Most Internet users are scared of hackers, and rightfully so. While the terms is sometimes used to describe any computer programmer, it typically has a negative connotation and is used to describe nefarious coders who make digital chaos their mission on the web.
Sometimes, hackers target large companies and steal customers’ credit card data. That data is then sold on the black market, potentially causing huge headaches for victims. And sometimes, hackers target companies or individuals just for fun — they cause as much chaos as possible just because they can.
There is no end in sight for the battle between security researchers and hackers, and now things have gotten even scarier thanks to a new service that makes it shockingly easy for anyone to hire a hacker.
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A new website called Hacker’s List was recently covered by The New York Times, and it has been hit with some downtime due to all the traffic undoubtedly pummeling the site right now. When it’s live, however, it serves as a portal where anyone can create a listing that seeks the services of a hacker for hire.
More than 500 calls for hackers had been made as of Thursday. One example is a post by an Australian man willing to pay as much as $2,000 to a hacker who could get him a list of his competitor’s clients by hacking into their database.
“I want the client lists from a competitors database. I want to know who their customers are, and how much they are charging them,” the unidentified man wrote.
The Hacker’s List site represents a frightening new step in the world of hacking. Finding a hacker to do your bidding is typically a daunting task for webgoers who aren’t very savvy, because it often involves exploring the “deep web,” which most users don’t even know how to access. But this new site makes it shockingly easy to find and pay hackers to carry out cyber attacks, and it opens up a world of possibilities to nearly anyone with malicious intent.
