With the increased use of technology in our lives, we are becoming more and more vulnerable to people who can get unauthorized access to our personal and financial data. Commercialization of such services, also known as HaaS, has enabled the dark web users to put their code, tools and expertise on sale for other cybercriminals. Such services are available from people, who can broadly be classified into three main categories:
- Black Hat Hacker is an individual who attempts to gain unauthorized entry into a system or network to exploit them for malicious reasons. Some of these hackers love to see their work and name in the news, so they would try to target popular brands.
- White Hat Hacker are deemed to be good guys who usually hack for a company or organization for defensive purposes. While having special permission to do so, they specialize in ethical hacking tools, techniques, and methodologies to secure an organization’s information systems.
- Grey Hat Hacker exploits networks and computer systems in the way that black hats do, but do so without any malicious intent. They tend to disclose loopholes and notify owner of the system/network about vulnerabilities that must be fixed immediately.
Nearly 50 such hacking services are available on Hacker’s List for tasks including data recovery, penetration testing and computer forensics. One specific bidder reportedly offered up to $2,000 to get a list of clients from a competitor’s database while another sought access to a boyfriend’s social-media accounts. The process is handled anonymously, and fee is mostly collected via cryptocurrency. The business is so widespread and competitive that your personal email accounts are available for sale at a mere $100 while official accounts can be bought for $500. High time that governments act fast enough to protect digital accounts of their citizens!