Things That Hackers Search For

1. Organization design, filings and registrations 

            Malicious hackers typically perform an online search to look for possible targets, and among the best candidates for an attack are those organizations that provide detailed descriptions of devices that they have access to, including the type of software and hardware that they have installed. Once hackers know that a certain person holds access to a possibly vulnerable point in an organization’s tech security, they get an idea on who they should hack first. Any hacker can obtain this extremely useful information with a simple online search. By digging online, you can find all SEC registrations, public biddings, publicly accessed files, subscribers, and many more. You can even search for all people involved in a particular organization, the time that a website is published, and the webmaster involved in creating web security for an organization. Having that knowledge can easily help a hacker prepare for a massive online attack that can take down an entire organization’s website and database.

 2. Subscriptions and payments 

            Hackers are most likely to hack devices and accounts owned by a person that make online payments or purchases. Since smartphones, emails and online payment systems contain a wealth of personal information, including credit cards and banking statements, hacking these systems make it easy for every criminal hacker to achieve identity theft. 

3. Social media accounts

 While some may say that there is possibly nothing valuable in a personal Facebook account, being able to gain access to social media accounts also enables a hacker to gain access to other personal details, such as passwords, emails, and mobile phone numbers.

 4. Emails 

Emails serve as the hub of your personal information because it serves as a control point for all your passwords, online payment accounts, among others.

 5. Passwords

 Many hackers perform an attack that is made to predict, snoop, or phish for a user’s password. Once they are able to find a single password, they are almost certain that a user may use them for different accounts or use a variation of it for other logins.

 6. Physical hardware

 It is easiest to steal information when you have physical access to a device such as a smartphone or a personal computer. You can easily check all accessed accounts through the registry, browser history, or saved passwords without even having to use a code. At the same time, having physical access to a device also enables you to make it possible to plant a listening device into its system in order to phish out any additional information at any point in the future. 

7. Target locations 

If a hacker cannot find any vulnerability yet in a system that he wants to hack, the next thing that he will try to find is where a computer system is. This will allow him to further study vulnerabilities through social engineering, dumpster diving, or even gaining physical access to a targeted device. Since all computers have a MAC address, and every device connected through the internet has an IP address, every device in the world can be easily searched for in order to figure out where it is located. A hacker, on the other hand, knows how to hide his location in order to remain undetected while he launches an attack.