2021/03/08 by Ben Collier, Richard Clayton, Alice Hutchings +1 · 1 citation
Computer Science · Social Sciences · #Cybercrime and Law Enforcement Studies #Crime, Illicit Activities, and Governance #Crime Patterns and Interventions #Alienation #Subculture (biology) #Deviance (statistics) #Mainstream #Hacker #Cybercrime #Sociology #Criminology #Extortion #Political science #Law #The Internet #Computer security
paper · pdf · doi:10.1093/bjc/azab026
openalex publication_date 2021/03/08 · openalex created_date 2021/04/26 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
Abstract The boredom and alienation produced by capitalist societies and countervailing forces of attraction and excitement are at the heart of the subcultural account of crime. The underground hacker subculture is no exception, commonly represented as based around exciting, technically skilled practices and high-profile deviance. However, the illicit economy associated with these practices has become industrialized, developing shared infrastructures that facilitate the sale of illicit services rather than skilled technical work. We explore how this shift in the nature of work has shaped the culture and experiences of this subculture. Developing a novel concept—the ‘illicit infrastructure’—and drawing on an extensive analysis of empirical data from interviews and novel data sources such as forums and chat channels, we argue that as they industrialize, deviant subcultures can begin to replicate the division of labour, cultural tensions and conditions of alienation present in mainstream capitalist economies.