Differences between a Script Kiddie and a Hacktivist.

Hacktivist refers to someone who engages in the practice of cracking, or hacking into a

computing system, for socially or politically driven goals. The computer networks and computers

are used as a means of protest to promote ideological or social causes and also political cause by

hactivism (Alaimo, 2019). On the other hand, a Script kiddie is a term used to describe

inexperienced malicious hackers who attempt hacking exploits using existing software. The

scripts or programs developed by others to attack computers or computer systems are called

Script Kiddie or skid and it is used by unskilled individuals to attack computer systems or

networks and websites such as web shell.

Do they have the same motivation?

No. The motivation for Hacktivists is mostly political in nature, since they seek to humiliate and

disrupt their targets' operations, mostly aimed at large businesses or government agencies.

Conversely, for Scrip kiddies, more often, are just bored teenagers searching for a thrill or fame.

Many never go on to become full-time hackers, preferring to keep their abilities as a hobby.

Surprisingly, many Script Kids go on to work in the security field later in life (Memon et al.,

2020).

Who do you think can cause more damage or harm to a system?

Hacktivists can cause more damage or harm to a system. Theft of important data and publicizing

it, or denial of service (DDoS), in which a server is overloaded until it breaks, are some of the

foremost typical ways hacktivists strike their target, which are very dangerous. Comparing them,

Script kiddies, are considered less proficient than experienced penetration testers and white hat

ethical hackers because they don't fully comprehend how programming and computer systems

work.
Can you give a famous example (person) for each?

Example of Script Kiddie :-

Social Engineering

An example of a script kiddie is a person who uses a Spying App to spy on their cheating spouse

using applications like ‘pctattletle’. Another one would be when an attacker somehow manages

to gain all the information of a system by manipulating or by tricks from a Social Engineering

which is often done through the creation of a fake website where the users put their login and the

fake-website-creator can then access their account.

Example of Hacktivist:-

A group called Zippies attempted to overload email accounts used by the UK government. An

example of Hacktivist ģroup today is Anonymous and grey hat hackers.

References

Alaimo, K. (2019). The Global Public Relations Strategies of the “Hacktivist” Group

Anonymous. In The Global Public Relations Handbook (pp. 162-169). Routledge.

Memon, I., Shaikh, R. A., Fazal, H., Tunio, H., & Arain, Q. A. (2020). The World of Hacking: A

Survey. University of Sindh Journal of Information and Communication Technology, 4(1), 31-

37.

Votipka, D., Stevens, R., Redmiles, E., Hu, J., & Mazurek, M. (2018, May). Hackers vs. testers:

A comparison of software vulnerability discovery processes. In 2018 IEEE Symposium on

Security and Privacy (SP) (pp. 374-391). IEEE.