Hackers and crackers computer security

The writer Peter Glaser coined the term “information journey”, as a metaphor for the curious machines digging in the research, which was operated by a hacker as a kind of hobby.

They made use of known vulnerabilities, such as the standard identifier “system” with password “manager” who was on DEC VAX/VMS computers and was not closed for the convenience of administrators.

Enjoying great popularity since 1984, the latest computer research at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Geneva, was established at this time involuntarily as a hacker school in Europe.

Depending on the motivation and loyalty to the law, a distinction is made between the White-Hat (lawful), Black Hat (deals with criminal energy) and Gray-Does (clearly marked as “good” or “bad) to be classified.

Crack (software) and demoscene

The origin of this culture is based on the craftsmen hams, as they have been around since the 1920s. Their strong interest in electronics provided fertile ground for the use of modern technology. They were enthusiastic about the idea of using computers in the home, which was dismissed by the then prevailing industry of the 1970s as absurd.

Home computers, such as the Commodore 64 went with color and pleasing sound quality in the 1980s leaving many gamers and developers under its spell. Supporters of the previously dominant hardware-subculture turned increasingly to the software.

The commercial software here (especially the computer) was provided by the manufacturers and more often with more or less sophisticated copy protection mechanisms.

They overturned the copy to get the software for themselves and for computer users in a friendly distributable state, developed under these hackers a technical skill and talent. Sometimes the software has been expanded to include useful features and eliminating programming errors which the software developers overlooked.

Hackers who had the ability to software code in order to circumvent copy protection mechanisms were called in since the early 1980s, including “software crackers” or simply “cracker”. In the early 1980s, it was the cracker groups who went into the prying of copy protection mechanisms, which specialized in commercial software, part of the warez scene. The cracker groups vied with each other.

The first person who managed to crack the copy protection of a new software, reaped the glory. Increasingly, they created so-called “demos” (also cracktro), usually in the form of musical shaded real-time animations, which were supplied with the crack.

It was not long before the makers of the demos were competing with each other. The aim was to begin to achieve the best possible code with the least effects thanks to clever programming solutions and the technology possible for the manufacturer’s specifications. Within the resulting demo parties they developed a platform for demonstrating the technical and artistic skills of the demo-maker.

In the late 1990s, they were developed into a separate demo scene, which will now be part of the warez scene to see distances. Beyond the illegal manipulation of commercial software, it was also a legal cracker scene of enthusiastic programmers who used their own Crackme on a spiritual level.