Hack

The first big-namehackers include Steve Wozniak,Bill Gates and Linus Torvalds,all now highlyrecog-

nizable names behindmany of the computer technologies used today. These early hackers had a love oftech-

nology and acompelling need to know how it all worked,and their goal was to push programsbeyond what

they were designedto do.Back then,the word"hacker" didn't have the negative connotationit has today.

The original hackerethic,rooted out of simple curiosity and a need to be challenged,appears to bedead.

The objectives ofearly hackers are a far cry from the goals of today'S hacker. The motivation ofthe new

breed of hackersappears not to be curiosity,or a hunger for knowledge,as it used tobe.Instead,most of to-

day'S hackers aredriven by greed,power,revenge,or some other malicious intent,treating hackingas a game

or sport,employingthe tools that are retdily available via the Internet.

The rate of securityattacks is actually outpacing the growth of the Internet.This means thatsomething

besides the growthof the Internet is driving the rise in security attacks.Here are some realitiesyou should

know about.Operatingsystems and applications will never be secure.New vulnerabilities will beintroduced

into yourenvironment every day.And even if you ever do get one operating systemsecure,there will be new

operating systemswith new vulnerabilities一phones,wirelessdevices,and network appliances.Employees will

never keep up with securitypolices and awareness.It doesn't matter how much you train and educate your

employees.If youremployees disregard warnings about the hazards of opening questionable e-mailattach-

ments,how are yougoing to educate them about properly configuring firewalls and intrusiondetection systems

for theirPCs?Managers have more responsibility than ever. And on top of the realitieslisted above,security

managers are beingasked to support increasing degrees of network availability and access.Thereare some

good securitymeasures you can take.Employ a layer 7,full-inspection firewall.Automaticallyupdate your

anti-virus at thegateway,server and client. Keep all of your systems and applicationsupdated.Hackers com-

monly break into awebsite through known security holes,so make sure your servers and applicationsare

patched and up todate.Turn off unnecessary network services.Eliminate all unneeded programs.Scannet-

work for commonbackdoor services一useintrusion detection systems,vulnerability scans,anti-virus protection.The underlinedword"hacker"(Para.1)most probably means“ ___________”.

A.highlyrecognizable names behind many of the computer technologies used today

B.the negativeconnotation of those computer users

C.a game,employingthe tools that are readily available via the Internet

D.people who breakinto computer systems