China's roving gang of tech vigilantes called to action

WIRED:I'VE BEEN hanging around the "computer underground", as the quaint old phrase has it, for almost 15 years, writes DANNY O'BRIEN

The underground was, and still is, that strange counterculture of hackers and crackers who span the moral universe from “unpaid guardian of society” to “sociopathic cybercriminal”.

They’re people who break into computers and defend them from attack, expose security holes and write viruses, save the internet from malicious attacks and steal grandma’s credit card.

When I visited hacker conferences, the good guys and the bad guys mixed, and I don’t think I was the only one who was unsure which was which. But there were certain qualities that seemed remarkably constant between those two extremes, across two continents, and even across two decades.

The outer appearance of this underground group in Europe and the US was always dominated by young, brash teenagers, fighting an understandable desire for some anonymity with a yearning to brag and strut.

They dressed like members of a not-quite-mainstream rock band, and were flashy with either their money or their skills.

They gave themselves cool aliases and, while you’d think of them as ridiculous in your local nightclub, their idle boasts of amazing tech powers frequently turned out to be disturbingly close to the truth.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, then, when I visit the webpages of Chinese hackers and recognise the pale faces behind dark shades, the heavy metal T-shirts and the bright hair – the traditional costume of the computer underground.

The Chinese computer underground seems to be enjoying the same spot in the limelight as the American computer underground did in the 1980s. But while the look is similar, the cliched story isn’t quite the same.

In Hackers and WarGames, the teenage crackers are rebels with a heart of gold. In the Chinese story, the underground is still a counterculture, but one whose secret morality lies in the hackers’ boundless patriotism for the mother country.

“Patriotic hackers” portray themselves (and are portrayed in the local media) as a roving gang of justified vigilantes, attacking and taking down websites that demean or criticise China. From Taiwan to South Korea, Japan to the US, teenage coders boast that they can use denial-of-service attacks and website infiltration to defend the honour of their homeland.

It’s a story that resonates locally and abroad. In China, it’s a safe yet edgy variant on the tale of the local tech kid doing his humble background proud.

Abroad, paranoia about China’s “cyberattack” capabilities and the dangers of these marauding rogue teams are puffed up by foreign policy hawks and security industry lobbyists.

Is it anywhere close to the truth? Does it have to be? Like the computer underground in the US and Europe, these tall tales don’t have to be true to have a real-world effect.

The computer underground looks and acts the same as it has for two decades because the young people entering it emulate the mediated style of how “hackers” are supposed to behave.

Kids in the West watch WarGames and Hackers and decide they want to be all-powerful rebels who take over television stations and invade military websites. Few of them actually have the ability to pull it off, of course. But just as a million grungy, terrible guitarists will produce one Kurt Cobain, the computer underground will eventually fulfil its own propaganda, and produce supergenius cyberpunks on demand.

And so it is in Wuhan city in central China, where tech colleges advertise their courses on billboards as “hacker schools” with suitably Matrix-like silhouettes of figures in long coats and sunglasses. All the better to attract those wanting to make quick money with IT skills. And, true enough, these schools teach not only basic computing abilities but also how to snatch passwords and take over instant messaging accounts.

The costumes on those advertisements come from the western media idea of hackers. But the way in which those IT skills are used online comes from an equally powerful domestic idea of patriotic hacking.

While I have my doubts that there is an organised “cyberwar” wing of the Communist Party, it’s undoubtedly true that some hackers have been indulging in targeted espionage and hacking attacks against the standard enemies of China: malware aimed at Tibetan activists and foreign journalists; denial-of-service attacks on websites critical of the current administration.

Even if such attacks are not orchestrated by the Chinese government, it’s exactly what it would expect the hackers to do if it was calling the shots.

The irony is that, a few years ago, I heard compelling reports that the computer underground in the US was being actively headhunted by the US security services with a very familiar refrain. “Your country needs you,” said the spooks.

And why? Because they were under attack from gangs of Chinese hackers.

If computer hackers remain the same for decades, our political masters have even more enduring qualities – including a continuing ability to persuade young men and women to fight their battles for them.