hijack: Definition, Synonyms and Much More from Answers.com

also high·jack tr.v., -jacked also -jacked, -jack·ing -jack·ing, -jacks -jacks.

1. 1. To stop and rob (a vehicle in transit).
   2. To steal (goods) from a vehicle in transit.
   3. To seize control of (a moving vehicle) by use of force, especially in order to reach an alternate destination.
2. 1. To steal from as if by hijacking.
   2. To swindle or subject to extortion.

n.

The act or an instance of hijacking.

[Probably back-formation from highjacker, perhaps from jacker, holdup man, from JACK, to jacklight.]

hijacker hi'jack'er n.

(1) Seizing control of an established communication by inserting fraudulent traffic into the data stream. For example, phone phreakers have been known to interfere with cellular phone calls by interrupting conversations to insert misleading, offensive or embarrassing interjections. See replay attack and piggybacking.

(2) See page hijacking, URL hijacking and DNS hijacking.

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Origin: 1923

In the early years of Prohibition, the word hijack was suddenly hijacked into American English. "I would have had $50,000," says a character in a story in the 1923 Literary Digest, "if I hadn't been hijacked." To this day nobody knows where hijack came from, so we can enjoy speculating about its origin without fear of contradiction. One plausible explanation is that it came from a holdup man saying something like, "Stick 'em up high, Jack," which then became "High, Jack" when he was in a hurry. Another possibility is that it came from the slang word jack, meaning "to rob with a weapon." In any case, hijack certainly had to do with holdups. To hijack in the 1920s was to seize a truck, or perhaps a boat, carrying illegal liquor, and make off with it. It was an action of one criminal gang against another, an illegal appropriation of an illegal cargo.

The end of Prohibition in 1933 did not end the usefulness of hijack. Rather, the meaning of the term broadened to include any illegal takeover of a vehicle, even one with a legitimate cargo. A hijacker was a kidnapper of a vehicle. And if the vehicle was a public conveyance that held passengers rather than goods, a hijacker was a kidnapper indeed.

Hijacking took off in the 1960s when for the first time it happened in the sky. In 1961 hijackers commandeered American planes and made them fly to communist Cuba. Hijackers in communist countries, on the other hand, forced pilots to get them out. And soon there were those who did it just for money. This aerial piracy was immediately termed skyjacking by reporters and headline writers. But hijack remained the usual word, even for airplanes. And by the mid-1970s, airport security had been tightened enough to make skyjacking rare again.

Back on earth, however, the summer of 1991 introduced a new kind of hijacking peril: taking a car from its driver by force. It was apparently in Detroit where the problem began and where the new crime of "Robbery Armed, Unlawful Driving Away an Auto" got the name carjacking. This has maintained its own meaning distinct from hijacking because the robber's interest is not in the contents or passengers but in the vehicle itself.

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v. 1. illegally seize (an aircraft, ship, or vehicle) in transit and force it to go to a different destination or use it for one's own purposes: three armed men hijacked a white van.

2. steal (goods) by seizing them in transit: the U.N. convoys have been tamely allowing gunmen to hijack relief supplies.

3. take over (something) and use it for a different purpose: the organization had been hijacked by extremists.

n.

an incident or act of hijacking.

hijacker n.

See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.

This entry contains information applicable to United States law only.

The seizure of a commercial vehicle — airplane, ship, or truck — by force or threat of force.

Hijacking is the modern term for "piracy." It is derived from the phrase "High, Jack!" which is a command to raise one's hands before being robbed. The word gained popular currency during Prohibition (1920-33), when bootleggers commandeered truckloads of liquor from each other, and reappeared when political activists began to seize commercial airplanes in the 1960s.

Airplane Hijacking

The first U.S. airplane hijacking occurred in 1961. The number of such incidents, also known as skyjackings or air piracies, grew during the 1960s, with forty attempts made in 1969. Many of these incidents involved persons seeking to divert airplanes to Cuba, where they could gain asylum. Hijackings became so numerous that the phrase "Take me to Havana" entered popular culture.

In 1973 the United States and Cuba were able to reach an agreement that allows either country to request the extradition of a hijacker. The agreement came about through an exchange of diplomatic notes. It was in Cuba's interest to make the agreement because many Cubans had hijacked planes from Cuba and forced them to fly to the United States. The agreement allows either country to take into account extenuating circumstances when the hijackers acted "for strictly political reasons and were in real and imminent danger of death without a viable alternative, provided there was no financial extortion or physical injury" to crew, passengers, or other persons (12 I.L.M. 370-76, No. 2 [March 1973]).

In addition to this agreement, the United States in 1961 made the hijacking of an airplane a federal crime. Under the Aircraft Piracy Act (18 U.S.C.A. § 32), the attempted or successful execution of the following actions is considered hijacking: damaging an aircraft; placing or bringing a destructive device or substance on an aircraft; damaging or interfering with an air navigation facility, or equipment and property used in connection with the operation of an aircraft; committing an act of violence against or otherwise injuring an individual on an aircraft; or making threats or statements that they know are false against or about the safety of an aircraft that is already in flight.

