Introduction

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The first "hackers" emerged from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1969. The term originally described members of a model train group who would "hack" the electric trains to increase the speed of their trains.

Today, the term has quite a different meaning. When people think of computer hackers, they think of computer experts who are adept at reverse engineering computer systems. They might think of malicious hackers who aspire to break into networks to destroy or steal data, or of ethical hackers who are hired to test the security of a network. Often, these ethical hackers, or penetration testers, mimic the same techniques as a malicious hacker.

The need for penetration testing is simple. The best way to stop a criminal is to think the way a criminal thinks. It is not enough to install burglar alarms and fences and assume that you are safe from burglary; to effectively stop a burglar, you must predict the moves a burglar would make. Likewise, to prevent against malicious hackers, you must think like a malicious hacker. One of the best ways that companies are assessing their security against attacks is by hiring outside security firms to attempt to penetrate their networks.

Companies are no longer falling victim to the "Titanic" syndrome. When the Titanic was built, its engineers never thought the ship would sink; companies now realize that just because their staff stamps their approval that the network is secure, you just do not know for sure until it is tested.

This book arises out of this need to know how to perform a thorough and accurate assessment of the network security for an organization. Although other books describe some of the tools that malicious hackers use, no book offered a definitive resource for penetration testers to know how to perform a full security assessment of a computer network for an organization. This book is written to fill this need.

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    Penetration Testing and Network Defense
    Penetration Testing and Network Defense
    ISBN: 1587052083
    EAN: 2147483647
    Year: 2005
    Pages: 209

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