Useful Information About Hacking and Hackers

By Srikanth R, 21st Feb 2011 | Follow this author | RSS Feed | Short URL http://nut.bz/yaom7-cv/
Posted in Wikinut>News>Crime

This article provides useful information about what hacking is. It also gives a brief description of hackers.

Hacking and hackers

Hacking means modifying a system by a third party to make it function in a way not intended by the designer of that system. In the field of information technology and computers, hacking is accessing a computer or a network of computers without appropriate authorization. The term "Hack" was first used by in the 1960s in the US.

A person involved in the activity of hacking is called a "Hacker". Normally people hack into other systems in order to misuse resources for financial gains. Teenagers and young adults hack into other systems just for the thrill or challenge involved. For some, hacking is an art. But there are also people called "Ethical Hackers" who acquire hacking skills in an endeavor to help society. Huge corporations like IBM employ them. These ethical hackers test the systems for their vulnerability and help in making them more secure.

There are many popular websites like http://www.gohacking.com/ which teach you to hack. This website has lot of useful information for hacking enthusiasts, like how to use keyloggers, how to trace IP addresses, port scanning, etc. Hackers are categorized as neophyte, script kiddie, white hat hackers, grey hat hackers, blue hat hackers, black hat hackers, elite, hacktivist.

Hacking is considered illegal in many countries and there are stringent laws against this activity. A person can be jailed if proved to be involved in unethical hacking. In the US, laws covering hacking can be found in the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

Users of computers or computer networks should use Internet security suit programs (which include firewall, antivirus, etc) to protect their computers from hackers. There are many companies like McAfee (http://mcafee.com/us/), Symantec (http://www.symantec.com/index.jsp), AVG (http://free.avg.com/in-en/homepage), etc which offer really good Internet security softwares.

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Meet the author

Srikanth R
Srikanth is a graduate in Mathematics, Economics and Statistics. He works full time. He loves writing as he says it is a great way to express his thoughts.