The Different Types of Hackers

Yesterday, I’ve explained to you what a White Hat Hacker is but now, I need to talk about the two other kind of hacker.

Hacker, cracker, geek, genius ... The denominations are many but very different!

To distinguish and prioritize the diverse types of hackers, specific categories have been defined.

They aim to make understand the multiple facets of hacking and to differentiate the goals pursued.

"It's like being in a good old American cowboy movie: we have the nice and the bad guy!"

The two main types:

The nice guy, the White Hat Hacker (the hacker with the white hat)

Like I told you yesterday, he helps victims, he helps to secure systems and he fights against cybercrime.

His slogan is:

"Learn to attack to better defend oneself (and not to cause damage)"

The bad guy, the Black Hat Hacker (the hacker with a black hat)

The black hat hacker can be as skilled as the white hat hacker and perhaps even more. But he works for its own purposes, which are illegals.

He steals data, illegally enters into systems or hacks accounts.

This is where the word "IT pirate" comes. The hacker with a black hat should not be called "hacker". But unfortunately, this is often the definition found in the media: the term hacker is used wrongly to talk about IT pirates

As ethical hackers, we would have liked that these definitions do not mix, but it’s no longer possible to change them. It remains to know how to distinguish oneself.

The third type: The Gray Hat Hacker (the hacker with the gray hat)

As if it was not complicated enough, we needed a third type of hacker.

You understand it: it's a mix of White and Black Hat.

This hacker sometimes acts for nobles causes, as a White Hat does, but can commit crimes from time to time.

For example: He illegally hack a system to then warn those responsible for the breaches he has found. His action is laudable, but still illegal.

Other subtypes of hackers:

The hacktivists (contraction of hacker and activist) often act for a political cause.
They usually attack businesses but never particular users. You can put there the groups Anonymous or Lulzsec
The script-kiddies are all those young men who, far from understanding the great principles of hacking and the ethics of the hacker, use ready-made programs to cause damages.
They also boast most of the time by pretending to be the creators of the programs they use and are therefore not appreciated in the communities.

CONCLUSION

We have seen that the definitions are numerous and sometimes redundant.

And if you need to remember something from this article:

There are hackers that cause damage (hacking, attacks, thefts, etc ...) and who don't deserve this name: they act illegally and are severely punished by law.👎
There are hackers who learn the attacks to defend themselves or to help others to defend themselves: they act legally and for the common good. We'll talk a little more about it tomorrow! 👍