When you think of hacking, you probably picture neon‑lit rooms, coffee‑fueled coders, and the endless scroll of the modern internet. But the truth is far more vintage: the very first 10 early hackers were pulling off astonishing feats long before any home computer ever existed. From wireless telegraphs to punch‑card machines, they proved that curiosity and ingenuity have always found a way to slip past the walls of technology.
10 Early Hackers: Pioneers of the Pre‑Computer Age
10 Nevil Maskelyne Hacked A Wireless Telegraph Demonstration: 1903
The moment a technology became hack‑able, someone was already tinkering with it. In 1903, that someone was Nevil Maskelyne – a name that can lay claim to being history’s first hacker. He slipped into a live demonstration of a wireless telegraph and turned the showcase into his own stage.
Maskelyne didn’t wait for Marconi’s wireless telegraphs to hit the market; he crashed the very first public demo. Guglielmo Marconi was on hand, eager to prove that his invention could send messages securely and privately. Maskelyne, however, had other plans.
As Marconi’s device began to broadcast, it started spitting out a bizarre message. First, the word “Rats” echoed repeatedly, then a limerick emerged: “There was a young fellow of Italy, who diddled the public quite prettily.” The limerick was a direct jab at Marconi himself.
The public humiliation was swift. Marconi soon discovered the mischievous mind behind the prank. Maskelyne proudly published papers bragging about his feat, insisting his motive was public‑interest: a warning that wireless messages would never be truly private unless people understood the vulnerability.
9 Rene Carmille Hacked The Nazi’s Database Of French Jews: 1940
Rene Carmille has earned the title of the first ethical hacker, and his story reads like a covert war drama. Working as a punch‑card specialist, he owned the machines the Vichy government used to catalog French citizens. When the Nazis seized control, they turned those same machines into tools for hunting Jews.
Rather than bow to the occupiers, Carmille turned his expertise into a lifesaver. He deliberately sabotaged the punch‑card systems so that, no matter what data the Nazis entered, the files never bore the label “Jewish.” In effect, the machines were rendered useless for that purpose.
He managed to keep the Nazis guessing for two years, claiming ignorance about why the machines kept failing. Eventually, the Gestapo uncovered his subterfuge. In 1944, they smashed his door open and shipped him to the brutal Dachau concentration camp.
Although Carmille paid with his freedom and endured the horrors of Dachau, his quiet sabotage saved thousands of lives – a chilling reminder that a single line of code can tip the scales of fate.
8 David Condon Was The First Phone Phreak: 1955
In the 1960s and 1970s a whole subculture of “phone phreaks” emerged, people who discovered that a particular tone could trick telephone networks into granting free access. While many used the trick for cheap calls, the ripple effect was massive – it laid the groundwork for modern computer hacking.
The man who first proved the concept was David Condon. In 1955, he took a Davy Crockett “Cat and Canary Bird Call” flute and whistled its tone into his telephone handset, testing a wild hypothesis about how the system interpreted sounds.The whistle produced a secret code that the telephone system recognized as a command from an employee. The network dutifully routed him to a long‑distance operator, who, assuming they were speaking to a colleague, connected Condon to any number he requested – all for free.
Condon’s experiments saved him a few pennies, but more importantly, they planted the seed for an entire movement. The phone phreaks that followed would evolve into the first computer hackers, and none of that would have happened without Condon’s whistling experiment.
7 Joybubbles Was The First Person To Hack By Whistling: 1957
While Condon may have been the first to discover the tone, the true legend of the whistling hack belongs to Joe Engressia, better known as “Joybubbles.”
Blind and gifted with perfect pitch, Joybubbles could mimic any note with astonishing precision. At just seven years old, he realized he could use his vocal talent to infiltrate the phone company’s network. His pitch was so spot‑on that the system treated his whistle as a programmed signal, opening any line he desired.
He turned this ability into a modest side hustle, charging friends a dollar to let them make free long‑distance calls. In 1971, Esquire featured him, thrusting Joybubbles into the limelight of the phone‑phreak scene.
The publicity also attracted trouble. He was arrested for fraud the same year. Some say he engineered the arrest, hoping a telecom company would hire him for security work, letting him monetize his talent beyond a dollar per call.
