My $.02 on the spike in hacking

I work in the security industry, so my point of view about both the incidence and importance of security vulnerabilities (and subsequent hacking disclosures) is probably unrealistically skewed. I offer my bias as a caveat.

That said, I don't see a rise in hacking incidents. What I do see, is that hacking is currently part of the zeitgeist, so much like when someone tells you about a red car and you start to notice red cars all over the place, the collective focus on security is just bringing more incidents to light.

Quantifying hacker activity is akin to quantifying IP piracy, in that there's really no good way to accurately capture the real numbers. For many years, publicizing breaches was anathema, so the general public were left unaware just how commonplace attacks were. If you want to see remnants of this mindset, just ask a security consultancy for references of other clients they've worked with (It's like asking for a list of someone's sexual partners). We're now at a point where there is more pressure to go public when an incident occurs (as well as things being more difficult to hide).

Even if I remove my cynical security consultant fez (which would make me salivate on the benefits to my livelihood based on the public perception of the state of internet security), I think it's probably a good thing for this stuff to be in the public sphere.

FTA: "Bruce Schneier says, "It’s not that things are getting worse; it’s that things were always this bad.""

Exactly. Everyone in the know has been saying this for a while now.

It appears that they may be trying raise the profile of "hackers" to pave the way for public support of new "cyber terrorism" policies:

  "States have an inherent right to self-defense that may be
  triggered by certain aggressive acts in cyberspace,” says
  the policy. Indeed, such aggressive acts might compel a
  country like the US to act even when the hacking is
  targeted at an allied country.

  "Certain hostile acts conducted through cyberspace could
  compel actions under the commitments we have with our
  military treaty partners,” says the document. “When
  warranted, the United States will respond to hostile acts
  in cyberspace as we would any other threat to our
  country."

United States International Strategy for Cyberspace (PDF) - http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/rss_viewer/int...

Not directly related to the article but I think it is also worthy to remark that this spike in attention that the "hacking" scene got recently (whatever are the reasons, even if I think espeed[1] might have a point on this) is of course very welcome by those who perpetrate these acts, but also —and that's what I want to emphase— very well used by them. The communication of Anonymous and LulzSec is exemplary at many levels (the language used in the writings, the use of memes and media...).

I continue to want to compare this movement with the Yippie movement[2], at least on the handling of media and communications. Having read "Do It!" by Jerry Rubin several times during high school, I really feel similarities between the two movements on this subject. I don't have the book with me but it would really be worth reading it again and try to make some comparisons on actual examples rather than vague ideas (usage of the medias, "for teh lulz" as part of the motivations, relation with the authorities...) like I'm doing here.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2804347

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yippies

While Bruce and company are correct in that it has always been this bad... what they are failing to notice, or at least point out, is that this is the first time it has been so publicized and in such a spearheaded manner. LulzSec or AntiSec is the first hacker movement that other people are rallying to and nobody could possibly predict what is going to come of it.