Book Review: The Dangers Of Computer Hacking

Years and years ago, someone gave me this book as a gift. [John Knittel], a co-author thought I might find it amusing. The book, titled The Dangers of Computer Hacking, is a grade school level breakdown of, well, computer hacking and the dangers thereof. At the time, I thought it was rather fun and amusing. Since then, it has sat on my shelf without much action.

Last weekend, however, my 8 year old son was building perfectly spaced shapes for his slinky (new plastic slinkies suck) and found this book. I snatched it up and read through it real quick. The realization came to me that though this is somewhat tongue-in-cheek(check the topics on the back cover), this book is actually a fantastic reference for the un-initiated.

They manage to push out a rather well put history of hacking, while keeping it short and easily consumable. Keep in mind this book focuses on “computer hacking” so they touch on the influence hackers like [Steve Wozniak] had on the computer industry. What the difference between “hacking” and “cracking” are, and even jump into how to safely practice “hacking” in your own home. They don’t skimp on social engineering either, with stories about [Kevin Mitnick].

I would easily recommend this book to my parents or my children alike.

 

30 thoughts on “Book Review: The Dangers Of Computer Hacking

  1. Interesting book, makes you think about current companies/individual security. The back cover creeps me out though, even more when I try to imagine the cover pictures for some of the strange titles… such as Family Violence, Aids, and Date Rape. Good thing they weren’t in my library when I was a kid.

      1. Evidently the book series goal was to help kids deal with some of life’s uglier issues. This is the wrong place to look far happier topics. Those would be in a different section of the library.

    1. Slang is slang. Not that unusual for 2 different slang terms for the same activity to evolve in different regions Quit possible for dumpster hopping, is the term that the book authors are familiar with. Lawyers would have the same problem with dumpster hopping, as they would dumpster diving, if they had a liability concern. Unless Dempster trademarked “diving” in association with dumper, probably not a trademark issue, echodelta.

    1. Hey you’re not gonna believe this, but the guy on the cover … is me !

      When I was way younger, a photographer took some pictures “for a book”, but I never heard from it again.

      I was looking at the picture, thinking “that dude looks like me”… and then WOAH.

  2. In the event the library doesn’t have copy I doubt I’ll read the book, too expensive to buy for kicks, and the reviews at Amazon aren’t that great in general. Caleb did provide a pseudo digital copy, but my eyes can’t read it. I’ll save the images to see if I can manipulate them when I want to kill some time.

    This series reminds me of a book a mother I knew passed around to get input from others, if she should give it to prepubescent daughter to read. A book many would consider a how to have sex manual. Ultimately the mother decided not to give the book to the girl, not unsurprisingly the girl learned how to be sexually involved without using birth control, becoming one more unwed pregnant teen. Often education can be damned if you, damned if you don’t,nearly impossible to judge cause,and effect.

  3. This series resembles an earlier version of the dummies or idiots books. “Hacking for Dummies,” “Sex for Dummies,” “Bereavement for Dummies,” etc. Very interesting.

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