There are other motivations, however. Much like the elusive British graffiti artist, web defacers want to make a political point too.
As you will see in the gallery later, many claim to come from anti-West factions. They make extremely strong claims about US and UK activity and often they aim for public service websites. Purported Iranian groups feature heavily, as do other developing nations with turbulent recent histories.
Another point to note is the number of hits on government websites. It is not for nothing that hackers are rewarded with a gold star if they infiltrate a .gov website.
Many of these political attacks even feature music, typically monolithic brass or classical numbers with a strong nationalistic vibe. It is clear these are attempts at rallying the troops,' bids to inspire soldiers of terror.
The lighter side
But the message can be somewhat more positive. As with real-world graffiti, the offending' parties are often hoping to express themselves and their opinions.
As noted, many issue political messages, some of which would gain support from more left-leaning web denizens. Iraqi protests against the war, for instance, have been the focus of many a defacement.
Furthermore, as you shall see in the gallery, many of the attackers have a sense of humour, albeit a somewhat darker one than the average person.
Typical Black Hat activity is also a mainstay of the web graffiti world. Hackers leave messages, often containing some fairly strong imprecations, spelling out in clear terms that the website's owners need to get patching. Whether their methods are right or wrong is another question entirely, but it is hard to deny Black Hats' intentions are good and they most likely succeed in making their point.
