Series on Information Security -(Weekly) - Part4-Introduction to Hacking

Let us talk about the early hackers to understand what is hacking .

John Drapper also known as Captain Crunch is one of them. It was way back in 1970's. He is also known as "Phone Phreaker" as he used to crack the Phone network.
John got Captain Crunch whistle that used to create 2600 Hz frequency to make the telecom switches to operate and allow them to have free phone calls.
John drapper developed a Blue Box that generated different frequencies which the telephone company devices used to consider that the sound was generated by their switching equipments. They used it for free international call with the help of blue box. Also they used a technique known as social engineering to talk to Telephone company employees and gather information they needed from the telephone company as and when needed. A red box is a phreaking device that generates tones to simulate inserting coins in pay phones, thereby fooling the telephone system into completing the calls making them as free calls. We may find making international calls is no big deal, but during those days making an international calls would cost you hefty amount.

Kevin Mitnick is another well known name in social engineering world. He got unauthorized access to a network back in 1979. He got into the computer system of Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). Mitnick gained unauthorized access to many of the computer networks. Mitnick stole computer passwords and broke into and read private e-mail. He had been arrested by FBI after a long chase and has been charged with criminal ofences. He is now working as a Computer security consultant. He is known to as master of social engineering.You may find him in many big conferences and interviews. He has written books like "The Art of Invisibility", "The Art of Intrusion", The Art of Deception etc..

As per the information available in the digital world, following are few known people as mentioned below. There are many other names like Kevin Poulsen who blocked all telephone lines to radio station to win a prize so that he can be the only person who can call the radio station. Robbert Tappan Morris who developed one of the very first worm viruses on the Internet, This worm eventually caused many thousands of dollars worth of damage and “loss of productivity” in late 80s. Jonathan James is also a known hacker who broke into NASA computer system network. Also there are many hacking groups which are well known to the security community. Many of these groups are rivals and at times work against each other.

It was important to understand what actually hacking means and hence I provided you with the above information. In simple terms Hacking means "Tweaking a system to perform such task which it is not designed for".
Remember friends, Hackers are very intelligent people and having exceptional skills and they are not always bad people.
See you in next part...