Hackers
Hackers, what are they? Who are they? And why do they do what they do?
All very good questions and some of the most common asked by your average computer user. All the bad press hackers receive is not entirely accurate, in fact the very term 'hacker' was though to have been contrived from the media itself.
All very good questions and some of the most common asked by your average computer user. All the bad press hackers receive is not entirely accurate, in fact the very term 'hacker' was though to have been contrived from the media itself.
A hacker is a person or individual who has an intense passion for technology and will often reverse engineer a product or program to discover its internal and innate workings. They have a desire to understand how things work (mostly computer technology) and will attempt to uncover flaws and vulnerabilities in technology that they may then try and fix or improve. Hackers help improve
online safety in many respects, some may even simply attempt to make a product do things differently or just experiement with its programming code to see what it may or may not do.
online safety in many respects, some may even simply attempt to make a product do things differently or just experiement with its programming code to see what it may or may not do.
Hackers are just people like you and me, only they might rate themselves as being a little smarter than your average computer user. The ones I have met are bright people indeed, but I don't know that the belief that they are people of such superior intellegence actually holds any real reverance. This might be some mindest that so-called geek people create to enhance their sense of selfworth, I don't really know, but for the most part, in my personal experience, I have found that with most things you are deeply passionate about, you will generally do very well.
Given the amount of time hackers spend on their particular endeavour, it is not suprising that they end up looking rather clever at what they do. Although I must admit, while the above is observed, there are some talented hackers out there. This is only my take on the hackers apparent high IQ or 'smarter than the rest of us attitude.'
Given the amount of time hackers spend on their particular endeavour, it is not suprising that they end up looking rather clever at what they do. Although I must admit, while the above is observed, there are some talented hackers out there. This is only my take on the hackers apparent high IQ or 'smarter than the rest of us attitude.'
Many people take an extremely dim view of those refered to as hackers, people will conjure up visions of some hooded crettin workin in some basement stealing peoples ID's and creating destructive viruses to crippple the internet. While a very small percentage of hackers do perform such menacing activities, most of the hackers out there are in fact very helpful to the World Wide Web and computers and IT.
The term hackers also referes to a person who finds vulnerabilities in programming code to try and patch and fix any holes that may exist. These kind of hackers are the helpful ones, these people may also work for big companies and even write virus signatures to help circumvent attacks on our computers. They may also be the very people who figure out ways to fix certain bugs within your operating system or applications. They may also discover new and improved ways to increase hardware security for your modem/router or wireless network or mobile phone, blackberry etc.
The term hackers also referes to a person who finds vulnerabilities in programming code to try and patch and fix any holes that may exist. These kind of hackers are the helpful ones, these people may also work for big companies and even write virus signatures to help circumvent attacks on our computers. They may also be the very people who figure out ways to fix certain bugs within your operating system or applications. They may also discover new and improved ways to increase hardware security for your modem/router or wireless network or mobile phone, blackberry etc.
So as you can see, hackers are not all bad as the media would generally have you believe, hackers are also the good guys out there working alongside IT security professionals to improve our safety.
It is only a very tiny percentage of them who use their talents to make some kind of living by perhaps defrauding people of thier funds or identity, or writing malicious code to destroy files etc.
It is only a very tiny percentage of them who use their talents to make some kind of living by perhaps defrauding people of thier funds or identity, or writing malicious code to destroy files etc.
Some IT security professionals are more or less legal and ethical hackers, they often try and hack their own corporate network while performing what is known as a 'penetration test', some security professionals do nothing but just that and attempt to uncover any security vulneralbilities within an organisations security.
If you are reading this article and wanting to learn how to hack something, you have clome to the wrong place, what I have provided here is simply a brief description of what hackers are and what they do, both good and bad. As this website develops I will write many more articles based on internet security and how you can best prevent your system being attacked or hacked, there is never a gaurantee that it will never happen no matter how much you try and harden your system.
Even hackers get 'hacked' and the old rule of thumb applies, 'if it was man made, it can be broken!' and this most certainly holds true of internet and network secuirty.
Even hackers get 'hacked' and the old rule of thumb applies, 'if it was man made, it can be broken!' and this most certainly holds true of internet and network secuirty.