Book Review - Hacking: The Art of Exploitation

The general public today would not think of hacking (that is the black hat hacking or better called security crackers) as an art form. I would submit that it is an ingenious art form, an art form that requires expertise, crafting, and practice. Like painters or musicians, you have those that dabble in the art form, not ever really perfecting it. Then you have those that push the boundaries, opening up a whole new appreciation or even genre. In my research of hackers and crackers, I came across Jon Erickson’s book, Hacking: The Art of Exploitation and found a master of  in the art of exploitation.

Author

With a formal education in computer science, Jon Erickson has been programming and hacking since he was 5 and speaks around the world on computer security regularly. He wrote the book Hacking: The Art of Exploitation in 2003, and it was revised in 2008 in a second edition. Erickson is currently working in Northern California as a computer security specialist and vulnerability researcher.

The book

This book received 4 stars on Amazon and 4.1 stars on gooreads.com.

Both easy to read and clear on explaining how computer hacking works, Hacking: The Art of Exploitation at the very least will give you a great respect for those that understand the inner workings of technology. The 2^nd edition opens up with a clear statement against illegal hacking. Erickson stresses following the law, and he does not condone hacking that is used in the end for wrong reasons.

The book encourages you to be creative, think outside the box, and use the knowledge of hacking to protect your own personal computer against network attacks. This is not a book on how to run existing exploits, but rather, gives you an understanding on how these exploits work. The book is intended to give you the foundation needed to really push the envelope and advance technology by finding the weaknesses within the technology and encouraging you to be creative. The book will give you an understanding of network communications, machine architecture, programming, and hacking techniques.

A closer look

• Program computers using C, assembly language, and shell scripts
• Corrupt system memory to run arbitrary code using buffer overflows and format strings Inspect processor registers and system memory with a debugger to gain a real understanding of what is happening
• Outsmart common security measures like nonexecutable stacks and intrusion detection systems
• Gain access to a remote server using port-binding or connect-back shellcode, and alter a server's logging behavior to hide your presence
• Redirect network traffic, conceal open ports, and hijack TCP connections
• Crack encrypted wireless traffic using the FMS attack, and speed up brute-force attacks using a password probability matrix

List taken from amazon.com

http://books.google.com/books/about/Hacking.html?id=0FW3DMNhl1EC

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61619.Hacking

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacking:_The_Art_of_Exploitation