"So you wanna be a Hacker?"
All Hackers are not created equal
Real hackers are born that way. God wires their brains a bit differently and they can do things the rest of the world can not even imagine.
The stuff you see in the movies is NOT real. You know...The hero logs onto the system and cracks the password in 10 seconds. Yeah right! Hacking into a computer system takes days, even weeks, of careful study. You must find out a lot about the system and what holes may exist in the security system. Then you better be covering your tracks or you will spend a lot of time in prison. These days the only time I hack into a system is because the owner of that system is paying me to do so. Network security is big business these days, Sysops want a friendly hack attempt, BEFORE they get unfriendly one. Or some company wants to recover some data they have lost.
Things have changed even in the last few years.
The best way to protect your code is to hack it yourself first!
Hey the real good news is... That it is perfectly legal to hack your OWN code!
IF you wrote it, then you are allowed to hack it. In fact to really debug your code, you must hack it! This is a great way to learn about how your software REALLY works. Most people who have been writing code for a while do a lot of hacking. They call it debugging... Hacking is basically debugging someone else's code, maybe making a few changes along the way!
Crossing the line into illegal hacking could have very serious consequences. You can spend a long time in prison for illegal hacking.
Most hackers are young, and broke, and they have lots of time to devote to their hobby.
How do I get started?
I repeat.. Hacking is basically debugging someone else's code, and making a few changes along the way. If you have done much debugging at the assembler level, then you have most of the skills you need already. First you must learn to program in assembler. To hack software you must be able to read assembler. It unlikely that the software will come with source code, so you must be able to read it much as the computer does. There are tools to make this easier, but it will be up to you to understand what the code is doing. Hacking forces you to look at software differently. The skills you acquire make you a much better programmer. It allows you to work "Magic" sometimes.
Always, Always, Always back up the file, BEFORE you try to hack anything!
Warning!
Your first hack... Change the text messages in you own or someone else's software. Use a hex editor to do this. I like to change the error messages from like "invalid filename" to "Does not compute" or "unknown command" to "Ow that hurts!!". You get the idea. This is a good place to start your career as a hacker. It is not hard to do, and will give you practice in finding something in a hex dump of a file, changing it, and saving the new file. Any good hex editor will let you do this. The stings usually MUST be the same size or at least the new one must be smaller (you can always pad with spaces). C strings will end with a zero, and pascal strings will start with a length. I know this is not much of a hack, but it is lots of fun to do. If you hack someone else's code well... as long as you don't distribute your changes to it, I very much doubt they will prosecute.
Your second hack... Hack yourself! Write and compile a simple program in you favorite High level language. Now go and hack you own code. Disassemble it and walk thru it using your debugger. Do this a first with both a symbol table. This will help you figure out what is going on. Observe how the various routines look and work as assembler code. Look for holes in anything you need to remain secure. Never forget that your high level language (C++, Pascal, Visual basic, etc) just create your machine code for you. From the hackers viewpoint it is that raw code that counts. Now Disassemble and walk though you code again but without any symbol table. This is what your code looks like to the outside world. Now hack your code. Make a dialog work backwards. Change the program flow. Keep it from crashing, just make it do something different.
Your third hack.....Now do all this to someone else's program. Pick something small. Again as long as you don't distribute it, I very much doubt anyone would prosecute you for this. Psst don't tell them....
Having the proper tools is vital! Most of these tools are available for download from my site, or come bundled with other software.
For the most part you will need different tools for hacking DOS and windows software. You will also need different tools for 16 bit and 32 bit hacks. Some of the 32 bit tools will work on both 16 and 32 bit code.
I will get to this soon.
The law enforcement comunity has finally started to set up special branches to catch the criminal hacker. So far their record is not so hot. They have nabbed a lot hackers, but so far most are just the curious type. The criminal hackers just seem to keep getting away while the curious are getting 10 years. Comeon guys go after the "Bad Guys" 'k!
I will get these links up real soon I promise!
Here are some stories about the Feds and Hackers. (From the hacker's viewpoint)