Ankit Fadia @ Sri Indu
The lazy morning was interrupted by a scream, “Ankit Fadia is coming today to our college! Thank God I came to college today”, by Shreya, viewing the huge banner in front of the campus. Her friends sniggered seeing her. Students were busy filing in the campus on their second day of college. The seminar was surely a welcome change. Those who knew who Ankit Fadia was, were busy explaining about his exploits and “fame” to who ever bothered to listen.
The seminar was to start at about 2 o clock and many managed to sneak away as they feared one more “boring lecture”. But little did they know how wonderful it was going to be. The day dragged on and the lecturers were a bit uncomfortable as their classes were to be dismissed. Students were lazing around in the afternoon and the session began quite late at 3. “Damn these lecturers for not allowing us to go earlier” complained the students.
Mr. Khadir, Humanities started with a sort of introduction about the renowned ethical hacker. Ankit Fadia started off in his silky voice and all sprang into attention. He first asked how many had internet connection at home. To this most of them echoed YES, immediately he said stop using them. Everyone guffawed aloud. He said we shouldn’t use any such applications. Every computer has an IP address which is like our cell phone number. It is a sort of identification of our system on the network. Many computers are linked to one another and IP address distinguishes each network. No two addresses are similar. IP address is very easy to detect and anyone can install a Trojan which is a sort of virus that can be used to control our computer’s actions. We can use the website like www.anonymizer.com which is a proxy browser and the IP address doesn’t get displayed when we search for information. But it comes for a price. We can use the Russian edition which is free of cost and add /ru after the address. Mischievous smiles followed and everyone jotted them down. Proxy servers are also available like Squid, Wingate, Winproxy and a list of IP addresses can be taken from www.samair.ru/proxy. These can be used when there is restricted access usually in offices and colleges. Once we get out of the local network these work fine. He joked that our college would have already blocked the above mentioned websites. Anti virus softwares are just gimmicks that install virus and do nothing in particular to control them.
Seminar hall crowded with students. Credit: Pearl Rive
He went on to explain how cyber crime has evolved into many facets and how an eleven year old hacked the NASA website. A lady from Mumbai was blackmailed as the attacker captured her videos by switching on her Webcam through a Trojan. Nowadays for terrorist attacks, messages are sent online which are encrypted in photos, pictures. This method is known as steganography which involves hiding of data in such a way that only the sender and receiver know what data is present.
About Ankit Fadia:
He is 24 years old and is an independent computer security and digital intelligence consultant in the field of internet security. He is based out of Silicon Valley, California. He has authored 14 internationally best selling books out of which many are best sellers. He has his own software security and training company in Kuala Lumpur.
He even features on the new show on the block “What the Hack” on MTV with VJ Jose. The show has quite a good fan following. “I regularly watch the show and never miss even a single show. I’ve got accolades in college for my internet skills. Thanks to this cool show”, says Chaitanya, a Sri Indu student. He was also conferred “MTV Youth icon 2008” title by MTV. He has many more awards to his credit. Log on to http://www.ankitfadia.org/ to know more about Mr.Fadia. There are very strong controversies on Mr.Fadia and his Claims/Achievements. He has more of them to his credit. Refer to http://www.rayarunava.com/blog/2009/08/28/fadia-ya-fraudia/ , http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_viagra-penetrates-ethical-hacker-ankit-fadia-s-site_1321722, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ankit_Fadia for detailed reports.
HACKED!!! with the Genious himself. Credit: Pearl Rive
He was in Sri Indu to promote the course offered by him which is called Ankit Fadia Certified Ethical Hacker course (AFCEH) in collaboration with Reliance world. AFCEH is a computer security program based on the science of ethical hacking. It is used to discover loopholes in target systems and to setup security systems to counter the computer criminals. Professionals who undergo this training and certification program will have the necessary knowledge required to administer security solutions to companies as well as individuals by making computer networks secure. The program consists of new updated material by the guru himself and consists of 4 hours live video conference, 16 hours of video on demand, lab and homework sessions and after successfully passing out can get a chance to work with the guru himself and also get 8 best selling books. The course fee is 6999 and last day for registration was 31 December which is extended upto 5th Jan 2010. The next session starts from 8th Jan 2010-8th Feb 2010. Log on to www.ankitfadiacertified.com for more details about the program.
