Path: utzoo!telecom-request Date: 23 Jun 91 05:08:33 GMT From: ninjam@csd4.csd.uwm.edu Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Please Explain the Terms 'Hacker' and 'Phreaker' Message-ID: Organization: The Hellfire Club Sender: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 483, Message 5 of 11 Lines: 52 This is responding to the person's question about what a Hacker and a Phreaker is. By the way, this is an UNBIASED opinion, unlike the Moderator's ... A Phreak is not generally someone who rips off the phone company, although it sometimes plays a small part. A true Phreak is someone who is dedicated to learning about the phone system, including not generally accessible proprietary information. As for the "Phreak" and "c00l dudez" syndrome that the Moderator was talking about, he is talking about a very small section of self-proclaimed Phreaks. These are the new "code kids" that sit around and set up their computers to "hack" long distance carriers. These are not true Phreaks. Unfortunately, these are the people that the media usually presents to us when they talk about Phreaking. In fact they are sometimes called "hackers" (sic). As for the definiton of a Hacker, yes, I agree with Pat, but I have to strongly dissagree with his other points. A true "Hacker" is still, and always will be someone knowledgeable about computers, and finds them so interesting that they want to learn as much as possible. You people write off an entire generation of Hackers as "crackers", with out looking at everything. Most of the true Hackers out there break in to these systems in the first place because they want to learn about the particluar computer or network. They are driven on for a need to learn. I admit there are exceptions in today's generation of Hackers. Some who do try to crash systems, and just trade "this new k-rad k00l account I just got", with no intentions of trying to learn from the system. But they are frowned upon by the rest of us. And again, these are the ones that the media usually picks up on. I have to strongly say that it is not right for people to write off the entire 80's generation of Hackers, and the Phone Phreakers as dishonest scum, or as the Moderator so kindly put it "the bad guys". You can't write off a whole group of people as malicious because some who are malicious do what they do. That's very unfair categorizing and stereotyping. Thanks for your time.. ________________ |NM --- THFC| ---------------- [Moderator's Note: Thank you for clearing up my biased misconceptions on the subject. PAT]