Hack This Site - IRC and Forums

IRC and Forums

HackThisSite is known for its IRC network, where many of its active users congregate. Within this network, users converse on a plethora of topics ranging from current day politics to technical issues with programming and Unix-based operating systems. Mostly, the HackThisSite IRC network serves as a social gathering of like-minded people to discuss anything. Although there are many channels on the IRC network, the main channel, #hackthissite, has a +R flag which requires users to register their nick before they may join the channel. This requirement helps reduce botnets in the main channel, because they would have to register every nick.

HackThisSite currently has one main set of forums, because of the recent split from its former sister site CriticalSecurity.Net. The Hackbloc Forums also had many HackThisSite users involved then, however they were recently taken down. Before the split, the CriticalSecurity.net forums had most HTS discussion, specifically related to help with the challenges on the site as well as basic hacking questions. The Hackbloc forums were more for focused hacktivist discussion as well as a place for people to discuss news and plan future projects. Many people criticize the forums as being too 'newbish' compared to IRC, most likely because many new users visit the forums to ask for help with the challenges. HackThisSite is taking steps to try to attract more qualified users to its forums.