How are hackers able to find such complicated exploits?
In: Technology
In short: Weaponized Autism..
In some cases it is aided by specialized computer programs that look for flaws, but in nearly all cases it is smart people who are maddingly focused on things that aren’t right – and computer programs and logic aren’t ever ‘right’ (in truth 95% of all exploits are just variations on a common flawed concepts in how developers code and how people actually apply logic). There is also a dash of just wanting to know how things really work.
Source: my prior life running exploit development teams.
Time. Speaking from personal experience all you need is time and will, Russian, Chinese etc. hackers have plenty of both. The digital world is a complicated place and there are a lot of potential exploits – the whitehat has to cover them all, whereas the blackhat only needs to find one. But honestly most hacks are not actually that difficult, people just leave doors open either out of laziness or ignorance. I can’t even count the times I have been at major companies and I asked “Are you really doing this? You know it can be exploited by a semi intelligent teenager.” Yet it didn’t change. They always close the barn door after the horse gets out.
Usually they aren’t complicated.
Think of a house. It has 2 formal doors to get in or out. There are windows. There might be a secret basement that you get to from the backyard. But how do you get into the house? You could just be invited in. You could falsify a profession that gets you in. You could observe, notice they throw huge parties where no one can possibly know everyone, and you act like you’re someone’s friend in there.
Now for the seemingly more complicated stuff: imagine someone has a huge house that they keep building and improving. They probably use blueprints for different parts of it. Now there are soooooo many doors and windows you could get in through. You could probably buy or even just find out common weakpoints in such a cookie cutter house online. At that point you’d just need to research all of them and try all of them.
…Or just go the easy route and have someone invite you in.
Looking for the weakest link and going from there. Whether that link be fooling a naive person or a poor decision made when creating the security system.
1. They’re smart. They understand the possible weak points of the system. 2. They stumbled upon it. 3. A developer told them 9f a possible exploit.
I’ve worked in IT for almost a decade.
I started learning about computers by breaking, them, taking them apart and eventually hacking them. A computer is a complicated device. Someone figured out how to take a bunch of electrons and convert that into binary which converts into code which runs programs to do complicated things.
By tinkering around with the software and hardware, I learned how to make the computer do or say something via a pop-up to another computer. Eventually I learned about how a computer was connected to other computers and how I can access those through my computer. Eventually you want to find what someone is hiding on a computer even though they don’t want you to see it because its password encrypted.
That’s all that hacking is. Rebellious curiosity.
The kinds of exploit you are talking about are only complicated because you don’t know or understand how computers work but once you get a general idea, you start to see the faults and learn to focus on those.
Because they spend years learning how to code, and how to code correctly. There is no way to keep data 100 percent secure, no password, no matter how long and complicated that can’t be brute forced with enough computing power. Basically, if you know how to code, how that code is read, and how it makes the processor process it and execute what the code says, you can do anything within reason. Because a computer is going to do what it is told, if it is told the right way, every time.
I’m not a hacker by any means. I’m not a programmer. But I can find exploits easy. I’m not going to give out my secrets on finding anything. But I don’t find computer exploits. I find business/human exploits.
But look for the obvious things first. Then check the even more obvious. Then check what has changed from last version to the version they are running. Then study other factors. Study hard. You’ll find a way in.
How bout those dumb games on Facebook, name your favorite place? Are you old enough to remember this? Etc. They are all bots farming your data and AI putting together a profile on you.
The best way to look at the exploit process is to look at examples.
A couple of great books to read (I did the audio books) for how the end to end exploit process works in some real world examples are Sandstorm (First state sponsored (allegedly Russia) cyber attack on civilian infrastructure (Ukrainian power plants), countdown to zero day (Stuxnet – attack of Iranian centrifuges and first state sponsored attack crossing boundaries from cyber world to the physical world). Another great audio book on a 50k foot view on the history of espionage that puts a lot of global events into context is Cyberspies by Gordon Corera.
Latest Answers