[Although this report was based off the work of a couple CNN correspondants, CNN interactive staff is *fully* responsible for the mistakes in here. Ms. Caltrider and Ms. Kellan have expressed their opinion of the piece and wanted to clarify. The following is a letter from Ms. Caltrider explaining why CNN Interactive butchered the piece.] http://cnn.com/TECH/science/9809/03/t_t/hacker.subculture/ Hackers: the good, the bad, the ugly September 3, 1998 Web posted at: 12:12 p.m. EDT (1612 GMT) LAS VEGAS (CNN) -- Computer hackers normally shun the spotlight, but many of them came out into the open for the recent Defcon convention in Las Vegas, offering outsiders a rare chance to glimpse their distinctive subculture. While most of the year, hackers connect via modems and e-mail, here they met face-to-face. Fueled by cigarettes and caffeine, they huddled in groups around computers, swapped strategies, exchanged tactics and briefed each other on the latest technological developments. No business clothes here. The standard apparel was T-shirts and shorts (and forget about those name tags saying "Hello, my name is ..."). Others opted for an in-your-face look: a spiky dog collar here, a punk hairdo there; miscellaneous pierced noses, tongues and other appendages. "The staples, the stitches, they're meant to hurt," said one hacker. Just as in cyberspace, the hackers are known only by their screennames; "Reverend Greed," "Despair," or "Opus," to cite a few. They start early Most hackers start practicing their craft by tinkering as kids. One hacker said he got his start at age 13, when he broke into a credit card database. "I knew I shouldn't have been doing it. But I figured: I'm under 15, I can't get in that much trouble, can I?" he said. The hacker community is divided into two categories. The "white hat hackers" are those paid by corporations and the federal government to legally break into systems to find vulnerabilities in computer software and then fix the flaws. The other group, known as "black hat hackers," are malicious: They break into networks illegally to steal bank account numbers or credit cards in order to make money. [To say that hackers can only fall into two distinct ethical groups such as "black hat" or "white hat" with no medium (gray?), shows a serious lack of understanding on human nature and ethics, let alone understanding of the hacker subculture.] Chasing thrills Many hackers say they do break-ins because it's addictive, a thrill -- and one feels the "power at the fingertips." "It's so many things at the same time: you want the knowledge, you want the power -- you just want to be there. You don't want to miss out," one of the few women hackers said of her experience. A hacker's idea of having a good time is a race to see which team can be first to break into a computer network. The winning team gets a cash prize. "We own every one of these machines. It's on our network, not the Internet. So this is completely legal," said one convention-goer. From outcasts to experts Even though they were once considered outcasts, many hackers now hold critical and high-paying jobs with corporations and governments. One group of hackers, called Lopht, even appeared before Congress recently to explain flaws in computer security. "It was actually a pretty monumental step forward to see the Senate and large legislative groups almost embracing hackers and saying: 'Hey, you guys have something that you're actually bringing to the table,'" said Dr. Mudge, a member of the group. Correspondent Ann Kellan contributed to this report.