The Hackers

BBC Radio 4
  • 4,5 (2)
  • Sociedade e cultura
  • Semanal

Gabriella Coleman, a digital anthropologist most famous for her work with the Hacktivist collective Anonymous, interviews the most influential actors in each era of the evolution of hacking culture from the 1970s to the present day, unveiling how they have moulded the digital world, pop culture and global politics.

Episódios

  1. 20/12/2021

    Broken

    In the past, it was natural to open your phone and pop in a new battery. Today, to do that you may have to be a hacker. Biella speaks to representatives from the EU Right to Repair Movement, and farmers Nebraska to talk about this new, and unexpected frontier in hacker culture we may all soon belong to - the Right to Repair Movement.

    14 min

  2. 20/12/2021

    End User

    In the past, state sponsored hacking focused on espionage, stealing sensitive information and disrupting technological system. Nowadays, the focus has shifted. Rather than hacking technology, state sponsored hackers are targeting people. Biella speaks with Darren Linvill about a new kind of malevolent hacking, and how by playing to the algorithms on various social networks, these professional agents can sow chaos, and rope lay users into spreading rage and misinformation across societies.

    14 min

  3. 20/12/2021

    For the Lulz

    Biella and technology journalist Frank Bajak discuss how two teenage hackers, calling themselves Lulzsec Peru, managed to expose corruption and shook the Peruvian government to the core with a massive leak of documents - and in doing so become some of the most impactful hacktivists of the early 2000s.

    14 min

  4. 20/12/2021

    Sharing

    One of the core beliefs in the many subsets of hacker culture is that information should be freely accessible and shared. But there are two distinct ways of achieving this freedom of information - Piracy, and The Open Source. Biella talks to Peter Sunde, co-founder of the Pirate bay, and Karen Sandler of the Software Freedom Conservancy, to discover how both movements have become entwined with the hacker community over the years, and which has the most potential to disrupt the increasingly monopolised world of tech development.

    15 min

  5. 20/12/2021

    Wetware

    Biella explores biohacking - the hacking of the human body - and the different reasons why people are becoming cyborgs. She speaks with artist Moon Ribas about how tech can be used to push the boundaries of creative expression while putting humans in touch with the earth, and even the cosmos, and Winter Mraz an engineer who in the aftermath of a horrific car crash, used various implants to improve her body, and hack her way to an easier way to live with mental and physical disabilities.

    15 min

  6. 14/12/2021

    Aaron

    Biella explores the legacy of Aaron Swartz. From the age of 14, Aaron was a prolific hacker, inventor and activist. He was integral in the creation of Creative Commons and the Internet Archive, co-founder social media site Reddit, and was passionate in his activism work that culminated in the dismissal of the Stop Online Piracy Act in the USA. But Aaron took his own life at the age of 26 when he was charged with violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, facing decades in prison and millions of dollars in fines - a court case that many at the time felt was completely unjustified. Biella speaks with Harvard Professor Lawrence Lessig who worked with Aaron on the Creative Commons project, and a Lisa Rein, co-founder of ‘Aaron Swartz Day’ that works to carry on projects started or inspired by Aaron’s work, and discusses why it’s important to remember Aaron’s story, the legacy of his work, and to find out if a recent Supreme Court ruling on the CFAA means that people like Aaron may be safer in the future.

    15 min

  7. 14/12/2021

    Press Ganged

    Biella uncovers the story of how in the 1980s and 90s the French government forced hackers to work for them, drawing young men who had skirted the law into the depths of international cyber warfare.

    14 min

  8. 14/12/2021

    Hail Satan

    Hackers have long been portrayed as the bad guys, but Biella uncovers how the ethical Grey and White Hat hackers created the modern security industry, despite the risk to their careers, and fierce opposition from major tech and software companies who wanted to keep any vulnerabilities in their products hidden from the public eye. She talks with Chris Wysopal, member the high-profile hacker think tank the L0pht, about the struggle for security, and how that fight may have inadvertently damaged a key part of hacker culture in the long term.

    15 min

  9. 13/12/2021

    The Worm

    In 1988, the first major computer worm shook the early internet to his core, disabling computers across the network and even causing panic in the Pentagon. Biella uncovers the story with Eugene Spafford, the first person to analyse the worm that caused so much chaos, and finds out why worms can still be so devastating decades later.

    14 min

  10. 13/12/2021

    Phreaks

    Biella Coleman explores the earliest hacking subculture - The Phone Phreaks. An entire subculture that learned to manipulate the phone system with plastic whistles and tone generating blue boxes, and played a part in birthing the modern digital world. She talks with Phil Lapsley, author of ‘Exploding the Phone’ and, Belial, a UK hacker who was one of the last generation of traditional phone phreaks, about the joy and the risks of the earliest type of hacking.

    15 min

  11. 06/12/2021

    Introducing The Hackers

    Digital anthropologist Gabriella Coleman explores the strange history of hacker culture. From the kids who Phreaked the phone networks of the 1950s, right up to the present day.

    3 min

Trailer

Classificações e avaliações

4,5
de 5
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Sobre

Gabriella Coleman, a digital anthropologist most famous for her work with the Hacktivist collective Anonymous, interviews the most influential actors in each era of the evolution of hacking culture from the 1970s to the present day, unveiling how they have moulded the digital world, pop culture and global politics.

Informações

  • Criado por
    BBC Radio 4
  • Anos de atividade
    2 mil
  • Episódios
    11
  • Classificação
    Livre
  • Copyright
    © (C) BBC 2021
  • Site do podcast
    The Hackers