September 2004
Intermediate to advanced
352 pages
11h 44m
English
So there I was at my ten-year class reunion, looking around awkwardly and wearing my best suit. Back in my high school days, I was definitely in the nerd crowd, and my discomfort at this reunion was starting to remind me of that fact. I chatted with a small group of friends who had started to grow thinner on top and thicker in the middle. Rick, the track jock who became a forest ranger, asked, “What do you do for a living, Ed?”
“I do computer security work…mostly penetration testing,” I replied.
“What’s that?” asked Mike, a former journalism major who had recently gotten a gig writing for a major newspaper.
“Well,” I started, “I hack into computer systems for banks, and then tell them how we got in so they can fix their security holes.” ...