The Dangers of Social Networking

IntroductionSocial Networking is the one area of the Internet that nearly every computer-literate person indulges in these days. It doesn’t matter whether it’s your company boss, your neighbor, your boyfriend or your girlfriend, everybody’s contactable via at least one of the Social Networking portals. However, since these platforms attract so many people – most of whom are blissfully unaware of the need for online security – they also draw in the cybercriminals who are out to make a fast buck from the unwary users.The threats out there can range from just the basic spam advertisement that we all find in our inboxes, to the more sophisticated scams designed to steal your Social Network account credentials, or ultimately, to infect your computer...

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An analysis of hacker mentality

Why people hack is a subject which is often discussed. Some say the explanation is the same as the one given by people who climb mountains: 'because they [computers] are out there'. Others claim that by highlighting vulnerabilities, hacking helps increase computer security. And finally, there is the explanation most often put forward: criminal intent.Whatever the reason, as long as computers exists there will be hackers - white hats, black hats and grey hats. And because there is no way of predicting which kind of attack ('curiosity' versus 'malicious') will hit your computer first, it is always best to be prepared for the worst.The truth is that in hours of a machine being connected to the Internet, somebody will scan it with an automated vulnerability probing tool, looking for ways to get...

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How to detect a hacker attack

Most computer vulnerabilities can be exploited in a variety of ways. Hacker attacks may use a single specific exploit, several exploits at the same time, a misconfiguration in one of the system components or even a backdoor from an earlier attack.Due to this, detecting hacker attacks is not an easy task, especially for an inexperienced user. This article gives a few basic guidelines to help you figure out either if your machine is under attack or if the security of your system has been compromised. Keep in mind just like with viruses, there is no 100% guarantee you will detect a hacker attack this way. However, there's a good chance that if your system has been hacked, it will display one or more of the following behaviours.Windows machines:Suspiciously high outgoing network traffic. If you...

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Notable hackers

This section contains brief information on some of the most famous hackers, both black and white hats. The individuals below are well known for a variety of reasons: their actions, whether good or bad, their contributions to software and technology development, or their innovative approach, skills and ability to think out of the box.Richard Stallman is known as the father of free software. When Stallman started working at MIT's Artificial Intelligence Lab in 1971 he was confronted with 'non disclosure agreements' and closed program sources while he was hacking and improving system drivers the 'traditional way'. After an interesting battle to obtain the source code of a faulty printer utility, Stallman gave up his job and became the loudest advocate for free computer software, creating GNU...

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Hackers and the law

Given that computer hacking is at least three decades old, there has been plenty of time for governments to develop and approve cybercrime laws. At the moment, almost all developed countries have some form of anti-hacking law or legislation on data theft or corruption which can be used to prosecute cyber criminals. There are efforts to make these laws even more stringent, which sometimes raise protests from groups which support the right to freedom of information. Over the past few years, there have been lots of convictions for hacking and unauthorized data access. Here are a few of them:Kevin Mitnick is probably the one of the most famous hacker takedown cases. Mitnick was arrested by the FBI in Raleigh, North Carolina, on February 15th,...

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A brief history of hacking

A brief history of hackingDecember 1947 - William Shockley invents the transistor and demonstrates its use for the first time. The first transistor consisted of a messy collection of wires, insulators and germanium. According to a recent poll on CNN's website, the transistor is believed to be the most important discovery in the past 100 years. 1964 - Thomas Kurtz and John Kemeny create BASIC, one of the most popular programming languages even nowadays. 1965 -it's estimated that approximately 20,000 computer systems are in use in the United States. Most of these are manufactured by International Business Machines (IBM). 1968 - Intel is founded. 1969 - AMD is founded. 1969 - The Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) create the ARPANET,...

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