What Is System Hacking?
System hacking is the practice of attempting to manipulate the normal behavior of a system, usually a computer system, to gain unauthorized access or perform unauthorized actions. It encompasses a range of activities, from simple password guessing to sophisticated attacks exploiting vulnerabilities in software or hardware.
In essence, system hacking is about exploiting weaknesses. These weaknesses could be in the system’s design, its implementation, or in the behaviors of its users. The ultimate goal of a system hacker is to gain control over the system, allowing them to execute commands, access confidential information, disrupt services, or perform other malicious activities.
However, it’s important to note that not all system hacking is malicious. In fact, a significant portion of system hacking is conducted by ethical hackers – professionals who use their skills to identify and fix vulnerabilities, rather than exploit them.
This is part of a series of articles about cyber attack
Ethical vs. Malicious Hacking
When it comes to system hacking, there are two main camps: ethical hackers and malicious hackers.
- Ethical hackers (white hat hackers): Use their skills and knowledge to improve system security. They work within the law, often being employed by organizations to test their systems and find vulnerabilities that could be exploited by malicious hackers.
- Malicious hackers (black hat hackers): Exploit vulnerabilities with the intention of causing harm or for personal gain. Their actions are illegal and harmful, leading to financial loss, damage to reputation, and even potential legal consequences for the victims.
However, the line between ethical and malicious hacking isn’t always clear-cut. For instance, some hackers are known as gray hat hackers. These individuals might break the law by hacking into systems without permission, but their intention is often to expose vulnerabilities and improve system security.
Stages of System Hacking
System hacking typically involves the following stages:
1. Reconnaissance
The first stage of system hacking is reconnaissance. This is the phase where the hacker gathers as much information as possible about the target system. This could involve researching the target’s infrastructure, identifying potential vulnerabilities, and understanding the system’s defenses.
2. Scanning
After the recognition stage, the hacker moves on to the scanning phase. This is where they actively probe the system to gather more detailed information. This could involve network scanning to identify open ports, vulnerability scanning to find weaknesses in the system’s defenses, or even social engineering tactics to trick users into revealing sensitive information.
The goal of the scanning stage is to find a way into the system. The information gathered during this stage is used to plan the attack, determining the most effective method to gain access.
3. Gaining Access
Once a potential entry point has been identified, the hacker moves on to the gaining access stage. This is where they attempt to exploit the identified vulnerabilities to gain unauthorized access to the system.
The techniques used during this stage can vary widely, depending on the specific vulnerability being exploited. For instance, a hacker might use a software exploit to take advantage of a flaw in the system’s code, a brute force attack to guess a weak password, or a social media attack to trick a human user into divulging their credentials.
4. Maintaining Access
After gaining access to the system, the hacker’s next goal is to maintain their access, also known as persistence. This could involve installing a backdoor to allow them to easily re-enter the system, or escalating their privileges to ensure they have the necessary permissions to carry out their intended actions.
Maintaining access is crucial for a hacker, as it allows them to continue exploiting the system even if their initial entry point is closed. It also allows them to remain undetected, as they can carry out their actions without alerting the system’s administrators.
At this stage, the hacker will carry out their primary attack, for example exfiltrating sensitive data or stealing funds.
5. Clearing Tracks
The final stage of system hacking is clearing tracks. This is where the hacker disengages and attempts to remove any evidence of their activities.
Clearing tracks could involve deleting log files, altering timestamps, and using obfuscation techniques to hide their activities. This stage is crucial for a hacker, as it helps them avoid detection and potential legal consequences.
Common System Hacking Techniques
While there are countless techniques hackers use to gain unauthorized access to a system, these are some of the most common.
Password Cracking
Password cracking involves obtaining a user’s password to gain unauthorized access to a system. There are several ways to do this, including:
- Brute force attacks: Involve trying all possible combinations of characters until the correct password is found. This method can be time-consuming and requires significant computational power, but it’s often successful given enough time.
- Dictionary attacks: Involves the use of a dictionary of common passwords or phrases. The hacker systematically tries each entry in the hope that the user has used a common or easily guessable password.
- Rainbow tables: Involves pre-computing the hashes for possible passwords and storing them in a ‘rainbow table’. This allows a hacker to quickly look up the hash of a stolen password and find the original password.
Phishing
Phishing is a technique where attackers masquerade as a trustworthy entity to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords, and credit card details. This is typically carried out using email or a messaging service, where the attacker tricks the recipient into opening a malicious link, or directly sending the sensitive information by return message.
An effective phishing attempt will appear to be from a reliable source, such as a well-known company or a trusted individual. The message will often create a sense of urgency, prompting the recipient to act quickly without scrutinizing the message too closely. Techniques used in phishing include:
- Spear phishing: Targets specific individuals or organizations and is often more personalized to increase the likelihood of the recipient’s compliance.
- Whaling: A specialized form of phishing that specifically targets high-profile individuals like executives or those with significant access within an organization.
