WYN2K-Enemy in Disguise

By Ron Eve

We hear of hackers, and it’s no news to the rise in cyber operations in this era, more war, transaction, crime, business have upgraded to the cyberspace network. As these are successful so also is the rise of crime, though more tech security are rushing to equip themselves to fight against threats, it’s better you understand some basics of how hackers behave, why they do what they do, and how to notice signs of intrusion in your network. Three types of Hackers are categorized, BlackHat, WhiteHat,GreyHat

BlackHat as the color depict

-which is racist, black shouldn’t be associated with evil-

Are the group solely for the destruction of everything in your network, from stealing, hijacking, ransom-ing, blackmail, destroying of data, files, etc.

 BlackHat are difficult to trace as they are hidden and don’t make their presence known too often. With a single laptop, they can wreck a whole supercomputer with single DDos attack, if you want to view how their works are done in full , watch the popular tv show Mr.Robot

WhiteHat are hackers that dedicate their lives to fight BlackHat hackers, find backdoors

-backdoors is a term in hackers world for loopholes to enter and gain access to your network-

 It’s been argued that to be a WhiteHat, you need eat the forbidden fruit, which I mean you need to experience the way of the BlackHat, so arguably WhiteHat can turn evil but we glad they not , they perform intensive system penetration, to find weakness and provide these to the owners to strengthen their network, also Whitehackers can act as a system analysts and use BlackHat technique to attack networks to test how strong their system can withstand attacks

GreyHat is simply a mix of the two, an example of such hacker group is Anonymous. It’s impossible to tell if they are the good guys or not  , they attack and help . So let’s say it’s a grey area (did you see what I did there )

Some hacker stories : In 1992, Argentinian student Julio Ardita hacked into the computer systems of Harvard University and the US Naval command. He was finally caught by police in 1997.

Young British hackers Richard Pryce and Matthew Bevan (nicknamed Datastream Cowboy and Kuji) broke into US military computers in 1994.

In 2002, Gary McKinnon (known as Solo) hacked into NASA and US military computers from a room in London, UK. He claimed to have been looking for evidence of UFOs.

Love UFO? CHECK THIS: Who really gets to go to Mars

-interview with Gary, Chief System Security Analyst, Pandora World –
Well, we interviewed our Chief system analysts and security, and he gave us a surface information

How do hackers get into your network and system?

1. Hackers can figure out obvious passwords, like their names or birthdays. Serious hackers use password-cracker software that runs through all the possible combinations of numbers and letters until it finds the right one.
2. Common attack at business networks is a tactic known “phishing”—sending emails pretending to be from a recognized organization so the victim emails back their details.
3. Using Man in the Middle attack-is an attack where the attacker secretly relays and possibly alters the communication between two parties who believe they are directly communicating with each other.
4. Another way is using a DDOS attack to force the server in reboot, during that stage its security becomes down and open to attack

Serious hackers don’t just want to eavesdrop on your computer’s links to the outside world, they want to get inside your computer and take it over and leak out all info. These are some of the tools they use:

• A Trojan Horse
• Keylogging
• Backdoor programs allow hackers to access your compute
•  Sniffers
•  Computer worms  makes them harder to stop
• Computer virus

Among others

How do you prepare for such attacks ?

As it’s always been said, prevention is better than cure, letting your security team do a sweep on all computers is one way

Training your workers and yourself to get packed with all information in the tech world,

it takes a single piece to drop the dominos, most attacks are became of one employee negligence and unprepared will unknowingly open the door wide for such attacks

How do I tell if a hacker is trying to attack my network?

Hackers sometimes need to physically gain access to the work computer or server , or use an employee to gain access, or remotely take over,

~EARLIER: How to survive a manhunt

Here are the in depth methods they use

Let’s use a detection scale of 1-10, with 10 being undetectable

A Trojan Horse

Detection level: 8

Trojan Horse are files that looks harmless until opened, but once open it installs a rogue program that takes control of the computer. Simply put , it could be a file sent through to your email in the disguise of a business proposal , upon opening, it infect your pc and worse the server, special training is required to detect fishy files, strong antivirus recommended

And for f$&k sake don’t say you have Windows Defender so that’s enough

Keylogging

Detection level: 10

is a method of linking up to someone else’s computer and monitoring every key that is pressed—useful for gaining passwords or other security information. It’s now a popular software for businesses, families, couples, the primary function was used by hackers to gain information and retrieve bank details, pin code, encryption keys etc,

Now keyloggers are so user friendly, couples use it to track each other for infidelity. Highly undetectable program

Backdoor

Detection level: 9

Backdoor are programs that allow hackers to access your computer without a password. Mostly these programs are installed when the hacker has physical access to your computer, for only one time, also individuals should beware some of tech support who want to repair your computer,

Once installed, you will be milked dry of info as well as your online finances

Scanners

Detection level:4

Often and all we see ads about programs offering error checks and software damages, also programs that help you clean up your pc, beware these apps are design to scan in length all loopholes into your computer, these Programs designed to scan for weaknesses in a computer’s “firewall” (protection) systems are called vulnerability .

Sniffers

Detection level: 10

 Sniffers monitor information traveling to and from a computer system, in order to capture all the passwords and user IDs of anyone using it.

Mostly sniffers program use the Internet to gain information, what ever site you go into, keys you typed, email you checked, sniffers with just your IP address can gain access to information outgoing and incoming your pc.

Worms

Detection level: 1

Computer worms infect networks by sending copies of themselves to all the machines in the system. Unlike viruses, they don’t have to attach themselves to a program—this makes them harder to stop. Even though detection is easy, removal is almost impossible , it duplicates so quickly and only strong antivirus can remove worms with minimal damages .

Worms are popular on usb drives, when opening the drive on your computer, it executes the virus, and don’t keep opening folders when you realize every folder has a copy of itself

Virus

Detection level: 5

A virus is a computer program that infects a host program and alters the way it works, virus can somewhat be detected, when you realize your programs isnt running properly, applications keep crashing, computer going off without you issuing a command.

Viruses are now constantly being battled by antivirus and frequent updates makes battling viruses a lot more less headache

Phishing 

Detection level: 8

 Certain links sent to your email in disguise as a website, are phishing sites, Hackers use this method to clone the original website, most popular sites that are phished include PayPal, Facebook, when a victim opens this link, and type the credentials, the credentials are then sent to the hacker, it’s almost impossible to detect phishing sites unless you look very closely at the website design, also to be on the safe side , type the website rather than clicking links.
***

With many other methods used by hackers, these are a few mentioned above, although ransomware are the new kind of method hackers use to extort money, we just want don’t want to go into it today , to keep this at a standard level of understanding

Eve signing off for today, and formally want to say thank you for the support guys

if you have any questions or suggestions and or experience about hackers please leave a COMMENT below

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