Kaos. Ten Years of Hacking and Media Activism

by Autistici/Inventati

Autistici/Inventati was funded in 2001 with the goal of creating an autonomous server and providing free web services which respected users' privacy and anonymity. Having grown into a distributed network spread over several countries, their projects and servers have repeatedly been subjected to legal pressure by governments: however, even while being forcibly seized, shut down and under invasive surveillance operations, they survived. As of today they still offer secure and non-commercial tools for free communication to thousands of users. +KAOS is a cut and paste of interviews, like a documentary film transposed on paper. It describes the peculiar relationship between hacktivism and activism, in Italy and beyond, highlighting the importance of maintaining digital infrastructures. While this may not sound as glamorous as sneaking into a server and leaking data, it is a fundamental topic: not even the most emblematic group of hacktivists can operate without the services of radical server collectives.

Genres: Biography

142 pages, Paperback

Published April 20, 2017

Reviews

[Nebogipfel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Provides an interesting view into the history of Autistici/Inventati collective. The social and political situation in Italy and the world that caused the formation of A/I, what's its philosophy, who are and were some of the participants, why A/I is important and mentions other similar collectives that existed at the time A/I were forming.

I found it slightly confusing as in some parts the story seemed to skip around a bit and I wasn't always sure who the characters mentioned were, but overall it was an informative read.