A Technical Seminar Report

on
“ETHICAL HACKING”

DRONACHARYA COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING

KHENTAWAS (GURGAON)
AFFILIATED TO MAHARISHI DAYANAND UNIVERSITY,
ROHTAK
APPROVED BY A.I.C.T.E

Submitted By:-

Name : - Sanjay Kumar

Roll No. : - 10101
Branch : - CSE-II(A)
Sem : - VIII
ABSTRACT
Today more and more softwares are developing and people are getting
more and more options in their present softwares. But many are not aware that they
are being hacked without their knowledge. One reaction to this state of affairs is a
behavior termed “Ethical Hacking" which attempts to pro-actively increase security
protection by identifying and patching known security vulnerabilities on systems owned
by other parties.
A good ethical hacker should know the methodology chosen by the hacker
like reconnaissance, host or target scanning, gaining access, maintaining access
and clearing tracks. For ethical hacking we should know about the various tools and
methods that can be used by a black hat hacker apart from the methodology used by him.

From the point of view of the user one should know at least some of these
because some hackers make use of those who are not aware of the various hacking
methods to hack into a system. Also when thinking from the point of view of the
developer, he also should be aware of these since he should be able to close holes in his
software even with the usage of the various tools. With the advent of new tools the
hackers may make new tactics. But at least the software will be resistant to some of the
tools.
INTRODUCTION

Ethical hacking also known as penetration testing or

white-hat hacking, involves the same tools, tricks, and techniques that hackers use, but
with one major difference that Ethical hacking is legal. Ethical hacking is performed with
the target’s permission. The intent of ethical hacking is to discover vulnerabilities from a
hacker’s viewpoint so systems can be better secured. It’s part of an overall information
risk management program that allows for ongoing security improvements. Ethical
hacking can also ensure that vendors’ claims about the security of their products are
legitimate.

Security:
Security is the condition of being protected against danger or loss. In the
general sense, security is a concept similar to safety. In the case of networks the
security is also called the information security. Information security means protecting
information and information systems from unauthorized access, use, disclosure,
disruption, modification, or destruction

Need for Security:

Computer security is required because most organizations can be damaged
by hostile software or intruders. There may be several forms of damage which are
obviously interrelated which are produced by the intruders. These include:
● lose of confidential data
● Damage or destruction of data
● Damage or destruction of computer system
● Loss of reputation of a company
Hacking
Eric Raymond, compiler of “The New Hacker's Dictionary”, defines a hacker
as a clever programmer. A "good hack" is a clever solution to a programming
problem and "hacking" is the act of doing it. Raymond lists five possible
characteristics that qualify one as a hacker, which we paraphrase here:
● A person who enjoys learning details of a programming language or system
● A person who enjoys actually doing the programming rather than just
theorizing about it
● A person capable of appreciating someone else's hacking
● A person who picks up programming quickly
● A person who is an expert at a particular programming language or system

Types of Hackers:
Hackers can be broadly classified on the basis of why they are hacking system or why the
are indulging hacking. There are mainly three types of hacker on this basis

● Black-Hat Hacker
A black hat hackers or crackers are individuals with extraordinary
computing skills, resorting to malicious or destructive activities. That is black hat
hackers use their knowledge and skill for their own personal gains probably by hurting
others
.
● White-Hat Hacker
White hat hackers are those individuals professing hacker skills and using
them for defensive purposes. This means that the white hat hackers use their knowledge
and skill for the good of others and for the common good.

● Grey-Hat Hackers
These are individuals who work both offensively and defensively at
various times. We cannot predict their behaviour. Sometimes they use their skills for the
common good while in some other times he uses them for their personal gains.

Social
Engineering

Automated
Organizational Attacks
Attacks

Restric
ted
Data

Accidental Breaches
in Security
Denial of
Viruses, Trojan Horses, Service (DoS)
and Worms

Different kinds of system attacks

ETHICAL HACKING
• Ethical hacking – defined as “a methodology adopted by ethical hackers to
discover the vulnerabilities existing in information systems’ operating
environments.”
• With the growth of the Internet, computer security has become a major concern
for businesses and governments.
• In their search for a way to approach the problem, organizations came to realize
that one of the best ways to evaluate the intruder threat to their interests would be
to have independent computer security professionals attempt to break into their
computer systems.

What do an Ethical Hacker do?

An ethical hacker is a person doing ethical hacking that is he is a security personal

who tries to penetrate in to a network to find if there is some vulnerability in the system.
An ethical hacker will always have the permission to enter into the target network. An
ethical hacker will first think with a mindset of a hacker who tries to get in to the system.
He will first find out what an intruder can see or what
others can see. Finding these an ethical hacker will try to get into the system with that
information in whatever method he can. If he succeeds in penetrating into the system then
he will report to the company with a detailed report about the particular
vulnerability exploiting which he got in to the system. He may also sometimes make
patches for that particular vulnerability or he may suggest some methods to
prevent the vulnerability.

