School of Social and Political Sciences - Theses

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Subject: Australia × Author: Bavinton, Fiona ×

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    Computer hacking and social control
    Bavinton, Fiona ( 1998)
    This research explores hacking sub-culture, and tests a theory that this sub-culture provides a number of techniques or mechanisms that hackers can use as justifications for violating traditional norms and values, especially the criminal law. These techniques however, resemble a set of guiding principles rather than motivations for hacking. The most common motivations for hacking are related to fun, challenge and experiencing sneaky thrills. In order to test this hypothesis, an ideal type or model of hacking based on the dominant sub-cultures are better understood when viewed within a wider social context. This thesis argues that individuals who inhabit deviant sub-cultures are not immune to the effects of broader socialisation and that individuals move between cultures adopting and abandoning group values and beliefs as they move. This being the case, hackers – like anyone else in the wider society – are likely to have internalised many of the values and beliefs of the wider society. Among these is a desire to be law abiding and to not want to cause social harm. Occasionally, however, the values and beliefs of a deviant sub-culture will conflict with those of the wider society. When this occurs, those belonging to the deviant sub-culture are required to choose which rules to follow. The choice to break the law, it is argued, is a difficult one, and those belonging to deviant sub-cultures often have to work hard to justify their rule breaking to themselves, as well as to others. In such instances, a person may look to the beliefs and values of the deviant sub-culture for reassurance and justification for their “deviance”. The hacker paradigm represents a set of guiding principles that hackers may adopt to various degrees while they are hacking to help overcome any reluctance associated with hacking being defined as deviant. It is hoped that by using the hacker paradigm as an ideal type, some understanding may be gained about hackers’ attitudes to regulation and control.