Hello world, this video is going to be a bit different - the channel is being taken over
by my good friend "Spacehuhn".
He has a very in depth and I think important take on what "hacking" really is.
Because, here on this channel we tend to focus on covering the evil side of hacking, because
it is really interesting - but that's only half the story.
Hacking is so much more, so when I watched Spacehuhn's video I knew I just had to share
it with you guys.
In fact, the video I'm about to play is from Spacehuhn's "BadUSB Hacking course", which
covers everything from what BadUSBs are, to BadUSB hardware, how to make your own BadUSB,
and how to write scripts for it.
It is really in depth, and if BadUSBs interest you, I highly suggest you check it out after
watching this video.
I've managed to persuade Spacehuhn to give you a cheeky discount which you can find in
the description.
And there's really no one better to give a course on BadUSBs, Spacehuhn is the brains
behind the firmware for the MalDuinos - a type of BadUSB I sell through my company Maltronics.
But anyway, let's get to that video spacehuhn, take it away.
Before we can start with the actual course content.
We have to talk about hacking.
What is hacking?
And what is a hacker?
And isn't a hacker a bad thing?
Isn't that what the media always talks about?
Well yeah.
Hacking in the media is portrayed as something bad.
And a hacker is someone who breaks into your computer.
I found this definition of a hacker online that I find represents the general perception
of hackers, not just in the media, but like generally in our society.
It says a hacker is a person who uses computers to gain unauthorized access to data.
Now I completely disagree with everything in this statement, but we will get to that.
This is just how the media portrays us.
Right?
And you probably get images like someone with their hoodie on, in front of a computer, in
a dark room typing on their laptop.
You have these masks that are connected to anonymous and you know, you have people stealing
your passwords.
That's what hacking is, right?
And they often use stock photos like this one, again, the guy with the mask and the
hoodie in front of the laptop in a dark room, or pictures like this, where someone points
at something on the display.
Because why not?
And they have gloves on because it's important to, I don't know.
Why would you have gloves?
I don't know.
What's on this display.
Nothing in this picture.
Makes sense.
All right.
It's stupid, but that's what hacking is.
Isn't it?
Well hacking isn't bad per se.
You can divide hacking into at least three categories.
You have the criminal or illegal hacking.
You also call that black hat hacking.
So that's hacking with no permission and with bad intent.
So you actually do break into computers, do some malicious stuff.
And, yeah, you are a black hat hacker if you do that.
This comes from old Western movies where the bad guy would have a black hat on and the
good guy would have a white hat.
So if you are a good hacker, a ethical hacker, then you are a white hat hacker.
And ethical hackers, they hack with permission.
So maybe a company hires a hacker to test the security of their systems.
So the hacker hacks with permission and with good intent, they want to find vulnerabilities
and help the company to fix them before someone else can break in.
So of course, that's the hacker you want to be, right?
That's a good guy.
That's the one that doesn't end up in jail.
That's the one who can have a fulfilling life without fearing the police or anything.
But at the same time, enjoy the art of hacking, right?
That's that's what you want to do.
And of course there's something in between.
There are gray hats.
Those people are often hacktivists or something in that direction.
So people who would hack without permission, maybe because they couldn't get permission,
but they still have good intent.
Maybe it's to get public attention towards a bigger issue, or it's about protecting a
system.
But yeah, everything between bad intent without permission and good intent with permission
is in this gray area.
Now this is usually where the explanation ends.
There're good hackers, there're bad hackers.
Media likes to portray the bad hackers.
So that's the only image you get.
But this frustrates me.
I hate that YouTube videos about hacking or even other online courses.
They say they are about ethical hacking and they use that title so their content doesn't
get blocked or taken down.
But they don't really explain it.
And they don't really share the hacker mindset, which leads to a lot of misconceptions.
So for me, everything I just explained to you, this is not what hacking is about for
me.
Not at all.
Of course you still have to know what these words mean.
So you can understand what other people are talking about when they say that someone is
a black hat hacker, or someone is a ethical hacker, or someone is a hacktivist.
But for me, this is not hacking.
Hacking is a mindset.
It's a bigger thing than all of this.
To better explain you what I mean, I want to show you this little clip from Mitch Altman
from this YouTube video I found.
Mitch Altman is a great guy.
Amazing hacker.
I recommend you watch the whole video.
It's really good.
I think it's made more towards children, but it's a great video if you want to understand
hacking culture.
Will have it linked down below, but yeah, let's listen to what Mitch has to say.
What is a hacker?
A hacker, a hacker to me is someone who does what they do because they love it.
You know, whether or not it makes the money they're doing it because they love it.
They're really into it.
Whatever they're enthusiastic about, they learn as much as they can and then they improve
upon it.
And then they share it with the world.
That's what a hacker is to me.
So it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with computers.
Oh, uh, quite often it has something to do something to do with computers or tech, but
not necessarily, it can be with food.
