Hacking, Hacker and Hacker Classes
Now, Let us learn about the following
- What is Hacking?
- Who is a Hacker?
- Types of Hackers i.e., Hacker Classes
Hacking:- Hacking can be defined as “exploiting the vulnerabilities to gain unauthorized access to the system” and involves “modifying system or application features” to pilfer the information from the systems.
Hacker:- Hacker is a someone, “who explores methods for breaching security defenses and exploiting the vulnerabilities in the system or a network”. The unique feature that hackers have is to create and explore computer’s software and hardware.
Now, let us discuss about hacker classes i.e., different types of hackers. There are “eleven” different hacker classes. The following are listed below
- Black Hat Hackers
- White Hat Hackers
- Gray Hat Hackers
- Blue Hat Hackers
- Red Hat Hackers
- Suicide Hackers
- Script Kiddies
- Cyber Terrorists
- State Sponsored Hackers
- Hacktivist
- Neophyte
Black Hat Hackers:- Black Hat Hackers are “the individuals who use their extraordinary computing skills for illegal or malicious purposes”. They are also called as crackers. Black Hat Hackers often involve in criminal activities. They release malware into the system that destroys files, steal passwords, credit card information, personal information, etc.
White Hat Hackers:- White Hat Hackers are “the individuals who use their hacking skills for defensive purposes”. They are also called as Ethical Hackers. Now-a-days, most of the organizations has white hat hackers as security analysts such that they perform penetration testing to ensure the security of an organization with the permission of the system owner.
Gray Hat Hackers:- Gray Hat Hackers are “the individuals who can work both offensively and defensively at various times”. They will fall between Black Hat Hackers and White Hat Hackers. The following is the advantage and disadvantage of Gray Hat Hackers.
- Disadvantage:- Helps in finding vulnerabilities of a system or a network to the Black Hat Hackers
- Advantage:- Helps in finding the vulnerabilities of a system or a network to the vendors to improve their software and hardware by checking limitations and making them more secure.
Blue Hat Hackers:- Blue Hat Hackers are “the individuals outside the computer security consulting firms who bug tests a system prior to its launch, looking for exploits” so that they can be closed. Blue Hat Hackers also refers to the security professional invited by Microsoft to find vulnerabilities in windows.
Red Hat Hackers:- Red Hat Hackers are “the individuals who launch aggressive attacks on black hat hackers to destroy their resources and bring their systems down”. Red Hat Hackers also called as eagle-eyed hackers.Red Hat Hackers intercept the black hat hackers and destroy them.
Suicide Hackers:- Suicide Hackers are “the individuals who bring down critical infrastructure” for a ‘cause’ and are not worried about facing jail terms or any other kind of punishment. These type of hackers are similar to suicide bombers and also not concerned about any further consequences.
Script Kiddies:- Script Kiddies are “the individuals who are unskilled uses scripts, tools, and software developed by others to compromise the systems or a network”. They are also called as Skiddie. Script Kiddies focus on quantity of attack but not on the quality of attack.
Cyber Terrorists:- Cyber Terrorists are “the individuals with a wide range of skills, motivated by political or religious beliefs to create fear of large-scale disruption of computer networks”. They use malware, phishing attacks, etc.
State Sponsored Hackers:- State Sponsored Hackers are “the individuals who are employed by the government” to penetrate and gain top-secret information and to damage information systems of other governments.
Hacktivist:- Hacktivists are “the individuals who break into the systems of government or an organization as an act of protest”. They use hacking to create awareness and announce a social, religious, ideological, or a political message. Most of the hacktivism involves in denial-of-service attacks.
Neophyte:- Neophyte are “the individuals who are new to hacking or phreaking and has almost no knowledge” or experience of the technology behind the hacking.
