so I am interested in "systems security"

[peterwlocke]

so I heard a good way to learn this is through learning how to hack. where would you recommend I start any books or sites or languages.

[StringJunky]

Being able to hack is a consequence of having an intimate knowledge of how computers and software works. It's born from endless hours tinkering; not like learning to be a doctor or tradesmen with a discrete set of skills that can be put in a book and you just follow the instructions. The road to hacking is necessarily a convoluted and empirical one; suck it and see. It's the realm of geeks.

[peterwlocke]

i know i have too much free time so i want to do something with it ya know instead of just sitting on my bum all day.

5 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

Being able to hack is a consequence of having an intimate knowledge of how computers and software works. It's born from endless hours tinkering; not like learning to be a doctor or tradesmen with a discrete set of skills that can be put in a book and you just follow the instructions. The road to hacking is necessarily a convoluted and empirical one; suck it and see. It's the realm of geeks.

 

[StringJunky]

Just now, peterwlocke said:

i know i have too much free time so i want to do something with it ya know instead of just sitting on my bum all day.

 

Jump in anywhere that takes your fancy in the area of computer security that interests you. I'm sure someone will give you a more concrete path to start but in my experience of learning anything solo, it seems one just jumps in anywhere and start putting pieces together.

[peterwlocke]

okay, i will do some research.I feel something about nodes? is that a good place to start?

[StringJunky]

5 minutes ago, peterwlocke said:

okay, i will do some research.I feel something about nodes? is that a good place to start?

Maybe Sensi or Strange can answer that. I just use them.

[peterwlocke]

oh. heh sensi

[nevim]

*Sensei

[Sensei]

5 hours ago, peterwlocke said:

i know i have too much free time so i want to do something with it ya know instead of just sitting on my bum all day.

(if you're Windows user) start from downloading free Visual Studio Express from MSDN website:

https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/vs/express/

Recommended is VS 2008 or VS 2010, because they are not tragic slow like the latest versions, which might be annoying for newbie, unless you have top-notch game machine with SSD, 16 GB+ RAM memory and Core i7 etc.

 

Then learn C/C++ (if you don't know yet)

https://en.cppreference.com/w/

And learn about TCP/IP stack. It's in WinSock docs:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/winsock/winsock-functions

The most obvious difference between WinSock and BSD socks from Unix/Linux, is that at the beginning of Windows app, you must call special initialization function WSAStartup().

 

This way you will learn how to program Internet and network applications. Everything for free of charge.

 

5 hours ago, StringJunky said:

Maybe Sensi or Strange can answer that. I just use them.

If you want to call for somebody on this forum, use @ and append proper name of user (or pick it from the list). This way that person will get notification from forum software. And don't misspell.. Like for example: @StringJunky

 

Edited February 5, 2019 by Sensei

[Endy0816]

9 hours ago, peterwlocke said:

so I heard a good way to learn this is through learning how to hack. where would you recommend I start any books or sites or languages.

From the sounds of it, you are interested in Ethical Hacking. More along the lines of knowing how hacking is done so that you might secure a system from attack.

This site has a good overview and covers different techniques used/involved:

https://www.greycampus.com/opencampus/ethical-hacking/

 

Strictly speaking hacking is simply you trying different things in order to gain unauthorized access of some sort. You don't need training though it can certainly help. Trying to find the hole in someone's logic with the least amount of effort.

Keep in mind the unauthorized access is the goal. If social engineering works better than attempting to brute force a password, expect the hacker to do what works best.

[koti]

12 hours ago, peterwlocke said:

so I heard a good way to learn this is through learning how to hack. where would you recommend I start any books or sites or languages.

I would suggest you start by learning how TCPIP works. Learn the basics of networking first then go into learning what makes modern routing switches tick. All the modern protocols and technologies that go into the modern networking infrastructure. Then go into learning how to code, it won’t help you much with „hacking” if you don’t know the networking basics first. Please note that „hacking” is nothing more than breaking in and steeling, it doesn’t matter if you do it in real life or in the virtual world, its against the law all the same and you will suffer the consequences if you break the law.

[peterwlocke]

thanks

 

[peterwlocke]

thanks i opened up the links and will look into them.