In this blog post we will be looking at hacking on computers systems.
Along with the
usual intent of harm there is also another breed of hackers called the “Ethical
Hacker / White Hat Hacker” who tries to hack into the system to ensure that
there are indeed no security flaws in the system that can be used by the
harmful hackers to compromise the integrity of the data and / or cause the system
to behave in an errant way.
All of the above was from the
view point of a system. However individual users can also be hacked.
References -
The recent hacking of various
important websites, like the nsa.gov, the defacement of public sites show
hacking can also serve as a means to protest.
There are a few basic steps that
are taken when trying to hack into a system –
1. Recon – Gather information
about the intended target.
2. Analysis – Analysis of the
gathered information for possible ways to hack the system. Then a decision on using one or more
vulnerabilities is made and a plan is chalked out.
3. Attack – The plan is actually
put into action.
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| Edit : The hacking process |
Today individuals have a lot of
online accounts like email accounts, Facebook etc. If individually targets and
if the user has not taken precautions then an account can be easily hacked.
Moreover these accounts are often
linked to each other and sometimes what is public information on one account
forms the basis of identification for another account as this post (very
interesting read) over here shows. The hacker gained control of his Amazon,
Apple and Gmail accounts and wiped all the data on the users HDD. All of this
possible because Amazon shows the last four digits of the credit card number to
the account holder. Apple considers these same four digits along with a few
publicly available pieces of info to be sufficient information to reset the
password.
Simple steps to prevent hacking are
to have a good anti-virus installed and monitoring all the activities. Additionally
things like creating a strong enough password can go a long way towards
preventing dictionary attacks on account passwords.
References -
I like how you break the hacking process into three steps: recon, analysis, and attack. It shows how hacking is a process that requires planning and information and not necessarily something that can be done on a whim. Including email and Facebook is a good way of letting average users know that such threats and pertinent to them as well. The picture shows hacking-related words, though it may have been better to use the picture to actually visually show the hacking process. Finally you use a specific person as an example of someone who was hacked and had his Amazon account compromised.
ReplyDeleteI too like the methodical approach. Your post is analytical, simply read, and creates a complete picture of the content with enough substance to gain interest. The links are then excellent in that it gives a way to learn more from like or related content. You obviously spend time in your posts and it's reminding me to reset my passwords. Thank you.
ReplyDelete