Point The Way

[HaVoK-69]

Hello guys,

I'm currently a college student majoring in computer network engineering focusing on cyber security and I want to get into the world of penetration testing and ethical hacking. I have began to teach myself basic concepts of security such as safe browsing habits, anti-malware removal and prevention, basic anonymity via proxies VPN etc, and others while continuing my education obtaining my A+ Certification and soon to be taking the test for my MCITP Certification.

I understand to get much deeper into the pentesting field I will need to learn programming such as C/C++, C#, Perl, Python, etc and understand Linux and various protocols. Through news articles I research about different attacks such as Man in the Middle and DDoS attacks and how they work but I guess my real question is....

Where do I go from here? I would like to pursue more of this knowledge outside the classroom and become more informed on how to harden security on my system, network, mobile devices, and those of others much better to prepare myself more for the jobs that lie ahead. I have read through the sticky, http://forums.hak5.org/index.php?/topic/913-hacking-where-to-begin/ which has some good resources but if anyone has any others that may help I would really appreciate anything you may submit. I have looked into websites such as http://www.codeacademy.com for alternatives to learning programming languages. I also would like to learn more about how Worms and other malware function as well as how IDS work and some example setups of how you guys secure your home networks if you are willing to share.

Thanks and eager to learn

[Infiltrator]

There have been many threads on this topic in the past. I would recommend you to read this "Breaking in to Security" survey. It answers if not most of your questions.

http://www.digininja.org/projects/breaking_in_part_1.php