The Art of Intrusion

May 10, 2008 @ 18:48 | In Books, Hacking | | del.icio.us digg devbump rss
The Art of Intrusion book image

The Art of Intrusion
Author: Kevin D. Mitnick & William L. Simon
Pages: 349
Published: 2005

Kevin Mitnick is one of the most famous hackers in the world. In the 80’s he was able to break the most secured systems and computers getting lot of private information. In 1995, with lot of controversy, he was arrested.

After five years in prison and as a logical maturation process, he changed sides and became a computer security consultant. A “white” hacker.

This book is about “real” hacking stories that have been contrasted by Mitnick himself. Although all the stories are presented as real, all the relevant details are altered so that nobody can try the same hack again.

This book got to my hands, months ago, while I was in a library. A first look at the book revealed interesting technical details of each episode and lots of external web links with more information. So I decided to buy it. This book can be perfectly read by a person without computer knowledge although the book is targeted to techy readers.

The book is structured in ten episodes about hacking, cracking, phreaking and social engineering. Some stories are greatly exaggerated to be believable (for example, I think that the story about social engineering is absolutely 100% fiction) but others (like the one about cracking) are incredible believable with lots of technical information about the details. It is hard to believe that those details are being invented. Working in a big Video-Game Studio (at least when I wrote this article), one detail that made me smile was in the episode about cracking. In that chapter the hacker being interviewed reveals that their team was successfully able to break most of the big Video-Game companies. Probably there are lots of fantasy elements in all of this, but my intuition tells me that there is something real under the hood…

The book is very easy to read and if you have spare time I recommend it. Probably I will read the book Mitnick wrote before this: The Art of Deception. It is getting quite good reviews.

Rating: 7 / 10




  1. It seems interesting, specially in the part about videogame companies. Anyway, there are a lot of security problems in companies (not only videogames) that I have seen. Hackers today still are in a paradise. It’s incredible, and an area very exciting where to work and improve, because there are processes and methodologies to implant, inexistents by now.

    I can see that you’re actually reading another book about hacking. Maybe a hacker resides inside of you ;)



    Comment by gyakoo
    May 11, 2008 @ 0:09 #

  2. Hackers will always be in a paradise. The more complex the systems and the procedures are the more possibilities for security holes.

    BTW, The term hacker in the Hacker’s Delight book is not in the sense of breaking into someone else’s computer. It is a book about computer arithmetic and low level tricks. In fact is a really really hard book. :)



    Comment by ent
    May 11, 2008 @ 17:31 #

  3. int *Kevin = (int*)malloc(1);
    free Kevin;

    :D
    ojete



    Comment by Zalo
    May 12, 2008 @ 14:58 #

  4. Right yesterday I saw this book in spanish in El Corte Ingles’ book store at Plaza del Sol, Madrid. Its price around 23€.
    For people who are interesting in buying it.



    Comment by gyakoo
    May 13, 2008 @ 16:39 #

  5. I always have a problem with the word “hacker” used in this context, as a hacker does not have to be a cracker. In other words they are different things, one creates code the other breaks it.

    How To Become A Hacker by Eric Steven Raymond
    http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html#I_want_to_crack_and_Im_an_idiot

    Q:
    Would you help me to crack a system, or teach me how to crack?

    A:
    No. Anyone who can still ask such a question after reading this FAQ is too stupid to be educable even if I had the time for tutoring. Any emailed requests of this kind that I get will be ignored or answered with extreme rudeness.

    Q:
    How can I get the password for someone else’s account?

    A:
    This is cracking. Go away, idiot.

    Q:
    How can I break into/read/monitor someone else’s email?

    A:
    This is cracking. Get lost, moron.

    Q:
    How can I steal channel op privileges on IRC?

    A:
    This is cracking. Begone, cretin.



    Comment by liam
    May 17, 2008 @ 12:46 #

  6. If you do not agree with a comment posted then please state why, do not just delete it because it shows you and the book have used wrong terminology.



    Comment by liam
    May 18, 2008 @ 1:46 #

  7. Hi,

    Your posts were not deleted liam. The antispam system enqueued them in the moderation queue due to the links. I have been on holidays these days.

    Anyway thanks for the interesting comment.



    Comment by ent
    May 18, 2008 @ 13:36 #

  8. Oops sorry about that :)



    Comment by liam
    May 18, 2008 @ 14:32 #


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