Top 10 Ethical Hacking Books

Are you a hacker or a software professional? Or an ordinary man who just has the basic knowledge of operating a Computer? This article is about the Top 10 Ethical Hacking books. This article will assist those who have already taken up or dream of a career in Ethical Hacking. Please read forward if you are one.

Ethical Hacking- what is it?

Let us come to the point straight – What is Ethical Hacking? To put it simply, the term defines the process of identifying weaknesses in a computer system or network and solutions to correct those problems. Since we share everything, personal and confidential bank information online, it is quintessential to secure those data. Criminals in cyberspace are so high in this digital age that and try to steal this confidential data for many purposes, like a conflict of interest, national security breaches, terrorist activities, and so on. Here lies the importance of Ethical hacking services. Ethical Hackers should identify loopholes, know about penetration testing, use the appropriate tools to carry out the hack and prepare for it. We can prevent our data from being stolen or misused.

Ethical Hacking Books

In any field, be it technical, financial, medical, or automobile, people become professionals and experts with years of working experience. Pursuing a course in a particular field and famous books written on the relevant subjects usually help them improve their efficiency and skills. In the field of Cyber Security also, Ethical Hacking books are available both online and offline to assist the professionals engaged in the field. Let’s have a clear look at the top 10 Ethical Hacking Books available in the Indian market.

1. Advanced Penetration Testing: Hacking the world’s most Secure Networks

This book is top-rated among the most popular Ethical Hacking Books. This is a splendid choice for beginners who have a sound computer background and don’t know any programming language. It is very engaging to read this book with so many real-world examples. While reading this book, we realize how unsafe we are in this digital world. It not only helps you understand the importance of pen-testing tools but also teaches you how to write custom code step by step. And, professionals who want to think like professional hackers and perform pen-testing on highly secure networks can also think of buying this book.

2. Hands-on Ethical Hacking and Network Defense

Freshers who have no idea about networking, hacking, security, etc can surely rely upon these types of Ethical Hacking books. Because, especially in this book, the author has explained various high-level hacking concepts like security testing, various tools, penetration testing techniques, mobile security, etc in simple and effective language. Additionally, technical details are very less in this book which urges readers to depend upon this book for understanding the theory. Also, the book lists good resources and has additional reference material in Appendix B. Besides this, there are a lot of case scenarios and questions at the end of each chapter.

3. The Hardware Hacker

Some of the Ethical Hacking Books contain collections of personal experiences rather than simply explaining theories and concepts. The Hardware Hacker, written by Andre Huang is one among them. This book has a wide collection of personal essays and interviews. Equally, it also covers topics related to reverse engineering to a comparison of intellectual property. It includes practices between, and society into the mix of open hardware. This book also contains detailed passages on manufacturing. Open-source hardware is the main focus. The author has shared his experiences in manufacturing and open hardware. In short, the book helps to solve the issues related to open hardware.

4. The Hacker Playbook 2: Practical Guide to Penetration Testing

Like all other guides and materials, this Ethical Hacking book teaches you plenty of hacking techniques with practical examples and valuable advice from experts. Apart from this, this book includes the hackers’ game plans, the latest attacks, tools, and lessons learned. Furthermore, this certified ethical hacking guide illustrates how to build a lab. Ethical hackers, IT professionals, and security researchers should prepare enough with their game plans. Moreover, this book follows ‘football-style plays’ and unveils numerous roadblocks people may encounter while penetration testing. This guide is an inevitable one in any ethical hacker’s library, especially for those who are looking for exciting new jobs in IT security.

5. Black Hat Python

As the name suggests, this book is one of the top 10 Ethical Hacking books which focuses on Python language. Most security analysts use Python 2 and teach the methods of writing effective hacking tools using Python. However, this book will be a great treasure for those who have programming experience but no practical experience. Without a doubt, python is very easy to learn and readers can gain knowledge about it on their first read itself. This book also explains so many techniques and challenges you at various levels. Above all, the learners can also explore the darker side of Python’s capabilities writing network sniffers, manipulating packets, infecting virtual machines, creating stealthy trojans, and more.

6. Hacking: The Art of Exploitation

Firstly, this Ethical Hacking Book is not a quick reference guide, but a learning book for intermediates. But it will give you a complete picture of programming, machine architecture, network communications, and existing hacking techniques. Besides this, the author also emphasizes the need to think like a hacker, be creative, and investigate areas never touched before. The book not only gives you use cases but also tries to build a strong foundation. Because of this, you can think of your ways of hacking. There is a CD for Linux to practice the techniques. The author also explains how arcane hacking techniques work.

7. The Basics of Hacking and Penetration Testing

To start Ethical Hacking from start to end, there is a need to perform a penetration test. The Basics of Hacking and Penetration Testing, written by Patrick Engebretson gives you an introduction to the steps of this test. In addition to this, the students will also learn how they can utilize the hacking tools required to complete this penetration test. Every chapter in this book contains examples and exercises and they teach learners how to interpret results and utilize them. It also provides a simple and clean explanation of how to utilize these tools effectively. For this, there is a four-step methodology. This book also equips students with the skill required to kick-start their careers and gain an understanding of offensive security.

