I've got Gray Hat Hacking this week, I haven't read all of it, but for Table of Contents I'd say this is just the book you're looking for. Of course prior experience with C/C++/ASM is helpful you can get by without it, at least with this book.

First off sooner or later you'll have to drop vista, can't do any off tha fancy stuff (injection) linux can. Now I don't know about the compatibility for that card or Vista. http://www.aircrack-ng.org/doku.php?id=install_drivers&DokuWiki=2027597954072b6768b8857e2aeb15e5#windows is a good place to start, and good luck.

Great post, so now I have two questions, do you really need to re-authenticate constantly, and more importantly, I did a wireless pen test for a company last week, they used wep , so I injected arp packets and ran aircrack-ng with -z, I was suprise to see that the attack did not succeed even with 1m IVs, I cracked it with the standard mode, but now I' wondering anyone have any idea why it failed?

That's exactly what I was looking for, thanks to both of you.

I once saw a nice colored chart showing how to do a pen test, sort of like a road map, if this port is open do that. I liked, but now I've forgotten where I saw it. It doesn't have to be colored or a map  , but if anyone had a checklist for pen testing that would be great.

And sadly most of the guys with unencrypted networks doesn't have a clue what they're doing, so really it's their right we're talking about, the one that willingly pen their networks are dwarfed by the unknown mass, so if you see a unencrypted network most probably you're not allowed to use it. Hypocrites as me still uses it

Yes, so network is unencrypted and a dhcp server is offering IP addresses to *everyone*  that ask, how can that possibly illegal? I understand that many don't know what they're when they set up wlans and their rights should be protected, But if you don't have a door to your house and somebody breaks into your house you won't get any money from the insurance company, the same should apply to wlans.

Correct me if I'm wrong but are not all the change you make client side, i. e. the server is not affected in any way. There are still vulnerabilities to be exploited  but you can't change a websites source code if that's what you meant.

This is an interesting subject, I've had this discussion with my parents a couple of times , First hacking a encrypted networks is criminal, that' breaking into the house. But I use open networks to check my mail or just read on the internet, and I find nothing wrong with that, my little amount of traffic doesn't affect their internet speed, do most probably won't notice and even less care that I use their networks. No if you want you network private you need to encrypt it. Fon (www.fon.com) is  also worth mentioning. Several ISPs where I lived has forbidden it's customers to provide free access to others, and threatening to shut off their internet. So when did ISPs gain he right to tell us what do o with our connection?

One thing to remember for your next post is no caps and a bit more descriptive question, and don and Negrita is right. And out of curiosity, why do you ask?

Since most trojans require you to install them willingly, that's why they're called trojans , I'd say you're probably not infected, unless it's a virus-trojan hybrid . Assuming you're on windows it might not be a bad idea to do a scan anyway, maybe some other kid got a virus that in turn effected your laptop. Better to be overcautious then sorry.

Great source of inspiration jimbob

Linux is a must for any serious admin or pen tester today, and it's becoming more and more popular. Actually when the school bought new computers the IT personnel wanted Linux, but the management made them go with Vista . So the right title should be "Linux is hotter then ever!"

Had he been using the schools system to store children pornography and stolen creditcard number 20 years would have been great, maybe even a bit to little. BU tnow the "only" changed the grades, didn't harm anyone, so a possible sentence of 20 years is too much, imho

No wonder hackers got a bad rep with this kind of articles, like all hackers are born dark-hat. By the way, anyone watched Die Hard 4, not very ethical "hacking".