It’s a well-known fact that hackers learn their trade in underground forums that feature tutorials, videos and other instructional material.  Traditionally, such material was designed to help hackers profit.

Recently, we came across a nice library that was assembled by a hacktivist group.  This group used to have quite a large site explaining about how to hack, forums for new hackers and exploits.  (The site is no longer active and the activity of its members is unknown.)

First, to get an idea of what this group did, here’s a screenshot from their Twitter feed:

In essence, their purpose was clear:  Release easy to use hacks for people that are semi technical. 

Here’s an interesting chat room example.  In the screenshot below, a newbie asks how to become an effective hacker:  

And the main thing to read from ALL the answers and replies he got is “don’t get skills, get tools and read stuff”:

What should a newbie do?  Use automation, such as password dictionaries and cracking tools.

With this example, we see:

• How education played a key role in the evolution of hacktivism that created the movement that we see today.
• How easy it has become to learn hacking for the nontechnical that lays the groundwork for future hacktivists.
• How efficiently good hackers created an infrastructure to proliferate their skills.