Book Image

Python Ethical Hacking from Scratch

By : Fahad Ali Sarwar
Book Image

Python Ethical Hacking from Scratch

By: Fahad Ali Sarwar

Overview of this book

Penetration testing enables you to evaluate the security or strength of a computer system, network, or web application that an attacker can exploit. With this book, you'll understand why Python is one of the fastest-growing programming languages for penetration testing. You'll find out how to harness the power of Python and pentesting to enhance your system security. Developers working with Python will be able to put their knowledge and experience to work with this practical guide. Complete with step-by-step explanations of essential concepts and practical examples, this book takes a hands-on approach to help you build your own pentesting tools for testing the security level of systems and networks. You'll learn how to develop your own ethical hacking tools using Python and explore hacking techniques to exploit vulnerabilities in networks and systems. Finally, you'll be able to get remote access to target systems and networks using the tools you develop and modify as per your own requirements. By the end of this ethical hacking book, you'll have developed the skills needed for building cybersecurity tools and learned how to secure your systems by thinking like a hacker.
Table of Contents (14 chapters)
1
Section 1: The Nuts and Bolts of Ethical Hacking – The Basics
4
Section 2: Thinking Like a Hacker – Network Information Gathering and Attacks
8
Section 3: Malware Development

Cracking passwords

In this section, we will learn how to crack password-protected files using a password database. We will try to crack a ZIP file in this section. A ZIP file is a binary format that stores files in compressed format and can be password protected. We will carry out a dictionary attack. Let's first learn what a dictionary attack is!

A dictionary attack is an attack in which a hacker tries to guess the victim's password by using a set of predefined passwords. They usually have a very large database of passwords stored in a file and try to use one of the passwords to see if the victim's password matches the password list. This password list is usually obtained from a leak of passwords from a compromised website and other forums. This is why you should never reuse a password for one website more than once. If you use the same password for a website and the website gets compromised, chances are that all your passwords could be compromised.

You can find...