- Clone phishing: Involves creating a nearly identical replica of a legitimate message that the recipient has previously received, but with malicious links or attachments.
Rootkits and Trojans
Rootkits and trojans are malicious software programs that give hackers remote control over a system without the user’s knowledge.
Rootkits can hide their presence and activities from users and system administrators. They can provide a hacker with administrative access to a system, allowing them to install other malware, steal data, or use the system for other malicious activities.
Trojans appear as legitimate software or files but contain malicious code. Once installed, they can give a hacker control over a system, allowing them to steal data, spy on the user, or use the system as part of a botnet.
Buffer Overflows
Buffer overflow involves overloading a buffer within a system’s memory with more data than it’s designed to handle. This can cause the system to crash or allow a hacker to execute arbitrary code.
There are two main types of buffer overflows:
- Stack-based overflows are the most common and involve overloading the stack, a region of memory used for storing temporary data.
- Heap-based overflows target the heap, a region of memory used for dynamic memory allocation.
To exploit a buffer overflow, a hacker needs to find a vulnerability in a program that allows them to write data to a buffer without bounds checking. Once they’ve found such a vulnerability, they can craft a specific input that causes the buffer to overflow and potentially allows them to remotely execute code.
Keyloggers
Keyloggers are a type of spyware that records a user’s keystrokes. Hackers often use them to steal sensitive information such as usernames, passwords, credit card numbers, and other personal information.
There are two main types of keyloggers: hardware and software. Hardware keyloggers are physical devices that are attached to a computer, often between the keyboard and the computer. Software keyloggers are programs that run on a computer and record keystrokes.
Privilege Escalation
Privilege escalation involves a hacker gaining higher levels of access to a system than originally intended, often with the goal of gaining full control. There are two main types of privilege escalation:
- Vertical privilege escalation: A hacker starts with a low-level account and exploits a vulnerability to gain a higher-level account, such as an administrator account.
- Horizontal privilege escalation: A hacker uses their existing account level to access resources that should be off-limits. For example, they might gain access to another user’s account at the same level but with different permissions.
System Hacking: Countermeasures and Protection
Here are some of the measures organizations can take to protect themselves from malicious system hacking:
- Software updates and patching: Cybercriminals often exploit known vulnerabilities in software to gain unauthorized access to systems. Software developers regularly release updates and patches to fix these vulnerabilities, but they are only effective if they are installed. Organizations should perform regular updates and patching for operating systems and all software applications, especially web browsers.
- Firewalls and Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS): A firewall is a network security device that monitors and controls incoming and outgoing network traffic based on predetermined security rules, and can block malicious traffic. IDS monitor network traffic for suspicious activity and send alerts when they detect potential attacks. They can detect a wide range of threats, including malware, botnets, and denial-of-service attacks.
- Multi-factor Authentication (MFA): MFA requires users to provide two or more independent credentials to authenticate their identity. These credentials can be something the user knows (like a password), something the user has (like a security token or a smartphone), or something the user is (like a fingerprint or other biometric data). This makes it much more difficult for hackers to gain unauthorized access.
- Regular system audits: During a system audit, an auditor examines the system’s controls, policies, and procedures to ensure they are properly implemented and effective in preventing unauthorized access. Regular audits can help identify vulnerabilities before hackers do, allowing organizations to fix them and reduce their risk of a cyber attack.
- Security awareness and training: Despite the best technical defenses, human error or carelessness is still a leading cause of security breaches. Security awareness and training involves educating employees about cybersecurity risks and how to recognize and respond to potential threats. This can include training on how to recognize phishing emails, how to create strong passwords, and how to safely use social media and other online services.
Malicious Hacking Protection with Imperva
Imperva provides a Web Application Firewall, which prevents attacks with world-class analysis of web traffic to your applications.
Beyond the WAF, Imperva provides comprehensive protection for applications, APIs, and microservices:
Runtime Application Self-Protection (RASP) – Real-time attack detection and prevention from your application runtime environment goes wherever your applications go. Stop external attacks and injections and reduce your vulnerability backlog.
API Security – Automated API protection ensures your API endpoints are protected as they are published, shielding your applications from exploitation.
Advanced Bot Protection – Prevent business logic attacks from all access points – websites, mobile apps and APIs. Gain seamless visibility and control over bot traffic to stop online fraud through account takeover or competitive price scraping.
DDoS Protection – Block attack traffic at the edge to ensure business continuity with guaranteed uptime and no performance impact. Secure your on premises or cloud-based assets – whether you’re hosted in AWS, Microsoft Azure, or Google Public Cloud.
Attack Analytics – Ensures complete visibility with machine learning and domain expertise across the application security stack to reveal patterns in the noise and detect application attacks, enabling you to isolate and prevent attack campaigns.
Client-Side Protection – Gain visibility and control over third-party JavaScript code to reduce the risk of supply chain fraud, prevent data breaches, and client-side attacks.