Required Skills of an Ethical Hacker:

• Microsoft: skills in operation, configuration and management.
• Linux: knowledge of Linux/Unix; security setting, configuration, and services.
• Firewalls: configurations, and operation of intrusion detection systems.
• Routers: knowledge of routers, routing protocols, and access control lists
• Mainframes
• Network Protocols: TCP/IP; how they function and can be manipulated.
• Project Management: leading, planning, organizing, and controlling a penetration
testing team.

HISTORY HIGHLIGHTS:
In one early ethical hack, the United States Air Force conducted a
“security evaluation” of the Multics operating systems for “potential use as a two-level
(secret/top secret) system.” With the growth of computer networking, and of the Internet
in particular, computer and network vulnerability studies began to appear outside of the
military establishment. Most notable of these was the work by Farmer and Venema,
which was originally posted to Usenet in December of 1993.

ETHICAL HACKING COMMANDMENTS:

Every ethical hacker must abide by a few basic commandments. If not, bad things can
happen. The commandments are as follows:
• Working ethically:
must support the company’s goals. No The word ethical in this context can be
defined as working with high professional morals and principles. Everything you do
as an ethical hacker must be aboveboard and hidden agendas are allowed!
Trustworthiness is the ultimate tenet. The misuse of information is absolutely
forbidden.
• Respecting privacy:
Treat the information gathered with the utmost respect. All information you
obtain during your testing — from Web-application log files to clear-text
passwords — must be kept private. If you sense that someone should know there’s a
problem, consider sharing that information with the appropriate manager.

• Not crashing your systems:

One of the biggest mistakes hackers try to hack their own sys-
tems is inadvertently crashing their systems. The main reason for this is poor
planning. These testers have not read the documentation or misunderstand the usage
and power of the security tools and techniques.

Methodology of Hacking:
As described above there are mainly five steps in hacking like
reconnaissance, scanning, gaining access, maintaining access and clearing tracks. But it is
not the end of the process. The actual hacking will be a circular one. Once the hacker
completed the five steps then the hacker will start reconnaissance in that stage and the
preceding stages to get in to the next level.The various stages in the hacking methodology
are
● Reconnaissance
● Scanning & Enumeration
● Gaining access
● Maintaining access
● Clearing tracks

Reconnaissance:
The literal meaning of the word reconnaissance means a preliminary survey to gain
information. This is also known as foot-printing. This is the first stage in the
methodology of hacking. As given in the analogy, this is the stage in which the hacker
collects information about the company which the personal is going to hack. This is one
of the pre-attacking phases. Reconnaissance refers to the preparatory phase where an
attacker learns about all of the possible attack vectors that can be used in their plan.
Scanning & Enumeration:
Scanning is the second phase in the hacking methodology in which the hacker tries to
make a blue print of the target network. It is similar to a thief going through your
neighborhood and checking every door and window on each house to see which ones are
open and which ones are locked. The blue print includes the ip addresses of the target
network which are live, the services which are running on those system and so on.
Usually the services run on predetermined ports.There are different tools used for
scanning war dialing and pingers were used earlier but now a days both could be detected
easily and hence are not in much use. Modern port scanning uses TCP protocol to do
scanning and they could even detect the operating systems running on the
particular hosts.

Enumeration:
Enumeration is the ability of a hacker to convince some servers to give them
information that is vital to them to make an attack. By doing this the hacker aims to find
what resources and shares can be found in the system, what valid user account and user
groups are there in the network, what applications will be there etc. Hackers may use this
also to find other hosts in the entire network.

Gaining access:
This is the actual hacking phase in which the hacker gains access to the
system. The hacker will make use of all the information he collected in the pre-
attacking phases. Usually the main hindrance to gaining access to a system is the
passwords. System hacking can be considered as many steps. First the hacker will try to
get in to the system. Once he get in to the system the next thing he want will be to
increase his privileges so that he can have more control over the system. As a normal user
the hacker may not be able to see the confidential details or cannot upload or run the
different hack tools for his own personal interest. Another way to crack in to a system is
by the attacks like man in the middle attack.
• Password Cracking:
There are many methods for cracking the password and then get in to
the system. The simplest method is to guess the password. But this is a tedious work.
But in order to make this work easier there are many automated tools for
password guessing like legion. Legion actually has an inbuilt dictionary in it and the
software will automatically. That is the software it self generates the
password using the dictionary and will check the responses.
Techniques used in password cracking are:
• Dictionary cracking
Brute force cracking
Hybrid cracking
Social engineering

• Privilege escalation:
Privilege escalation is the process of raising the privileges once the
hacker gets in to the system. That is the hacker may get in as an ordinary user. And
now he tries to increase his privileges to that of an administrator who can do many
things. There are many types of tools available for this. There are some tools like
getadmin attaches the user to some kernel routine so that the services run by the user
look like a system routine rather than user initiated program. The privilege
escalation process usually uses the vulnerabilities present in the host operating system
or the software. There are many tools like hk.exe, metasploit etc. One such
community of hackers is the metasploit.

