Search Engines turns threats !!. Review on Tips on the Effective Use of Search Engines

Boy ! Oh ! Boy ................ Search engines the magic tool of the cyber world .Lets you find information about anything and everything in just a matter of seconds . Undoubtedly the most useful and handy tool in the internet .

BUT IS IT A HACKING TOOL !!!

" Thats rich !!! How can it be a hacking tool " ........... Sounds a bit ironic....... but its true . Even I was astounded when I came to know about it . The lunatic fringe is after your data and Search engines serves them best .

" But how can it be possible " .... Yeah it is possible and this is how it works .

Say for example , a hacker needs certain information . The next thing he will do is to find out in which possible format the file which has the information he need will be in .

Ok lets make it more simple .... Consider yourself  a cyber thief and you need some  password files . Password files can most probably  exist either in .txt format or .xls format  .So you connect to the internet , opens your favourite search engine ...Let it be Google (its my fav ). Now you are in the google .com webpage all you need to do is to search using index of , file type strings to search  the possible file name and data type .

index of /passwords filetype :txt

OR

*index of /passwords filetype :xls

Thats it ... You got what you need . The first search will return all the files in .txt format with password as part of their name and the second will return the files in  .xls format . hmm .......... Now thats a cloud on the horizon .

Now put yourself in another situation ...... You are a music freak and you are a die hard fan of Bryan adams ( even I am ) ....  You need the lovely song " Everything I do " but you are not willing to pay for it . Well you dont have to ...Search engines to the rescue ! Once again go to the google webpage and seach with the keywords

*intitle:index of" Everything I do "mp3

Holy s !! you have just got the list of urls where you can download the mp3 song for free .Not just one song , but many more . Isnt that great !!  Those are the url's of webspaces where some people or companies upload their data and music without password protection . The owners of the url's may be unaware that their url is listed in  search engines . ( even I have downloaded many english songs like this .............. NO COMMENTS ).

"Thanks , But no thanks . This  doesnt bother me , I trace the ip address of all visits to my webspace , I can easily trace the intruder "

Well think again . Do you expect the hacker to be dumb enough to intrude into a secure site without any defence measures . A technical hacker always uses "Anonymity proxy servers " (jap for instance) and leaves no trace .

So this is how search engines turns into free hacking tools . Nearly everything can be downloaded and accessed  this way from the internet , Even the most sensitive data unless protected . The majority victims of such attacks are systems administrators of companies who fail to secure the data efficiently .

"Prevention is better than cure "

So here are a few things that you can do to protect ur data from such attacks .

Password protect ur directories containing sensitive data (confidential)

Create robos.txt file in the root directory and list the data that u dont want to be listed in the search engines .

Avoid uploading confidential information in the internet as much as you can . No matter whatever defence you take , online is not 100% secure .

So even the most useful things created for a postive purpose can be misused and made a deadly weapon against one's privacy and secrecy . Anyways we cant stop people who find pleasure in doing such insane acts (no matter whatever the reason is ) .

So all u guys its time to clamp down unauthorized access to ur webspaces . Ensure more security to ur url's and be a better administrator .

{The info  in this review is not meant for any misuse .}