The Philosophy of Cracking Software

8/6/2019 The Philosophy of Cracking Software

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The Philosophy of Cracking Software

Oleh: Nofia Fitri

Each Man Kills the Things He Loves (Oscar Wilde)

Centuries ago, an inventor of America Napoleon Bonaparte stated politics is

destiny today we may state technology is destiny after a million of innovations

have been emergent, and giving new variant shapes of the humans life, included

the technology of computer. In this modern era whereas the technology of

computer spreads to the every space of the wide world, on the contrary most

philosophers have been seen that a modern technology as a product of hyper-

intelligent has been affected the human life negatively which is brought the

human being alienated through the cyber life.

Hence, the critiques of philosophy towards the modern technology have to be

criticized by exploring the technology as destiny use a philosophy approach

itself.

Technology and the Philosophy of Alienation?

Have you ever heard the statement that the computer expert (and either hackers

or crackers) sometimes more philosophically action than the philosophers

themselves or the statement that the computer expert more politically

perspectives than the politician themselves, or more economically oriented than

the economist themselves.

There is nothing in this world could standing alone from the philosophical

standpoints, included the technology development. One important thing that the

philosophers have been worried about, is the advance technology which involved


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human into the computers life and go deep to exploring it has created the

strange circumstances which human were alienated.

Hence, the question is, whether those people who spent times with a thousand

codes of computer programming were alienated?

Many debates have occurred on this question. Let I start with the statements

were agreed by many scholars, that at least there are two kind of human at the

time when they are very busy with their own world might alienated in the

individual combat with their own self. The first profession is a philosopher, they

exploring the meaning of life, what is natural and what is fundamental of live

motives, and else, sometimes they stuck in their own logic of thinking while the

second profession is a human of technology (such a computer programmer),

when they exploring a thousand of binary being alienated and mostly gone far

astray in the virtual world with a thousand of programming codes as they

enjoyed themselves with their activities.

I would not answer the question, youre the only one who knows, have you been

alienated for longer, when you execute those codes in computer programming?

But however, a philosophy would never bring human go astray, lost the way or

alienated, because the philosophy itself can answer every motives of human

actions, included the cracking software, a sophisticated work to eliminating a

thousand codes, creates something new by exploring the computer

programming language. Based on that, I would like to explore the secrets of

cracking software motives use philosophical point of views.

Philosophy and the Motives of Cracking Software

If you ever did any cracking software, you might intimated so much with the

disassembler programs such Win32dasm, or debugger Olydbg/softice Win API,

Ultra Edit32, Hiew, etc. Those tools are used for crack the software you wanted,


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you needed, for create something new, something different. From patching,

serial fishing, hunting the serial numbers, create a KeyGens and else. Such a

process of challenge, as philosophers said exploring a space and a time to find a

solution for human life.

Before go deeper into the philosophy within the cracking software, just for

remain you, if in the previous times for cracking software we needed only 15 -30

minutes, but now? Well those programmers are seen getting smarter through

their strategy on their works. For example, how many minutes do you need to

find out the commands of registration? The terms such an error registration, an

incomplete or incorrect information or bla..bla..bla.. Nowadays, are not that

explicit written as what it should be when it appears on the nag-screen, at the

time when the body codes of a software are being traced in your dissassambler

programs. Whenever you want to jump to the place you wanted to jump, to push

to the command you wanted to push, to break the code you wanted to break, to

patch the hole you to wanted to patch, first you should be succeed, make a

through this long process because those registration commands were protected

perfectly or to difficult to recognize, use a term a key based protectionthen you

might find yourself stuck with file invalid it giving marked that you were failed,

because your efforts have been in cut-down. Though you might not reach that

option at the beginning process, you still have to create more ways and strategy

in any case that the software has no registration options.

Furthermore, lets start to play with a philosophy in cracking software.

The first motive of cracking: through one of the software cracking tutorials

written by one of the university student, she stated I did cracking of software

because I was dreamed about it, exploring the world and was challenged to take

over bid of it. Well, it was sound so strange. This strange story could be

understood like this: those software crackers are persons who love adventures,

entered to the new places where no one ever has been gone before,

emasculating a hundreds even a thousand codes of programming languages.


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Their principle is in the adventures, when it getting harder for me, it will make

me getting stronger. Hence, one of the motives of cracking software is a

pleasure for a new challenge. They like to entry a new space, a new world, to

find something new, to learn a new thing as they believed challenge makes me

learn a new thing.