It can be with photography, with video, with music.
This just sounds really good.
It sounds nothing like what I'd come to think of is a hacker based on what I've seen on
the news and stuff.
The news will talk about things that scare us and they'll put the word hacker on someone
who's doing something criminal, criminal with computers.
But in my view, those aren't hackers, they're just criminals.
You know, and there's criminals everywhere, but at hackerspaces people, aren't doing things
that are illegal.
They're doing things that are really fun and teaching and sharing, uh, and, uh, you know,
making the world a better place in so many ways.
So, yeah, I think that kind of sums it up perfectly.
Hacking doesn't have to be about computers at all.
There's this quote from Wau Holland, the founder of the chaos computer club, which is Europe's
largest group of hackers.
He said that a hacker is someone trying to figure out a way to make toast with a coffee
maker.
And I like this quote because it, it conveys this explanation of what a hacker is within
one sentence in a way that I find is really smart.
Notice how he, isn't saying that a hacker is someone who is making toast with a coffee
maker.
No, a hacker is someone who's trying to figure out a way to make toast with a coffee maker.
So it's really about learning, trying out new things, and trying to fix this problem.
Maybe you have toast, but you don't have a toaster, you only have a coffee maker.
Can you fix this problem?
Sometimes the problems we hackers want to solve are maybe meaningless to others, but
they're never meaningless.
Because you will always learn something and the skills you acquire in that process and
the experience you will gathered from that, will bring you forward in life.
So this way of thinking, this like hacker mindset is something very valuable.
So for me, being a hacker means being curious and being open-minded.
It's about learning new things all the time.
And of course a hacker has an interest in technology, but it doesn't have to be in computers
specifically.
You don't have to be good at coding necessarily.
It's just having an interest in these things.
So you have the energy and the capacity to dig deeper if needed.
And you do that because you want to solve problems.
Those problems can be silly sometimes, it doesn't matter.
But you're going to solve them in creative ways.
In non-standard ways.
Maybe in ways, no one ever have concidered.
Often there's a trial and error approach.
You just try things.
If it didn't work, why didn't it work?
Can I share this knowledge?
But in the end you do it because it's fun.
And hackers don't take themselves too serious either.
You see in the media hackers are often portrayed as this like dangerous thing.
And they are really serious and have this like dark image.
But when you actually see hackers in real life, no, we don't take ourselves too serious.
That's why we try to make toast in a coffeemaker.
So yeah, overall, it's, it's a way of living and working and approaching problems.
And the most amazing thing happens when hackers meet other hackers.
Because then events happen like the chaos communication Congress or chaos communication
camp.
Here a few pictures I took, if you're wondering why barely anyone is in these pictures, it's
because there's a policy on events like this, that you are not allowed to take pictures,
unless everyone in the picture gives you permission to do that.
But you can see there's a lot of tech here.
Imagine this room full of people and you have a hacking event or a hackerspace.
Hackerspaces look just like this.
And it doesn't have to be indoors.
We like to go camping, too.
Events like this are amazing, because everyone contributes something to make it nicer, to
make it better, to improve it.
And even though no one was asked to bring fancy things or to set up their tens in a
specific way.
In the end, everyone contributed something.
And I find this is beautiful.
And that's because everyone is thinking like a hacker.
Of course, you have people who bring their projects like this LED cube.
This cube is made out of LED panels that are usually used for giant walls for advertising
or for digital street signs or something like that.
But they took it and made a led cube out of it that you could control.
I think there's a raspberry pi inside, and it also has a gyroscope and a lot of fancy
effects.
It looked amazing.
Given the space and opportunity, hackers will use this to set up projects like this pneumatic
tube transport system build from vacuum cleaners.
You can send stuff back and forth within the entire hall.
And of course, sometimes this breaks down, but people will help you fix it, figure out
where something got stuck and it's just, it's fun.
And why do people do it?
Because they can't do this at home.
And because it's just so much better, if you can share it with others.
Heck, people will bring an entire truck with them just because it looks nice and it definitely
was an upgrade having this there.
They will set up art projects.
And again, silly things, of course, like this cat, which you could call and depending on
the number you press, it would do different things.
Now of course you can't just call it with a normal phone.
You need to be on the phone network that they set up just for this event.
They set up their own phone network.
I believe they even had a 4g network running.
So you could access the internet for free.
Isn't that crazy.
There can also be games or challenges like this pixel flut display, where you have a
giant Beamer projecting this image on the wall.
And you can send packets to a server to change a specific pixel on this giant display.
Now, of course you have to be smart and program a script that sends a lot of packets to the
server to draw an entire image.
And if your script is really good, then you can maybe get your image on top of the others
because anyone else can do the same thing.
So you have to imagine that this thing was in motion all the time.
Pictures were overlapping and rendering back and forth.
And again, we don't take ourselves too serious.
