The phrase "electronic civil disobedience" was coined by a group of US artists and theorists, the Critical Art Ensemble. In 1994 they published their first book that dealt with this subject, "The Electronic Disturbance," and in 1996, "Electronic Civil Disobedience And Other Unpopular Ideas" was published. Both of these works are devoted to a theoretical exploration of how to move protests from the streets onto the Internet.
Hacktivism evolves from the convergence of the computerized activist and the politicized hacker. Hacktivism becomes a more overarching category of cyber protest within which public and vocal mass-based Electronic Civil Disobedience actions co-exist with anonymous and silent individual-based political hacks. Under this wider umbrella of Hacktivism there is no hierarchy of value. Public, mass-based actions are not seen as superior nor inferior to private individual anonymous acts.
The World Trade Organization protests in Seattle were the first to take full advantage of the extremely dense and wide-reaching alternative media network which uses the internet. The use of "media special forces" is one of the hallmarks of netwar and informational conflicts. With the rise of the alternative media, the internet and other disintermediated mass communications, it is no longer possible for the establishment to control the information reaching the public. Attempts to distort the news for propaganda or public relations purposes will enhance movement recruiting and create a "credibility gap" for establishment policies.