Basically, you have to protect the information you have about yourself on your computer, by preventing the computer from allowing others in to access your information. It's sort of tricky, but not entirely implausible.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=qitlNpPqM7E&feature=RecentlyWatched&page=1&t=t&f=b
Check out that link, and then think about what they said. Just an exclamation mark at the end of your password can make the difference between a hacker making and not making out your password. Hackers have special programs that allow them to run your password through an entire database of words and phrases, but as they expand that library to include capital letters and special characters, the search takes a whole lot longer. Supposedly, an eight character password of mixed case and containing special characters would take several days or even weeks of searching before it could finally be broken. However, in today's age, someone would uncover this scheme, whether it be hotmail if they're trying to hack into your e-mail, or yourself even, catching someone in the act of hacking your computer through the c-prompt or by some other sneaky, malicious means.
Yet this is not the only way that hackers and crackers can gain access to your personal information. It's called social engineering. I once saw one of the most famous hackers of all time (this guy actually did 5 years in the chink) speak about this concept "social engineering," by which you work people and manipulate their trust. For example, you call the switchboard at HP and ask for the Manager of some department in Sales. The guy answers the phone and instantly you have his name and the sound of his voice. You apologize for the wrong number, and then call some guy in the IT department. You persuade him that you're in fact "Johnny Smoothtalker," and convince them to reset your account access password to "1234." Thus, you're into the system, collecting and examining highly sensitive and confidential/secret material. It's as easy as this, and you too can be conned in a similar manner. It's just like e-mails from fraudulent people trying to convince people to input their bank information in an online form to confirm that they're still patrons of a certain institution. Hundreds of examples like this exist. Yet, still, high-faluting lawyers, and even congressmen (I believe he was from Florida) get conned, and have their identities stolen.
Friday, March 9, 2007
Protecting Yourself
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3 comments:
Hackers are a scary thought. That's why I protect myself by having absolutely no money in my bank account or anything worth stealing. However, for those less inclined to spend their money on stupid crap, my friend has all of his passwords set to chemical formulas, and has yet to encounter an instance of hacking because there don't seem to be codes that can pick up the pattern.
Hah, yeah, like Clare my first line of defense is having nothing worth while to steal. Still eventually it is going to be important to protect something on my computer, so thats all useful information.
Hackers are everywhere and everyone hopes that they won't be the victim when they create their "easy" password. I, for one, am one of these people using the same password for pretty much everything I own, except for some things (and I probably shouldn't have said that but ehhh). But those methods of hacking you explained were really enlightening to me. I had no idea it could be that simple to hack into a extremely confidential system!
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