Customer Reviews

Hack Attacks Encyclopedia: A Complete History of Hacks, Cracks, Phreaks, and Spies over Time

5 star:		(32)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

"We're sure someone's thought of this idea before, but it took John Chirillo to pull it off: an encyclopedia of 30 years of hacks, cracks, phreaks, and related endeavors. Yes, there's now a single authoritative reference for all of it.

Hack Attacks Encyclopedia starts back in the mists of time, chronicling John Draper's long-distance telephony adventures as Captain Crunch (that is, before he wrote Easy Writer, the original IBM PC word processor). If you were too young for the '60s or early '70s, Chirillo quotes some anarchist texts that put you right in the spirit. His timelines and narratives then take you through "the golden age" (1980-1989); "the great hacker war" (1990-1994); the age of "zero tolerance" (1994-1999), and beyond the millennium.

Of course, the heart of the book isn't the narrative. Together, the book and CD-ROM assemble nearly 2,000 historic texts, program files, code snippets, and hacking/security tools -- files as old as the '70s and as new as tomorrow's headlines. You name it: password programs, Unix/Linux scripts, remote hacks for Windows systems, scanners, sniffers, spoofers, flooders, keystroke capture programs, virus hacks -- not just one variation but many. A veritable cornucopia of digital anarchy. (Bill Camarda)"

Well constructed text all about cyberculture and the dark underside of security. Within I found writings by Cap'n Crunch (famous phreaker), Justin Peterson, Kevin Mitnick (hacker celebrity), Kevin Poulsen (aka. Dark Dante), L0pht and Masters of Deception (famous hacking groups), Mixter (author of Targa and TFN), and Robert T. Morris, just to name a few. To think there's much more in here makes this book hands down the best title on infosec available today.

Revealed gave me a good understanding of the network security. This is the first book I've ever read from the Wiley series. I now know where to turn if I want to get going on something fast. In conclusion this book might not make you a master at hacking but if you want a good foundation and methodoligal approach, take a look.
Denied is the second part to Hack Attacks Revealed, over 500 pages, whose value is in the patches for all the security holes illustrated in the first book. The CD is loaded with compiled programs for securing systems, building firewalling devices, and secure browsing, telnet, ftp, chat, and mail. Again, there are extensive walkthroughs which makes it unique in this category.
Encyclopedia is something completely different. The book is a look at hacking and cracking and phreaking and some I haven't the title for, all from different user submissions from all over the globe. I rated high Revealed and Denied, but this book is much better organzied and a pleasure to read.

In the past we've been full of praise for the two others books in this series. It's now been joined by another, called Hack Attacks Encyclopedia. If you want to know all there is to know from hackers of the 70s, 80s, and 90s, check it out!

Most computer-security textbooks approach the subject from a single point of view. In contrast, Hack Attacks Encyclopedia talks about almost every security topic from thousands of view points. That's right, the book is like "60-Minutes Goes Underground"-there are documentaries from past and present hacker's; actual texts, e-mail, articles-a HUGE collection, some dating back to Cap'n Crunch and other legends. Really an excellent composition of "just the facts"-excerpts from before the 70's to the Millennium. 5 Stars for the research that went into this text, and the kicker...the COMPLETE text containing each excerpt is organized on the CD. It will literally take me months to get through all this history!

When it comes to hacking, Hack Attacks Encyclopedia has everything you need to know about. A great resource on REAL researching, OS vulnerabilities, network security, internet user security, home pc and network security software, and more.

For me, visual images and literature are so closely related they can at times be almost indistinguishable. Perhaps this is a form of `synaesthesia'? No matter; the fact remains that the different types of writing mingle together in this book, almost inextricably in my mind, create a three-dimensional solid work. From this I know that a tremendous amount of research and planning went into this book. I've been waiting twelve years for an anthology like this of e-zine, BBS, and web postings. The industry sorely needs manuscripts of true events and collections from actual "doers". What a great start this is. The author did an excellent job, bringing us to the front lines of the hacker movement, creating for us a complete battleground of the cyber-underground.

This book covers everything-security from Prehistory (before 1969), Elder Days (1970-1979), The Golden Age (1980-1989), The Great Hacker War (1990-1994, Zero Tolerance (1994-1999), to the Early Millennium (Resurrection of Tiger Teams). I was relieved that it doesn't glorify "Hacks, Cracks, Phreaks, and Spies" but exposes only the real facts of each.

More than ever before, you will be fascinated by the first-hand account of documented hack attacks in this book. Does history repeat itself? Find out in this master encyclopedic reference of hacking texts. I hope to see more in this series.

The third book in the Hack Attacks series is unlike the first two as a unique text full of surprises. The book is exactly what the author said it would be, "A Complete History of Hacks, Cracks, Phreaks, and Spies Over Time". There are exploits in here, e-mails from hackers, crackers, and phreakers, designs and documents written by well known hackers from every crack in the world. An excellent reference for anyone to enjoy.