Is there a way to keep hackers out 1

[dcwtechmech]

Is there a way to keep hackers out of systems using a common router D-links DI-604 when playing games like starcraft and AOE. And how do they(the hackers)get in through these games anyway? Let everything that have breath praise the Lord.

 

[wybnormal]

Is there a way to keep hackers out? the short answer is no. Unless unplugging your router from the internet counts. Many times the hacker comes in via an exploit of the game itself. Or to put in simple terms, the program has a bug that the hacker can trigger and get something in return.. ie. control, kill the game, etc..etc. This is the same for SQL servers, Webservers, DNS servers etc. I can pop a Sun Solaris box (up to ver.5.8 depending on patch level) with a simple telnet session. THis is an buffer overflow exploit where you exceed some parameter and the system barfs to a command prompt as a result. THere are Unicode attacks against webservers which come in on port 80 and so they look like normal web traffic which bypasses the firewall.. unless your firewall is outbound only SQL servers can barf when you type in certain commands instead of the userID and password.

Anyways.. sorry for the winded reply but I hate to give a general answer without some details

MikeS
Find me at

http://www.packetattack.com

"Take advantage of the enemy's unreadiness, make your way by unexpected routes, and attack unguarded spots."
Sun Tzu

 

[wybnormal]

I did foget to mention the easiest fix is to make sure your router is current firmware and the OS and game is patched to current levels. Also, in the home arena, most traffic should be outbound and so inbound traffic should be denied. In other words, you are asking for something *from* the internet.. people are not coming to YOU to get something from your LAN.

MikeS
Find me at

http://www.packetattack.com

"Take advantage of the enemy's unreadiness, make your way by unexpected routes, and attack unguarded spots."
Sun Tzu

 

[dcwtechmech]

How can i learn these things that you metioned and since there are no real ways to avoid this is the best defence just to have a hdd for games and nothing else, if i change hdd for other things will the limiting of incommig traffic be my best bet against attack. Do I have to know any programing language to learn it. Just one more thing, I have an idea for a firewall if you will intertain it for me. I dont want to go through tek-tips in view of the rules. Im not trying to recruit you, just want so feed back from someone who knows. Let everything that have breath praise the Lord.

 

[wybnormal]

How to learn? be prepared to read ALOT and to have a test lab set up to see how this stuff actually works.. or not. There is not any one book that will cover it all. You end up with several books on the shelf to cover different aspects. A programming background is useful if for nothing else but to get an idea of how something was hacked conceptually.

The idea of dedicated hardware is a good one. Set up the system for games, get it working and them image it with Ghost or if you like unix, the dd command. This way if something bad happens, you are back up and running in just minutes instead of hours. A favorite trick for some is to run the system off a CDR and a big RAM disk if possible.

Even Cisco routers/switches can be vulunerable. THe Callcenter software for VoIP is based on NT as is Ciscoworks and so is Cisco Secure (although there are some Unix versions available) So patching takes on even more importance as does ghosting a server in order to be extra safe.

I can be found through the contact page on Packetattack.com

MikeS
Find me at

http://www.packetattack.com

"Take advantage of the enemy's unreadiness, make your way by unexpected routes, and attack unguarded spots."
Sun Tzu

 

[dcwtechmech]

That site crashed my browser. How does that work. I'm sorry I have so many questions. But I do know how computers are suppose to operate and I know when the operation has changed (hacked). What books do you recomend? What OS's am I suppose to have for this lab? Let everything that have breath praise the Lord.

 

[wybnormal]

crashed your browser? interesting.. since it's been tested with IE4, 5, 5.5, 6, Opera 6 and 7 and Mozilla. Not too mention a couple of Linux versions along the way. It does rely on Java in a couple of items and flash so maybe...

Books?

Catching the Cool Packets by Laura Chappell
Honeypots: Tracking Hackers
Hacking Exposed
CounterHack
Hack CounterHack Training course.. not the best but useful for a person trying to make sense of the more common tools used.
Hacking I.T.
Cisco Secure Internet Security Solutions
Cisco Secure Intrusion Detection Systems
Managing Cisco Network Security


I own all these listed and they all have good and bad points. But go to the local store and see what they have.

I'm sure others here have their own favorites

MikeS
Find me at

http://www.packetattack.com

"Take advantage of the enemy's unreadiness, make your way by unexpected routes, and attack unguarded spots."
Sun Tzu

 

[dcwtechmech]

Is there a software with some or most of the tools that can do some of the tracking or network tracking for this type of analyzing. I do mean from a company, even though shareware is good I have found that it also does it's own thing for the creator of the program. And you metioned denying inbound traffic. I suppose that's a setting on the router or is that port settings that have to be changed? Let everything that have breath praise the Lord.