it’s ok to break into things if you’re just demonstrating

Speaking of ethics, the BBC decided to do some of its own hacking for a show, Click.

The technology show Click acquired a network of 22,000 hijacked computers – known as a botnet – and ordered the infected machines to send out spam messages to test email addresses and attack a website, with permission, by bombarding it with requests.

Click also modified the infected computers’ desktop wallpaper.

If the BBC doesn’t get hurt by this, the lesson we can all learn is: Make sure you have a hobby in journalism/reporting/television. That way next time you get caught cracking into something, you can just say it is for research and part of a report you’re doing. Then we can all laugh and share a pint because it’s all good then!

Oh, and next time I accelerate my fist into your abdomen, just let it be known it was without criminal intent. Over and over. Maybe I’ll laugh during that too, to show I have no ill will in it.