Maintaining Access:
Now the hacker is inside the system by some means by password guessing or
exploiting some of it’s vulnerabilities. This means that he is now in a position to
upload some files and download some of them. The next aim will be to make an
easier path to get in when he comes the next time. This is analogous to making a small
hidden door in the building so that he can directly enter in to the building through the
door easily. In the network scenario the hacker will do it by uploading
some softwares like Trojan horses, sniffers , key stroke loggers etc.

Clearing Tracks :
Now we come to the final step in the hacking. There is a
saying that “everybody knows a good hacker but nobody knows a great hacker”. This
means that a good hacker can always clear tracks or any record that they may be present
in the network to prove that he was here. Whenever a hacker downloads some file or
installs some software, its log will be stored in the server logs. So in order to erase
those the hacker uses man tools. One such tool is windows resource kit’s auditpol.exe.
This is a command line tool with which the intruder can easily disable auditing. Another
tool which eliminates any physical evidence is the evidence eliminator. Sometimes apart
from the server logs some other in formations may be stored temporarily. The Evidence
Eliminator deletes all such evidences.

Ethical hacking tools:

Ethical hackers utilize and have developed variety of tools to intrude into
different kinds of systems and to evaluate the security levels. The nature of these tools
differ widely. Here we describe some of the widely used tools in ethical hacking.
• Samspade:
Samspade is a simple tool which provides us information about a particular
host. This tool is very much helpful in finding the addresses, phone numbers etc
The above represents the GUI of the samspade tool. In the text field in the top left
corner of the window we just need to put the address of the particular host. Then we
can find out various information available. The information given may be phone
numbers, contact names, IP addresses, email ids, address range etc. We may think
that what is the benefit of getting the phone numbers, email ids, addresses etc.
But one of the best ways to get information about a company is to just pick up the
phone and ask the details. Thus we can get much information in just one click.

• Email Tracker and Visual Route:

We often used to receive many spam messages in our mail box. We
don’t know where it comes from. Email tracker is a software which helps us to find
from which server does the mail actually came from. Every message we receive will
have a header associated with it. The email tracker uses this header information for
find the location.
The above fig 2.2 shows the GUI of the email tracker software. One of the
options in the email tracker is to import the mail header. In this software we just need
to import the mails header to it. Then the software finds from which area that mail
comes from. That is we will get information like from which region does the
message come from like Asia pacific, Europe etc. To be more specific we can use
another tool visual route to pinpoint the actual location of the server. The option of
connecting to visual route is available in the email tracker. Visual route is a tool
which displays the location a particular server with the help of IP addresses.
When we connect this with the email tracker we can find the server which actually
sends the mail. We can use this for finding the location of servers of targets also
visually in a map
The above fig 2.3 depicts the GUI of the visual route tool. The visual route GUI have
a world map drawn to it. The software will locate the position of the server in that
world map. It will also depict the path though which the message came to our system.
This software will actually provide us with information about the routers through
which the message or the path traced by the mail from the source to the
Destination.
Some other important tools used are:
• War Dialing
• Pingers
• Super Scan
• Nmap etc…

Reporting:
Assess your results to see what you uncovered, assuming that the vulnerabilities
haven’t been made obvious before now. This is where knowledge counts. Evaluating the
results and correlating the specific vulnerabilities discovered is a skill that gets better
with experience. You’ll end up knowing your systems as well as anyone else. This makes
the evaluation process much simpler moving forward. Submit a formal report to upper
management or to your customer, outlining your results

Advantages and disadvantages:

Ethical hacking nowadays is the backbone of network security. Each day its
relevance is increasing,the major pros & cons of ethical hacking are given below:
Advantages
• “To catch a thief you have to think like a thief”
• Helps in closing the open holes in the system network
• Provides security to banking and financial establishments
• Prevents website defacements
• An evolving technique
Disadvantages
• All depends upon the trustworthiness of the ethical hacker
• Hiring professionals is expensive.

Future enhancements:
 As it an evolving branch the scope of enhancement in technology is
immense. No ethical hacker can ensure the system security by using
the same technique repeatedly. He would have to improve, develop
and explore new avenues repeatedly.
 More enhanced softwares should be used for optimum protection. Tools
used, need to be updated regularly and more efficient ones need to be
developed

Conclusion
One of the main aims of the seminar is to make others understand that there are so many
tools through which a hacker can get in to a system. Let’s check its various needs from
various perspectives.
● Student
A student should understand that no software is made with zero
Vulnerabilities. So while they are studying they should study the various possibilities and
should study how to prevent that because they are the professionals of tomorrow.
● Professionals
Professionals should understand that business is directly related to
Security. So they should make new software with vulnerabilities as less as possible. If
they are not aware of these then they won’t be cautious enough in security matters.
In the preceding sections we saw the methodology of hacking, why should we aware
of hacking and some tools which a hacker may use. Now we can see what we can do
against hacking or to protect ourselves from hacking.
● The first thing we should do is to keep ourselves updated about those
softwares we and using for official and reliable sources.
● Educate the employees and the users against black hat hacking.
● Use every possible security measures like Honey pots, Intrusion Detection Systems,
Firewalls etc.
● every time make our password strong by making it harder and longer to be cracked.