Hijacking has not been confined to the United States and Cuba. In 1970 hijackers seized more than ninety planes around the world. The growth of international terrorism, specifically in the Middle East, led to widely publicized hijackings. In these situations hijackers sought the satisfaction of political demands and a platform to air their views. In 1970 members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine hijacked three airliners to the desert near Amman, Jordan. The hijackers demanded the release of Palestinian prisoners in European prisons and in Israeli jails. When their demands were not met, they removed the passengers from the airliners and destroyed the planes one by one.

Faced with increased numbers of air hijackings, the international community sought to negotiate agreements that would prevent hijackers from finding safe haven. The 1970 Hague Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Seizure of Aircraft (22 U.S.T. 1641, T.I.A.S. 7192 [effective in the United States in 1971]) deals specifically with the hijacking of aircraft in flight. The 1971 Montreal Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Civil Aviation (24 U.S.T. 564, T.I.A.S. 7570 [effective in the United States in 1973]) addresses attacks on or sabotage of civil aircraft either in flight or on the ground, or destruction of or damage to air navigation facilities when this is likely to endanger the safety of aircraft in flight. Either the state of registration or the state in which the aircraft lands can exercise jurisdiction. The state having the hijackers in custody must prosecute or extradite them. A state may decline to extradite if it considers the offense political, or may prefer not to extradite to a state that imposes the death penalty, but in either of these cases, it is obligated to prosecute the offenders.

The United States passed the Antihijacking Act of 1974 (49 U.S.C.A. § 1301 et seq.) to implement these international conventions. This act seeks to prevent nations from adopting a permissive posture toward illegal activities such as the commandeering of aircraft, by providing penalties for hijackers and for nations that shield or fail to take adequate precautions against hijackers. The act gives the president the power to terminate air service between an offending nation and the United States if the president determines that the offending nation has acted inconsistently with its obligations under the antihijacking conventions. Since the signing of these international conventions in the 1970s, airplane hijacking has fallen sharply, especially in the United States.

Ship Hijacking

Ship hijacking is rare, but the seizure of the Achille Lauro made clear that it can happen. The Italian cruise ship was commandeered on October 7, 1985, by four members of a faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization. The hijackers boarded the ship posing as tourists, and waited until the ship was off the Egyptian coast before taking its crew and passengers hostage. They threatened to kill the hostages if Israel did not meet their demand to release fifty Palestinian prisoners. They also threatened to blow up the ship if anyone attempted a rescue mission. When the hijackers' demands were not met the next day, they shot and killed Leon Klinghoffer, a U.S. citizen who was partially paralyzed and used a wheelchair. They dumped Klinghoffer's body in the sea.

Denied access to a Syrian port, the hijackers sailed to Alexandria, where they surrendered to Egyptian authorities. The hijackers were allowed to leave Egypt for Italy to stand trial, where they were convicted for violating an Italian statute that made terrorist kidnapping illegal. The hijacker who confessed to killing Klinghoffer was sentenced to thirty years in prison.

Dansk (Danish)
v. tr. - kapre, plyndre, beslaglægge
n. - kapring, plyndring, flykaprer, gidseltager, hijacker

Nederlands (Dutch)
kapen, beroving van transporten, kaping

Français (French)
v. tr. - détourner, s'emparer de force, (fig) s'approprier, récupérer (un événement, une manifestation)
n. - détournement d'avion

Deutsch (German)
v. - entführen
n. - Entführung, Überfall

Ελληνική (Greek)
v. - ενεργώ (αερο)πειρατεία, σταματώ και κλέβω φορτίο κινούμενου οχήματος
n. - αεροπειρατεία

Italiano (Italian)
dirottare, impadronirsi di, dirottamento

Português (Portuguese)
v. - seqüestrar
n. - seqüestro (m)

Русский (Russian)
остановить на дороге и ограбить, заниматься воздушным пиратством, угонять транспортное средство

Español (Spanish)
v. tr. - robar, asaltar, atracar, secuestrar, desviar un avión
n. - secuestro aéreo, asalto

Svenska (Swedish)
v. - kapa, råna
n. - kapning, rån

中文（简体） (Chinese (Simplified))
抢劫, 劫机, 劫持, 拦路抢劫, 勒索, 劫持者

中文（繁體） (Chinese (Traditional))
v. tr. - 搶劫, 劫機, 劫持
n. - 攔路搶劫, 劫持, 勒索, 劫持者

한국어 (Korean)
v. tr. - 공중 납치하다, ~를 강탈하다, ~을 강요하다
n. - 납치행위, 하이잭

日本語 (Japanese)
v. - 乗っ取る, 強奪する
n. - 乗っ取り

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(فعل) يختطف أو يسطو على عربه أو قاطرة أو سفينه أو طائرة, يسرق, يكره أو يقسر (الاسم) الاختطاف أو السطو ألخ, السرقه, الاكراه أو القسر‏

עברית (Hebrew)
v. tr. - ‮חטף (מטוס)‬
n. - ‮חטיפה, גזל‬

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