News reports and political speeches are currently replete with references to hacking and hacktivism, i.e., politically motivated hacking. They often portray hackers and hacktivists negatively and put them onto the same level with, for example, terrorists. This talk is based on a PhD research project examining the perception of self-identified hackers and hacktivists on these (in)securitising developments. It investigates how hackers and hacktivists understand themselves and their activities, explores how they articulate the effects of this (in)securitisation, and outlines the ways they resist these processes.

Leonie Maria Tanczer