Wanted: Hackers!

When other 12-year-olds spend the day playing or watching films, Shantanu Gowde has been in the news for spending time with IT professionals twice his age. India's youngest hacker, Shantanu was just three years old when he used the computer to make PowerPoint presentations, slideshows and birthday cards for friends. Now, he has 'ethically' hacked into websites of over 50 corporate houses and individuals and gives regular security tips to a Mumbai IT firm.

Worried over increasing piracy and leaks of movie trailers and posters, film-makers and production companies have turned to experts who can take down the offending websites. Girish Kumar, managing director of Aiplex Software has provided online anti-piracy solutions to over 50 Bollywood films including My Name is Khan, Housefull and Peepli Live and big banners like UTV, Eros and Yashraj Films. He says, "Most production houses are aware of the fact that online piracy is a real threat. Often, copyright notices do the trick. With sites that offer 'torrents' of movie downloads, we flood it with fake links or direct the website address away from the actual page."

In 2010, hackers made news several times, for instance, when Future Group's flagship ecommerce portal stopped functioning for two days after an attack, investigation agency CBI's portal was hacked by programmers who identified themselves as "Cyber Pakistani army". Rajya Sabha member and industrialist Vijay Mallya's personal website too was allegedly broken into by Pakistani hackers. The US Army website also stopped functioning for a day after being hacked. Social messaging service Twitter also shutdown for hours, while Facebook experienced intermittent access problems after such attacks.

Explains security evangelist Rohit Srivastava, "A hacker's job is to help the company find and plug loopholes in the system. Companies hire us to build a team of inhouse security which develops software and systems that are hacking-proof." Rohit is the founder of Hack-Club, a first for hackers in India, to increase security awareness among the general public.

As the unconventional skill gains credibility, more and more people are opting for it as a career. Says Sheetal Kapoor, who has done a post-graduate diploma course in ethical hacking and cyber security, "I have worked as a cyber security consultant with MNCs and on certain government projects. Companies are increasingly concerned about the security of their websites."

Over the years, hackers have perfected innovative ways to crack into protections built into a computer operating system. Wellknown hacker Ankit Fadia began by experimenting with his home computer at the age of 12 and in two years, wrote his first book on the subject. Ankit claims he was consulted by an intelligence agency for breaking an encrypted message that was believed to have been sent by one of Osama Bin Laden's men. Today, he is a security consultant for several MNCs and even hosts a show on a popular youth channel. He says, "I was attracted to the power of being able to do something most people could not, that's how my love for hacking began. Now, I have been able to convert my hobby into a profession as well."

Ankit adds, "As the reach of the Internet spreads, the challenges that organizations, whether government, semigovernment or private, face is enormous. New vulnerabilities are discovered daily and can expose the information network to unwanted elements."

A much abused word, "hacker" originally meant "clever programmer ". Hackers stunned the world when WikiLeaks supporters unitedly brought down the Swedish government's website along with those of Paypal and Master - Card. In fact, the world - wide web was discovered by hacker Timothy J. Berners-Lee, who was caught hacking and banned from using his university's computer. Hacker Steven Gary Wozniak invented the Apple I, one of the first microcomputers. He and Steve Jobs assembled the first prototypes in Job's garage. The software was coded mostly by Wozniak.

Among the country's best ethical hackers, Sunny Vaghela e-mail account was hacked when he was 16. And the curiosity to catch the hacker motivated him to become a professional himself. ''I hacked into major government and private websites and later sent them a note, suggesting possible solutions,'' he says.

Sunny, whose technical advice was accepted and adopted by Google's social networking website Orkut, when he pointed out loopholes to its administrators, explains, "A professional hacker can earn more than a regular IT professional. In the last six months, nearly 4.5 lakh sites were hacked, and last year, around 2.5 lakhs were hacked. Antivirus and firewalls are not enough to protect your data." Dinesh Pillai, CEO Mahindra SSG and his team of "ethical hackers" believe that every company needs trained hands to implement security risk management systems. "The demand for this skill is going to go up as companies realize the need to protect business and brand value."