hacker.org

Good day,

At risk of sounding even more amateurish than I am I have decided against my better judgement to post this. I would like to learn hacking and cracking in general, not so much in order to personally hack or crack anything but rather a combination of a life-long curiousity and the fact that I really don't like not fully understanding everything I can about networks and network navigation.

After all I was an early 90's teen and thus the entire focal point of geekdom in my youth was computronics and the notorious and rapidly emerging clan of evil hacker monkeys that would destroy America and everything great and free it stood for. Fortunately we elected Bush and taught the world that true evil can only be achieved through sheer stupidity...)

What I'm looking for is someone experienced and open to imparting their knowledge that I could ping questions off of and receive generalized and brief direction from. I do know several programming languages but would consider myself an intermediate only because of my degree as I have not coded professionally in a rather long while. My true strengths lies in electronics design and engineering (which means I can find my way around a circuit and work out an adder like noone's business and do some pretty neat gadgetry). Sadly, while this does help to impress children and their single mothers, outside of understand the theories and general mechanics of aforementioned activities it does little to boost my abilities in practical applications.

To keep this from becoming any longer... if anyone in this community has both the desire and knowledge to assist me along I would greatly appreciate the involvement.

-S

Sorill wrote:Good day,

At risk of sounding even more amateurish than I am I have decided against my better judgement to post this. I would like to learn hacking and cracking in general, not so much in order to personally hack or crack anything but rather a combination of a life-long curiousity and the fact that I really don't like not fully understanding everything I can about networks and network navigation.

After all I was an early 90's teen and thus the entire focal point of geekdom in my youth was computronics and the notorious and rapidly emerging clan of evil hacker monkeys that would destroy America and everything great and free it stood for. Fortunately we elected Bush and taught the world that true evil can only be achieved through sheer stupidity...)

What I'm looking for is someone experienced and open to imparting their knowledge that I could ping questions off of and receive generalized and brief direction from. I do know several programming languages but would consider myself an intermediate only because of my degree as I have not coded professionally in a rather long while. My true strengths lies in electronics design and engineering (which means I can find my way around a circuit and work out an adder like noone's business and do some pretty neat gadgetry). Sadly, while this does help to impress children and their single mothers, outside of understand the theories and general mechanics of aforementioned activities it does little to boost my abilities in practical applications.

To keep this from becoming any longer... if anyone in this community has both the desire and knowledge to assist me along I would greatly appreciate the involvement.

-S

If no one asked questions their would be no answers. I'm sure for the most part everyone here will be willing to help you on your path of knowledge. The biggest peave here are those that ask question such as: "i want 2 be 1337, pleez show me to h@x0r myspace, school, pentagon..." and the list goes on." At the very least we can direct you on where to find the answers you're looking for. A few suggestions:

Books:

Hacking - The art of exploitation

Security+ Guide to Network Security Fundamentals


Websites:

hackthissite.org

hackerhighschool.org

w3schools.org

and of course Google, one of the best friends you'll ever have...

Sorill wrote:Good day,

At risk of sounding even more amateurish than I am I have decided against my better judgement to post this. I would like to learn hacking and cracking in general, not so much in order to personally hack or crack anything but rather a combination of a life-long curiousity and the fact that I really don't like not fully understanding everything I can about networks and network navigation.

After all I was an early 90's teen and thus the entire focal point of geekdom in my youth was computronics and the notorious and rapidly emerging clan of evil hacker monkeys that would destroy America and everything great and free it stood for. Fortunately we elected Bush and taught the world that true evil can only be achieved through sheer stupidity...)

What I'm looking for is someone experienced and open to imparting their knowledge that I could ping questions off of and receive generalized and brief direction from. I do know several programming languages but would consider myself an intermediate only because of my degree as I have not coded professionally in a rather long while. My true strengths lies in electronics design and engineering (which means I can find my way around a circuit and work out an adder like noone's business and do some pretty neat gadgetry). Sadly, while this does help to impress children and their single mothers, outside of understand the theories and general mechanics of aforementioned activities it does little to boost my abilities in practical applications.

