Hacking is the process of exploiting vulnerabilities to gain unauthorized access to any computer, smartphone, tablet, or network system. Hackers use advanced computer and programming skills to exploit and get into the victim’s system without their knowledge and gain lots of personal information including personal and financial data with passwords. Not all hackers use their skills to exploit systems or to gain access to the victim’s system, rather they use their skills to protect confidential information from being stolen and are called Ethical Hackers or white hat hackers in the hacker’s community. Some hackers use their knowledge for their greed, revenge, and also just for fun. Here are some common techniques used by hackers you should know to protect yourself from being hacked or at-least use some preventive measures.
1. Bait and Switch
Using Bait and Switch the hackers buy advertisement space on any website and then create an eye-catching advertisement on the website’s page. Whenever a user comes to visit that website, most of the time user gets convinced to click on that advertisement due to its presentation to the user and the time user clicks on that advertisement he gets redirected to a malicious web page. This way hackers can install malicious code on the victim’s system and can steal user information.
2. Virus, Trojan, and Other Spyware
The attacker uses a virus, Trojan, and other malicious code and installs them on the victim’s computer to get unprivileged access. Virus and other Trojans keep sending data to the hacker regularly and can also perform various tasks on the victim’s system like sniffing your data and diverting traffic etc.
3. Cookie Theft
We use Browser to search for different websites and those websites store cookies in your browser. This includes our search history, some account passwords, and other useful information, When attacker gets on your browser’s cookie session then he can authenticate himself as you on a browser and then can conduct attacks. It’s always a best practice to periodically clear the search history and cache of your browser to ensure protection from such kinds of attacks.
4. Denial of Service
This hacking technique involves flooding the network with a huge amount of data packets to bring the system down. In this manner, users are unable to use the service due to the real-time crash of the system. Hacker uses too many requests to lower down the system so that the system cannot respond to the actual or original request from genuine users. Another attack called DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) is also used to fulfill the same purpose by using zombies or computers to flood the intended system, The number of data packets or requests used to fulfill the requirements of the attack increases if it fails every time. You should always use good anti-malware software and other security measures to make sure they are safe from these attacks.
5. Keylogger
A keylogger is simply software that is used to record key sequences and store the strokes of keys pressed on your keyboard to a file on your computer. These log files can contain some useful and sensitive data of the user that may be account information and different passwords. Check your computer regularly for this type of theft by using security tools and make sure to use a virtual keyboard while doing transactions if you have any suspects during login. It’s always a good practice to install good antivirus software that checks your system periodically for any virus and other suspects on your computer. Also, make sure your windows firewall is turned on for additional security of your system and do not respond to fraud e-mails and offers. Try installing software from a trusted and secured software provider and avoid doing transactions and exchange of other sensitive data using public Wi-Fi networks.
