Deviant behavior: causes, consequences, and social responses

Deviant Behavior

Computer hackers and their deviant activities are the stuff of movie plots, creating an entire genre of entertainment and yet in reality the activity of computer hackers has exponentially increased in complexity and danger, based on the correlating exponential growth of computer and world wide web dependence by our society. (Taylor, 1999, p. 11) Computer hackers have recently been labeled as deviant, as their behavior is outside the norm, and the effects of such behavior can be substantial. Many people who are knowledgeable about the inner workings of a computer, network and world wide web pages and sites, could potentially hack and the systematic demonstration of hacking skills has become a status symbol in some circles.

The relative anonymity, real and assumed and the potential lack of knowledge by the officials, who might be combating such a problem and even media hype has even increased the status of hacking. (Patterson, 2003, p. 14) "Anonymity also has important effects upon the nature of officialdom's response to the computer underground and its activities, tending to exacerbate perceptions of its threat thereby increasing its underground status." (Taylor, 1999, p. 31)

Hacking can include activities which are harmless and in some sense simple fun, as individuals with the knowledge to do so can manipulate electronic media, that requires little if any intervention to repair. Still others have utilized their knowledge to step across some invisible line and do real harm, be it through identity theft or by inundating network and systems with computer viruses and/or actually changing electronic data to commit fraudulent acts of theft. Though to some degree all hacking can be considered deviant behavior as interfering with another person or organizations intellectual property is a crime in most cases, though hard to identify and source and particularly hard to prosecute.

Because hacking works against such recuperation that makes it serve the system as either negative counterpart or corrective critique, the "transgressions" of hacking, defined as such by the system that is hacked, must be described otherwise. "My crime," writes the Mentor (1986), "is that of outsmarting you, something you will never forgive me for" (3). (Gunkel, 2001, p. 8)

It would seem, that the line that one oversteps to become deviant is the line that demonstrates the outsmarting of another to create chaos in ones system and potentially do real damage to materials and data. Of coarse this would include any hacking that results in crime, and especially theft and fraud.

Hacking in all intense and purpose is deviant behavior, that challenges the current cultural dependence of upon technology, as it challenges the trust of the system as well as many other issues, regardless of its real or potential damage. Yet, the current trend in cyberspace is to create systems that are safe from hacking, and elicit all possible protection for legitimate users and owners of the intellectual properties within. Another interesting trend includes creating hacker sites that require hacking to enter, potentially redirecting hackers to more positive sidelines. (Wible, 2003, p.1577) Such sites are even stressing the legitimacy of their works by barring criminal hackers from competitions and allowing hackers to anonymously offer information to authorities about hacking offenses and potentially helping authorities trace criminal hackers..