To keep this from becoming any longer... if anyone in this community has both the desire and knowledge to assist me along I would greatly appreciate the involvement.

-S

I'm the network programmer and with adjacent fields of programming. I can help you out in most aspect what you consider hacking. I cannot make a project for you, but to help you through it. I expect you to learn C#, C++, or python.

Whiteknight,

I happen to have a few books on all three. In the past I've only used them as references, however, while working on various hobbiest projects. I'd prefer to really understand the languages more intuitively so I'll work through the books more completely over the next few weeks. I'll PM you or post an update on these forums when I'm done (whichever you prefer, really).

Plope0726,

Thank you for the references. I believe I pulled some of these from previous posts I saw you make and added them to my favorites (hackthissite and hackerhighschool). I couldn't find a domain at w3schools.org but I did find w3school.org which appears to be an informational site for web building (HTML, CSS, PHP etc.). Is this the correct site? Google of course is my best friend... it helps me find great golfing spots to make the boss happy after I "forget" to file those "very important" reports before the quarter closes and makes me look like less of a dunce when I'm heading into personally uncharted territory.

Again, thank you both for the information and I look forward to continued dialogue.

-S

Sorill wrote:Whiteknight,

I happen to have a few books on all three. In the past I've only used them as references, however, while working on various hobbiest projects. I'd prefer to really understand the languages more intuitively so I'll work through the books more completely over the next few weeks. I'll PM you or post an update on these forums when I'm done (whichever you prefer, really).

Plope0726,

Thank you for the references. I believe I pulled some of these from previous posts I saw you make and added them to my favorites (hackthissite and hackerhighschool). I couldn't find a domain at w3schools.org but I did find w3school.org which appears to be an informational site for web building (HTML, CSS, PHP etc.). Is this the correct site? Google of course is my best friend... it helps me find great golfing spots to make the boss happy after I "forget" to file those "very important" reports before the quarter closes and makes me look like less of a dunce when I'm heading into personally uncharted territory.

Again, thank you both for the information and I look forward to continued dialogue.

-S

I'm glad you found my references useful, and yes, I meant w3school.org...You may find it useful to learn about scripting languages like js and php. That usefull when you learn about different web exploits. Also, I might suggest you read up on SQL and how databases are designed and implemented...this can be very boring but very good to know.

trust me... it is boring

I've actually worked my way through a few SQL books (started on an Oracle book as well). It's been a while at this point but I remember the core and the basic syntaxes. I've also managed to work my way through writing a few small programs that use SQL queries in Java and VB.

Of course.. since then I've written my own generic DLL's and libraries to perform these operations, mostly for the learning experience of writing and using your own DLL's and libs. I'd have used the supplied libraries that come with VB but there were a few quirks I didn't appreciate and at that point preferred to set up my own logic, and my knowledge of Java isn't extensive enough at this point to know all the libraries that are out there now, but it does seem google tends to be a great resource for deciding which libs are useful for what scenarios.

I'm very excited about the PHP references though as I haven't forced myself to learn much of anything about it and am hoping to come up with some small solo-project to get some level of comfort with it.

EDIT: And yes I fully agree on the boring part... admittadely, it's why I stopped short on the Oracle binge I was on. It was one of those "I'm bored and this is getting repetitive so I'll learn more when I'm using it for something productive" things.

I too am looking for a mentor on hacking. I have significant interest with little knowledge but am willing to learn that which is taught to me. Please, someone advise me. Thank you.

I think it might be worth noting that to be a hacker you need the motivation, initiative and ability to educate yourself. No one can teach anyone to hack, it must be achieved by the individual. However, asking for advices about what to learn and where to learn it is on the right path.

My own interests are operating systems, low level programming, reverse engineering and exploitation. A good (and fun) way to learn about that is to play wargames.

Suggested sites:
http://intruded.net/
http://smashthestack.org/
http://www.overthewire.org/