8. The Web Application Hacker’s Handbook

This Ethical Hacking book is a very popular and commercially successful book that explains web security. Both beginners and intermediates can refer to this book. Like the other guides on the same topic, this book also contains real-world scenarios and practices. The book follows a well-organized style and the approach is very efficient. And it allows the readers to think about each topic. The first few chapters discuss major web components and potential vulnerabilities, and the next few focus on hack steps for sessions, databases, etc. The readers can also learn the techniques presented to attack and protect web applications. Similarly, some sections in the book will help you build your code and have examples in C++, Java, etc.

More about this book

Teaches how to deal with the new technologies and techniques aimed to defend web applications against attacks that have appeared in the previous edition
Explains new linking frameworks, HTML5, cross-domain integration techniques, UI redress, frame busting, HTTP parameter pollution, hybrid file attacks, etc.

9. Exploiting Software: How to Break Code

This Ethical Hacking book assumes that you will have a basic understanding of *86 processors. Together with this, you will learn how to write your own cracking tools. The book also gives focuses on how software quality problems may lead to security lapses and how they can be rectified immediately. Many chapters in the book describe about attacking patterns like stack overflow, string format overflow, URL encoding, etc., and explore how to overcome them with examples from different languages like C++, Java, etc. Last but not the least, the author covers in detail rootkits, writing them, call hooking, and many more advanced concepts.

More Details

Exploiting Software contains so many examples of real attacks, attack patterns, tools, and techniques used by hackers to break software. To protect your software from attack, you must first learn how we carry out these attacks. The paperback of this book costs 5009 INR.

10. Hackers & Painters: Big Ideas From The Computer Age

Penned by Paul Graham, this Ethical Hacking book influences heavily on how we work, develop technology, and how we live. The ingredients of this book are the importance of software design, how to make wealth with it, programming language renaissance, digital design, internet startups, etc. This book also includes the importance of beauty in software design, how to make wealth, the programming language renaissance, the open-source movement, and digital design, etc. explains this world and the motivations of the people who occupy it. By revealing historical examples, the author explains this world and the motivations of the people who occupy it.

Price Details

The Kindle edition costs 221.55 INR. The paperback costs 1646 INR.

Get a Certificate in Ethical Hacking

There is a lot of material that adds value to your learning, apart from these books. They are blogs, online tutorials, and online courses as well. If you are planning for a certification course before kick-starting a career in Ethical Hacking, I have a strong recommendation below.

Henry Harvin

Henry Harvin Education, the winner of the prestigious top corporate training award is a viable choice for pursuing the Ethical Hacking Course online. This course is to help the candidates master the key skills and techniques of Ethical Hacking like Penetration testing, Enumeration, Sniffing, Vulnerability Analysis, SQL injection, and Network packet analysis. Experts according to the latest CEH v11 by EC-Council have consolidated the curriculum. And it helps to prepare candidates to build Network Security skill-sets and prevent Hackers. Similar to the benefits of all the other courses offered by the institute, experts with 15 years+ of working experience will handle the course. By joining this course, the candidates can also avail of one year Gold membership of Cyber Security Academy that includes E-learning Access through recorded Videos, Games, Projects, etc.

Here are some of the learning Benefits :

Know about Information Security threats, Web Server Attack tools, Methodology, and Patch Management
Learn how to implement Footprinting through Webservices and Website Footprinting.
Pick up concepts like Trojans, Malware, Viruses, and worm

Summing up

Generally, Hacking is a very exciting topic. It is the same with the case of Hackers. There are different types of hackers whose intentions are also different. Some of them are White Hat Hackers, Grey Hat Hackers, and Black Hat Hackers. It is important that Ethical Hackers will definitely have permission to hack. Otherwise hacking is a crime or a punishable offense. Prior to being into hacking, it is good to try to learn some basics about at least one programming language like C, C++, Python, or Java. With that, additional knowledge on what DBMS is, and how we structure them will also do good. This will surely help you focus better on hacking. The books mentioned above definitely cover all these topics. But having previous knowledge is always good for self-learning.

FAQs

Ques.1 Which is the first book about Hacking?

Ans.The Cuckoo’s Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage is considered to be the first book about Hacking. It was written in 1989 by Clifford Stoll. It tells the hunt for a computer hacker who broke into a computer at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL).

Ques. 2 Which language is commonly used in hacking?

Ans. Python is the common programming language used largely for exploit writing in Ethical hacking. It also plays a vital role in writing hacking scripts, exploits, and malicious programs.

Ques.3 Is hacking illegal?

Ans. If a person hacks into a computer without permission, it is a serious offense. It is not necessary if he steals information or damages the system. Intrusion is itself a crime. Ethical Hacking is done with permission only.

Ques.4 What do Hackers learn first?

Ans. To become a hacker, first, you will have to learn about computer programming. This is considered to be a vital step. A variety of software programs are now available that help make hacking easier. However, if you really want to know how it is done, you will definitely need to have basic knowledge of programming.

Ques.5 Can I learn Ethical Hacking after Class 12?

Ans. Young aspirants can choose graduate and post-graduate courses in Ethical Hacking after completing their Class 12. Diploma and certification courses are also available after the 10th standard. Admissions to bachelor and master courses are mostly carried out on the basis of state or national entrance examination scores.