisations to assess their security measures. The government or other
corporations hire ethical hackers and provide them access to their networks to access their
weakness so they will remove such shortcomings before actual hacking (Losh, 2012).
I believe that actions of Hacktivism are justified when it is done to protect the rights
of individuals and reveal the illegal activities of large organisations. I think that Hacktivism is
a prevalent form of protest and it is growing with the popularity of internet and internet based
services (Fuchs, 2014). Many experts believe that the popularity of social media and internet
of things has increased the risk of cyber-attacks; hacktivists use these platforms to hack the
data of individuals and organisations easily. But other illegal entities also use the popularity
of social media and IoT devices to conduct terrorist activities. For example, ISIS has started
using professional hackers, and they use social media and other websites to spread their
messages and plan their next attacks. The ISIS organisation targets teenagers on social media
sites and lures them into their illegal operations by giving them money or other things
(Stampler, 2017). Many websites also use independence of internet to show child
pornography which is a horrific offense.
The government throughout the world has failed to regulate the actions of illegal
organisations on internet properly. The growth in technology and specifically internet-based
services has been substantial in past few decades, corporations provide their services through
online websites and mobile applications, and people are dependent on them. Peoples’ use
internet services for various activities such as online shopping, banking services, home
security, job application, and communication (Himma, 2008). Along with personal uses, the
internet will be used by peoples as a method to protest against political agendas and social
causes. Social media debates are a good example; people use websites such as Twitter,

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Reddit, and Facebook to share their opinion regarding specific actions and protest against the
decision of the government. Online protesting or Hacktivism is inevitable, and the
government can not stop it without drastically changing peoples' lives. Therefore, the
government should create specific rules for the Hacktivism to regulate it properly and to
protect the interest of public.
Any illegal act done by hacktivists or other peoples using online services should be
punishable with punitive action. The government should work with hacktivists to conduct
ethical hacking to improve their infrastructure and making it invincible against cyber-attacks
(Fitri, 2011). Proper regulations should be created for Hacktivism; the government can create
its own hacktivist groups to collect and reveal illegal data from large corporations. Many
attacks reveal data that can be utilise by the government to stop illegal activities. For
example, Panama paper provides information regarding peoples who were using offshore
banking to avoid taxes and government can use such information to levy tax on such
individuals and make strict regulations for the future. The process of legalising and regulating
Hacktivism will be substantially difficult for the government, but in the long run, it will
benefit society.

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Conclusion
To conclude, Hacktivism is a new method of protesting which is used by online
groups to attack on political agendas and social causes. In recent years, Hacktivism protests
have affected various individuals, organisations and governments such as Sony, Panama
Papers, Ashley Madison, and many others. I think that Hacktivism should be properly
legalised and regulated by the government to catch illegal acts of individuals and
corporations. The government can implement rules of Hacktivism and punish such hackers
which act outside the law. The government should also work with hacktivists to implement
modern technology in their operations to protect themselves from the hacking attacks. The
government can also use data reveal by hacktivists to help individuals and corporations liable
for their actions, such as Panama papers. The government will face several difficulties while
regulating the Hacktivism actions but it will be beneficial for the public and organisations.

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References
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Fuchs, C. (2014). Hacktivism and Contemporary Politics. Social media, politics and the
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Hampson, N. C. (2012). Hacktivism: A new breed of protest in a networked world. BC Int'l
& Comp. L. Rev., 35, 511.
Harding, L. (2016). What are the Panama Papers? A guide to history's biggest data leak.
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