6 Allan Scherr Was The First Person To Hack A Computer Password: 1962
The very first computer to sport a password also became the first to be cracked, thanks to MIT student Allan Scherr. In 1962, MIT introduced password protection on its shared mainframes, hoping to give students a sliver of privacy while limiting each user to a four‑hour daily quota.
Scherr grew impatient with the time caps. He crafted a punch‑card that forced the system to spit out every stored password, then used those credentials to log in as anyone else whenever his allotted time ran out.
He didn’t keep the treasure to himself; he shared the passwords with his friends. Together they became the first computer trolls, hijacking a professor’s account to leave cheeky messages and generally cause mischief across the campus.
5 MIT Phone Phreaks Were The First People Called ‘Hackers’: 1963
The word “hacker” didn’t originally carry the cool, rebellious vibe we associate with it today. In 1963, MIT professor Carlton Tucker coined the term in a rather scolding way, aimed at a group of phone phreaks who had infiltrated the institute’s telephone network.
The phreaks flooded the campus lines with calls to Harvard, effectively tying up the system and rendering it unusable. They also made a string of random long‑distance calls, charging the costs to a radar facility simply for the thrill of it.
Incensed, Tucker slapped the label “hackers” onto the culprits – a term that had previously meant “to tinker with electronics.” He warned them sternly, noting that any caught could face jail time.
4 RABBITS Was Probably The First Computer Virus: 1969
The earliest known computer virus may have been a program christened “RABBITS.” Its creator remains a mystery, but the program’s impact is well documented: it crippled the University of Washington’s Computer Center.
RABBITS was a tiny, seemingly innocuous piece of code that replicated itself endlessly, much like a rabbit’s rapid breeding. Once installed on a machine in 1969, it began spawning copies, each of which spawned more, quickly overwhelming the system’s resources and causing it to crash.
Five years later, an inspired programmer borrowed the concept, creating a “Wabbit” that spread across ARPANET – the precursor to the modern internet – delivering the first denial‑of‑service style attack.
3 Ray Tomlinson And Bob Thomas Put The First Virus On The Internet: 1971
The first email‑borne virus, known as “Creeper,” emerged in 1971, courtesy of Ray Tomlinson – the very person who invented email – and his colleague Bob Thomas.
Creeper was a modest worm that copied itself across ARPANET, popping up a message on each infected terminal that read: “I’m the creeper: Catch me if you can.” Bob Thomas designed it to be benign, ensuring it deleted itself after a brief appearance.
Tomlinson, however, tweaked the code so it no longer self‑destructed, allowing it to linger and gradually sap a machine’s performance until it stalled. Thus, the first virus to roam the internet was born, setting the stage for the spam‑filled world we know today.
2 Steve Jobs And Steve Wozniak Got Their Start As Hackers: 1971
Before they revolutionized personal computing, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak cut their teeth on telephone systems. After reading an Esquire piece on Joybubbles and the phone‑phreak scene, Wozniak tracked down the legendary “Captain Crunch” – John Draper – and invited him over.
Under Draper’s tutelage, Wozniak built a “blue box,” a device that could manipulate the phone network to place free calls. He even used it for a prank, impersonating Henry Kissinger in a call to the Pope.
Seeing a market opportunity, Jobs teamed up with Wozniak to mass‑produce the blue boxes for their classmates. Jobs handled sales while Wozniak managed the technical side. Their small‑scale hustle on the phone network was the unlikely seed that grew into the Apple empire.
1 John Walker Created The First Trojan Horse Virus: 1975
John Walker is credited with crafting the first Trojan horse virus, predating the debut of home computers by two years. He had built a popular game called ANIMAL, which guessed the animal a player was thinking of.
In 1975, sharing the game required mailing magnetic tapes. To avoid the tedious task of copying tapes for each friend, Walker embedded a hidden routine that, while the game ran, silently replicated itself into every directory it could access and onto any tape inserted into the machine.
Consequently, anyone who received a copy of ANIMAL unwittingly received a self‑propagating virus. Walker claimed his motive was benevolent – a way to demonstrate what could happen if he weren’t “nice.” In reality, it was both a prank and a cautionary tale about the power of self‑replicating code.