A philosopher Descartes through his very famous statement stated cogito ergo

sum means by thinking therefore we exist so at the time when were doing

cracking, our brain is working hard, sometimes till we get a headache even stop

from sleep, do not ever think that youre succeed for exist as a computer expert

if you have not face any problem within the cracking process. In politics, when

we failed to use our brain then we can use our muscle, but for the computer

stuffs, what would be useful muscle is? Brain is the main t ool within the cracking

process, which the cracker was asked for thinking philosophically, find

something that fundamental, could be hidden and needs more and more efforts

for uncover it. One of characters of a philosopher is find something essential,

such a treasure in this mysterious life which human never reach before, "to

boldly go where no one has gone before" (Captain Jean Luc Picard, Startrek Next

Generation).

The second motive is very close with the principle of distribution that those

software should be useful as what they are should be, can be used for every

users and someone who needs. Those software crackers are very happy when

their tutorials useful for others and if their software were shared in the virtual

world, giving an info about serial number, or sharing KeyGens, seems like they

got a mercy from that. Moreover some of them even offered a hand to help

others to crack any software.

At the time when we have a discuss with a political student, philosophy and law,

they would be very often mention John Rawl as they reference, a modern

philosopher, a political thinker who was very famous with his principle of

distribution of justice for fair. For them, who involved themselves into cracking


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software acts, the distribution means fair in the virtual world, whenever they

got a software which being cracked by others, they have to do the same things,

giving a fair for others by freeing the software and distri bute it.

The third motive is, them, who understood the political-economy point of views

in cracking software. They will say those software should be useful, can be use

for every user without paying expensive. Such a spirit of anti-capitalist, anti-

hegemony and exploitation by corporations, supporting the solidarity, believed

on the principle that human is free while their chained each other. Theyre free

to create something, but they are chained by the place they are living, quoted

from Rousseau the greatest philosopher man was born free and he is

everywhere in chains.

And the last motive is for educational purposes.

The Political-Economy of Software Building

Now, I would like to invite you to go deeper as a computer philosopher, giving

any response to the third motive of cracking software.

Within the study of political-economy there is a concept of intangible assets

(something valuable but can not be touched) this is about works created by

someone. Something that exists from knowledge and skills are very valuable or it

has been called as the value of information. Because a work of a programmer is

so much valuable, if the creator relies on the principle of fundamental paradox

of information it wont be easy for him to sell the software to the company, that

simply, because he did not want his software can be monopolized by one

company.

But there are also some programmers who just think about money, think

strategically, how to ensure that their works can attract profits, and because

information is very valuable, they might think several times before giving their


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software to a company. So, if the programmer did not give the information about

making software, how could the company make any deal? Therefore to

accommodate, it was emergent the concept that scholars have been called

firms horizontal integration which the software was handled (produce and

distribution) by more than one company, to guarantee that there would be no

monopolizing of products. But however, the companies are profit orientation, it

makes the software shall be sold expensive, considering that the profit needs to

be share for more than one company.

Therefore the RMSs campaign about open source and those activists who

supporting the free software were to answered the needs of programmer, that

they did not want the companies with profit orien tation monopolize their works.

In facts, when there are more than one company, to make sure that there is no

monopolize, still, the more companies, the more profit they need to reach. Well,

thats political-economy.

That is why sometimes as we can see, the programmer can be more politically

thinking than the politician himself. Have you ever heard about the politization

of anti-virus? That those viruses were created by the programmer worked for the

anti-virus company. If there is no computer viruses, who is going to buy the anti-

virus?

Finally, can we get the points?

Well, I just wanted to bring you for a little bit play with a philosophy and

political-economy when we talk about the computer stuffs. Understanding the

philosophy within the computer actions means that those things we have been

done used the computer were not the things that emergent without any reasons,

or just for fun. We are philosophers themselves who act with the motives, the

meaning of life.


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Now, let us give the rest of our discussion to the human with their own

philosophy of life. Is it true that the programmer wanted their software were

distributed to the society by paying expensive? So why don t we ask the

programmer about this. Some of them may answer we are humans; we are

demanded by the cost living of life. If we ask the producer or the distributors

they may answer market needs products while producer needs capital, and the

result is, al of us get advantages from it, the programmer, the distributor and the

users.

Enjoy it, when youre thinking philosophically, though, before those computer

stuffs.

Thanks..

Acknowledgement:

I thank to the greatest philosopher DESCARTES who made me always thinking

for exist. My Angle Hacker KeTEk aka b374k Sang MataHarry, Aak Cakill

Schumbag my dear brother, papi Whitehat and my beloved family Devilzc0ders;

koin_putih and Casper_Spy for help me to build my skills and knowledge; IHT,BHI and YF, etc (the places I can share) and those Indonesian Young Hackers who

inspired me much.

*The author is a graduate student in Turkey, an Indonesian young researcher who interests on

political-economy, philosophy, Hacktivism and Computer stuffs. Reach her at nofia.fitri (at) yahoo

(dot) com

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The Philosophy of Cracking Software