Hackers and Forms of Electronic Trespassing

Piracy has always been an issue for intellectual property owners. Piracy existed even as early as the 1500’s. In one famous instance, Renaissance artist Marcantonio Raimondi copied some of Albrecht Dürer’s works and claimed it was his own (Gambino, 2011). Politicians and content creators try to combat piracy with laws and lawsuits, but people engaging in piracy remain active and elusive. However, the development of the Internet has exacerbated this issue. Technological advancements, specifically the advancements in file sharing, have made the exchange of information extremely inexpensive, quick, and easy. People have direct access to unauthorized copies of millions of movies and songs due to programs such as Napster and Limewire. Thus, illegal

In the early days of computing, a hacker was primarily referred to as a computer guru, someone who is extremely technical with a high expertise in computer also known as “Expert Programmers”. Nevertheless, as technology is advancing at a face pace, hacking has adopted a completely different definition. The modern definition is someone who access a computer system primarily to steal or destroy information. Hacking has caused major harm in the realm of technology. Over the years, hackers have become much more lethal in their craft. They manage to break into complex information systems from entities such as banks, government agencies, and private businesses. Furthermore, they often manipulate their victims through social engineering in order to obtain financial benefits. Hackers hold different label such as: black hat hacker and white hat hacker in which all have their own motives.

Hacking: Hacking is a type of crime which involves gaining unauthorized access to a computer and changing the system in such a way as to permit continued access without the knowledge or approval of the systems owners.

Unlicensed software use continued to be a major problem in 2013. Indeed, 43 percent of the software installed on PCs around the world was not properly licensed, an uptick from 42 percent in 2011. The commercial value of the unlicensed installations was $62.7 billion. (The Compliance Gap, 2014). As we can see piracy of software and other digital media is a global problem that adversely affects many businesses and the welfare of employees and consumers.

Since the inception of the personal computer, piracy and software has been a problem faced by many software publishers. In the early days of the modern computer, virtually all computers had a floppy drive, and program's executable and library files were seamlessly transferred from the hard drive or the software diskette to a blank floppy disk. Friends and colleagues would then get access to the costly software free-of-charge, or worse, multiple copies would be made of that program to later be sold for a fraction of the retail price, with the publisher seeing none of the money. It was already becoming a problem in the early 1990s, that the Software Publishers Alliance had produced a promotional video, Don't Copy That Floppy, to spread awareness of the implications pertaining to pirating software. A similar promotional video, Don't Copy That 2, was released in 2008 as a reminder, mainly targeting the younger generation and college students.

This report shows that digital piracy can reduce the growth of digital content. However it’s also encouraged many positives

Economically, $12.5 billion in losses each year is due to piracy in the music industry, $2.7 billion in workers’ earnings are lost each year due to online piracy and almost 71,000 jobs are lost in the United States every year due to online piracy as well. It may seem that these numbers are horrifying, but one statistic proves otherwise. In the statistics for the highest and lowest piracy rates in 2010, the United States comes up the very top of the lowest piracy percentage, only accounting for 20% of media downloaded from the Internet. Most consumers in the U.S. obtain their media legally because they support their artists. They realize that artists are also people working and making their craft just like everyone else. Consumers may download the songs illegally, but if they really loved the album, they would buy the real deal.

A hacker is a person who breaks into computers, usually by gaining access to administrative controls. There are several types of hackers. The black hat is someone who breaks computer security without authorization or uses technology for credit card fraud, identity theft, and piracy. A security exploit takes advantage of a known security weakness. These are very common in website/domain hacking. A packet sniffer is an application that captures data packets, which can be used to capture passwords and other data in transit over the network. A spoofing attack involves one program, system, or website by pretending to be the real trusted program, system or website and then stealing your usernames and passwords. A keylogger is a tool designed to record every keystroke on an affected machine stealing user's passwords.

Hacking-This occurs when a person who has significant knowledge about computers and are capable of accessing files, passwords, documents, etc., through the computer. These people often have skill to do this to hundreds maybe even thousands of computers at a time, even before the authorities realize what is going on.

Computer hacking generates a lot of controversy these days. Hacking involves the use of computer skills to penetrate a network or a computer mostly to obtain protected and sensitive information. Computer hackers are generally of two types - white hat hackers and black hat hackers. White hat hackers use their computer skills for constructive purposes while black hat hackers use their skills for nefarious activities. To prosecute black hat hackers, different countries have put in place special IT law provisions.

Hacking computers have been around for many years. Every time new technology arises to the forefront; some entities want to expand upon it. Hacking in general terms is only taking a technology and trying to improve upon it without the authorization of the owner.

Online piracy is commonly referred to as a threat to businesses in the creative industries. The WTO Agreement on Trade-related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (a.k.a. “the TRIPS” agreement) defines piracy as:

The digital revolution has been one of the most important causes in control of piracy. As the arrival of the digital revolution, it has become not difficult to copy digital information without losing in its features. One more significant cause has been the introduction of the Internet, a commercial Internet protocol that has basically opened the front gate to low cost worldwide sharing. A third facilitator has been the fast growth of high speed internet. Developments in broadband technology have permitted people to upload and download enormous files fast. The existence of these three causes has become a ‘perfect storm’ for illegal downloading. As a result this could considerably destroy market progression and sustainability of companies. (Sudler, 2013).

Hacking in the world of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is defined as the process of getting unauthorized access to the technical details of a computer such as, programs, applications or the entire computer system. Hacking is performed to improve the system capabilities or to manipulate its normal functions. People who are engaged in this practice are known as “Hackers” (777, 777, 888, 888).

Computer hacking: Is the practice of modifying computer hardware and software to accomplish a goal outside of the creator’s original purpose. People who engage in computer hacking activities are often called hackers. Since the word “hack” has long been used to describe someone who is incompetent at his/her profession, some hackers claim this term is offensive and fails to give appropriate recognition to their skills. The majority of hackers are technology buffs. They are self-motivated and learning about computers is their true passion. ("What Is Computer Hacking?" WiseGEEK. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 July 2013).