> -----Original Message-----
> From: APseudoUtopia [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 9:12 AM
> To: tedd
> Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; PHP General
> Subject: Re: [PHP] how to not show login info in the url ...what am I
> looking for?
> 
> On Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 10:03 AM, tedd <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > At 9:52 PM +0000 12/9/08, Ashley Sheridan wrote:
> >>
> >> You shouldn't be passing info like that over the URL; use sessions
> >> instead.
> >>
> >> I saw a shopping cart system once that passed the price of items
> over
> >> the URL, and when I found out and alerted them, we won the contract
> for
> >> a rebuild and then got accused of hacking by their previous web guys
> >> (who incidentally built the system!)
> >
> > Ash:
> >
> > Even if you did hack the site, all that means is that site was hack-
> able and
> > thus should have been fixed anyway.
> >
> > In my mind, hacking a site (without doing damage) is a good
> introduction to
> > a client.
> 
> *Ahem*....You mean 'cracking'? :-P

IMHO...

Cracking: breaking encryption/obfuscation methods in order to gain unauthorized 
access to information. "I cracked the admin's password using a brute force 
algorithm."

Hacking: circumvent or leverage security flaws in order to gain unauthorized 
access to information. For example - "I hacked into the Gibson by re-routing 
their logon routine." (No, that doesn't make any sense. Maybe it's straight out 
of the movie "Hackers.")

I realize that people have been using "cracker" as a malicious form of 
"hacker," and that a "hacker" is not malicious; but that is stupid. Cracking 
started out dealing with cryptography in my experience, and that's how I will 
continue to identify it.

Think about it--people were "safe crackers" (discovering the combination to 
safety deposit boxes) before there were computers in existence.

My 2c,


// Todd

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