The people choose our targets, RedHack says
ISTANBUL
RedHack, a socialist organization of Turkish hackers, came to prominence after the group successfully accessed the servers of the Ankara Police Department in February, acquiring secret information and revealing that the Turkish police were protecting secret files under the password of "123456."Although formed in 1997, RedHack captured the attention of the Turkish people – and of the Turkish authorities – in the first months of 2012 as they hacked one government website after the other in a bid to voice dissent and dissatisfaction with state policies. Their motto is "Halk için hack" (hacking for the people).
Independent journalist Hıdır Geviş made an online interview on Twitter with a member of the RedHack group, asking the hacker about the group's organization and decision-making process.
Here is a portion of the interview conducted with RedHack:
Hıdır Geviş: [RedHack] has a skeleton crew composed of 12 people, whom am I chatting with?
RedHAck: Is it important to know whom you are chatting with? Papa Smurf, Hefty Smurf or something else?
H.G.: Why did you pick up Papa Smurf as a nickname?
R.H.: Names and nicknames are not much more than tools which are used for categorizing and archiving an idea. But you can call me the Maniac, if you would like to. Some people call me Papa Smurf...
H.G.: Is there a hierarchy among the members of RedHack? What is your mode of organization?
R.H.: The only hierarchy between us is the process of collective work; we don’t have a pecking order. Everybody has the equal right to speak, and everybody sees each other as a brother inasmuch that they are more than brothers, [they are] like comrades. We don’t consider RedHack a group; it is a kind of fraternity. We have already created our imagined world.
H.G.: I haven’t been able to understand – how do you make a decision and implement it?
R.H.: The decision is taken by you, the people. We just execute it. After people were irritated by Interior Minister İdris Naim Şahin’s “somersault” and “dance” incident, we were able to take down the Turkish Interior Ministry website and make him do a somersault. People just decided, and we just executed this. It’s not a group of people’s decisions that are binding for us – the people’s decisions are.
H.G.: Your actions can be considered a punishment. You have [attacked] government agencies, private companies and political parties. Do you consider yourselves a modern Robin Hood?
R.H.: No, we don’t. We are not heroes. Our comprehension of life is not composed merely of eating, drinking, taking a holiday, having sex and watching TV but also a social conscience. The philosophy of “If we are not living forever, we live as we like” is important for us.
H.G.: How do you identify yourself? Virtual guerilla, virtual terrorist, virtual revolutionary or what?
R.H.: The victors decide who was a terrorist in history, who takes the bread out of someone's mouth, who forces people to go to war, and who uses the people as pawns to live in fortune. Who we are? If we are against these things, we can call ourselves “awakened” and “not sleepers.” Moreover, we are honest people and we want to wake the people up.
