About.com Rating

The Bottom Line

There are plenty of books that go into great detail about various methods and tools for hacking- teaching how to find and exploit vulnerabilities in network or computer defenses. However, a story often helps illustrate more than the detailed instruction can. This book is a collection of case studies or short stories which demonstrate different attack scenarios in a "real-world" setting so that you can understand how they impact you and relate better to how you should defend your network.



Pros

• Good compliment to authors' previous book, Hack I.T.
• Like Hacker's Challenge, but with the answers included in the story
• Stories relay the information well and some are even entertaining

Cons

• None

Description

• Provides an overview of various attacks and defenses at a high level
• Broad range of case studies covering everything from basic mapping to viruses to cyber-extortion
• Compliments the authors' previous book, Hack I.T., which provides details on how the attacks work

Guide Review - Book Review: Defend I.T.- Security By Example

The authors of Defend I.T.: Security By Example, teamed up previously to write Hack I.T.. The previous work was more along the lines of the hacking genre of books such as Hacking Exposed or Counter Hack, providing detailed explanations of various attacks to use in performing a penetration test of your network.

Books like that are great for those with the knowledge and skills to make sense of them, but people who aren't as technical and don't necessarily work the front lines of network security such as managers and executives can still benefit from having an understanding of how such attacks can impact their company and a high-level understanding of how to defend against them.

This book is not written for someone with zero technical knowledge. It does assume a certain level of understanding, but the case studies help to illustrate how the various attack techniques in the other type of books can be used and how you can protect your network.

This book is similar to the Hacker's Challenge books in that it provides real-world scenarios, except that rather than solving the puzzle on your own the solution is included in the story like a short mystery.

Managers of I.T. departments or security personnel and those who control the security budget would benefit from reading a book like this to understand what their people are up against. Those who actually work the front lines would still benefit from being able to associate information with real-world examples and applications.