As technology advances, crime related to it also moves ahead. It is not enough to use a firewall and anti-virus to protect our computers. Even strong passwords can only protect you to a certain extent. Hackers, in today’s scenario, use cutting-edge technology to hack into our digital systems. As a defensive response to that problem, relying on old methods will not suffice. We must learn to think like hackers to defeat hackers. Have you ever heard of Certified ethical hackers or CEH course professionals? They are one of the major defense strategies we possess, to safeguard our systems from the wrath of cyber crime. 

White hat hackers are those professionals who are qualified to think like a hacker through their ethical hacking training. And there is a reason for that. There is no stronger defense strategy than climbing into the shoes of your enemies and attempting to attack yourself, with the aim of finding the loopholes and weaknesses of your own defense and correcting them as a precautionary measure. This article will take you into the mind of a hacker and enable you to see his/her process of a successful attack.

Reconnaissance

Gathering information, also known as reconnaissance, is the art of getting to know as much about your target as you can. There are many sources that allow you to perform OSINT (open source intelligence). A hacker can be present inside or outside your organisation. If present inside, a hacker will have knowledge of almost everything in your organisation that could benefit him in the hacking process. If present outside the organisation, a hacker can gain access to crucial information by spying on employees, using social engineering tools and other reconnaissance methods. 

Scanning

Scanning is also known as enumeration. To think like a hacker, you need to plan how you will attack an organisation. You need to know what operating systems, network architecture and ports it uses. This phase is of crucial importance to a hacker as it leads to the next step where the actual exploitation takes place. Scanning can be of ports, networks and vulnerabilities, each of which will help obtain useful insights about weaknesses of the target. 

Exploitation

This phase is where the real action happens. If you are thinking like a hacker and have found out about open ports, network hosts and vulnerabilities from the above steps, then you can move one step ahead and try to attempt trespassing in the target system. For this, you can try accessing the system using stolen credentials or SQL injections. Entering a guarded system requires authorisation, in the absence of which a hacker tries to circumvent his way around the fences, for example, entering through a backdoor.

Maintaining access

The next step in the train of thought of a hacker is maintaining access. This is the second part of the exploitation process, and holds crucial importance as well. After a hacker has entered a protected system, he/she will need to escalate their privileges and rights so that they are able to manipulate the system and upload their malicious code (payload) in order to fulfil their ultimate criminal motive. Gaining root access (through a bug or some other software loophole) while also evading detection is included in this step.

Clearing tracks

The last step in the hacker’s mind is to clear the crime scene. For legal as well as convenience reasons, a hacker tries to clear all his/her tracks from the victim system. This includes deleting the event logs, command history and other important evidence. Hackers also clear their tracks so that the victim remains in dark about how the hacker breached the system in the first place, leading to a weaker defense in the future.