The Information Technology (IT) Vocabulary Builder series aims toimage deliver a very concise summary of a currently relevant topic to Information Professionals.  It is done mostly by collecting a small number of highly relevant web links to save you the time of combing through search results yourself.  

I came upon the word, Hacktivism, today, and I honestly had never heard it used before outside of the news.  I surmised that it must be starting to be mainstreamed. 

This is how Wikipedia defines it:

“Hacktivism (a portmanteau of hack and activism) is "the nonviolent use of illegal or legally ambiguous digital tools in pursuit of political ends. These tools include web site defacements, redirects, denial-of-service attacks, information theft, web site parodies, virtual sit-ins, virtual sabotage, and software development."[1] It is often understood as the writing of code to promote political ideology – promoting expressive politics, free speech, human rights, or information ethics. Acts of hacktivism are carried out in the belief that proper use of code will be able to produce similar results to those produced by regular activism or civil disobedience.”

Please understand that I am not condoning, approving, or commenting on the morality of this issue, just pointing out a new word that should be understood by all Information Technology Professionals.

Here are some other great sites that discuss this issue:

I hope that helps you.  Enjoy the new word!

That is my Information Technology Thought of the Day (ITTOD) for March 12, 2010 ©Scott Coughlin.

Image Credit: Cafe Press

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