So on events like this, you have a lot of hacker humor.
So yeah, if you look at pictures like this, do you still think hackers are bad?
Hackers are just people like any other.
And of course you have criminal hackers, but you have bad people in any community.
It's just frustrating that bad hackers are the only kind of hackers that exists for pretty
much anyone else.
But it doesn't have to be that way.
There's actually a hacker ethics that people came up with ages ago.
And I want to show you a little clip from a film I quite like it's called all creatures
welcome.
And if you want to learn more about hacking culture and especially the events I've shown
you pictures about, then I can recommend you watch this whole documentary.
It's available for free online, and I will have it linked down below, but there is a
clip in this movie where they explain the hacker ethics.
And I want to show you that real quick.
The hacker ethic originated in the intranets of the American universities in the 1960s
and 70s.
It was first put into writing by the journalist Steven Levy in 1984.
It's still considered as a valid guideline and its principles are still widely accepted
until today.
Access to computers and anything which might teach you something about the way the world
works should be unlimited and total.
Always yield to the hands on imperative.
All information shouldn't be free.
Mistrust authority, promote decentralization.
Hackers shouldn't be judged by their hacking, not bogus criteria, such as degrees, age,
race, or.
You can create art and beauty on a computer.
Computers can change your life for the better.
The last two points are additions by the CDC from the eighties.
Don't litter other people's data.
Make public data available, protect private data.
These extra paragraphs still seem particularly relevant in 2018.
So yeah, we actually have ethics.
And as you seen "don't litter in other people's data" this pretty much goes against criminal
hackers and what they do.
But don't confuse hacker ethics with ethical hacking.
This is a misconception I actually had before I researched a bit more for this particular
lesson here.
I thought that ethical hacking had something to do with the hacker ethics, but ethical
hacking just describes hacking with permission.
And it's based on the idea that hacking is inherently bad and is about breaking into
computers.
So ethical hacking is a good way of breaking into computers.
But this doesn't have to do anything with the hacker ethics.
The hacker ethics are a set of rules, but they're not like law.
They're more like guidelines and basis for discussion.
So something to keep in mind.
Something to honor, but it's not a step-by-step tutorial or anything like that.
But that's what ethics are.
They are abstract.
And it's not black and white.
You have to decide things on a case by case basis.
But yeah, I hope this shows you that hackers are not evil or bad.
And they never have been.
But what does this have to do with this online course?
Well I think it's important to know what hacking is, so there are no misconceptions.
This course will teach you about BadUSBs of course.
That's why you're here.
At least I assume.
And that's what I will try to provide you with the best way I can.
And I do this so that you can understand these security vulnerabilities and test for them.
But you still have to try out new things.
You have to test your knowledge.
You have to be creative sometimes and be curious.
So this course alone won't make you a hacker.
It's not something which you need a certification for or anything.
It's just a way of living.
And I think BadUSBs can be a good gateway into other information security topics, like
learning more about your operating system and how it works and how you can use the terminal
to take control of it.
Or how my way I can be obfuscated to not be detected by antivirus systems.
So, yeah.
I really hope that this course will be something valuable in your journey as a hacker.
And if you're now interested in hacking culture and you really want to find other people and
go to events, like the ones I've shown you.
Check out hackerspaces.org.
They have a list of hackerspaces all around the world.
You can find a lot of information in here.
And if you go to find or start a hacker space near you, they have this word map here with
hackerspaces from all around the world.
And you can just zoom in and see if there's one nearby.
So maybe you can find one in your area that's worth checking out and connect with other
hackers from your area.
But, okay.
I really hope this clears up some misconceptions about hacking.
And, uh, yeah.
Let me know in the comments, what you think about hacking or what a hacker is?
I would really like to learn whether or not what I just told you is something new to you,
or if you're always known that hacking is this kind of mindset.
Yeah.
Let me know in the comments.
Hey, what you just watched is one of the lessons of the intro chapter of my BadUSB course.
So if you want to learn more about hacking and how to build your own BadUSB then check
out learnbadusb.com and use the code "WHATISHACKING" at checkout to get 25% off.
Since I've recorded the lesson a couple of weeks ago, I've already come across a couple
more interesting definitions of hacking.
For example, that if we want to develop vaccines, we have to hack the virus.
Or you can see hacking more of like a trick.
I like comparing it to magic tricks sometimes because magic tricks are like fascinating
to watch.
You see them, you think, wow, that shouldn't be possible, right?
And I think hacking is very similar in that regard, but that's also just one way of looking
at it.
And I hope that after watching this video, you at least have a wider view of the topic
instead of just the little bit the media feeds you.
So yeah, I would like to hear what you think hacking is.
I'm sure there will be some more interesting views on the topic.
But anyway, thanks for watching.
Thanks so much for Seytonic for, I guess, having me here on this channel and don't forget
to check out learnbadusb.com.
All right.
Bye-bye.