With the dominance of online word increasing as we speak, it is highly unlikely to keep hackers at bay. The term hackers mean individuals with great technical and programming knowledge but they use it in the wrong direction.
For instance, imagine your company’s data being stolen through a loophole. Only a technical person with programming knowledge can find this loophole. But, since these people are not using their knowledge for any benefit, they are called hackers.
Ethical hackers, on the other hand, are people who work for the government or other organizations to protect data or deal with crime. This is why these individuals are ethical hackers.
Of course, the term hacker may confuse you a bit. But, here, a hacker is only used because an ethical hacker also has the same level of intelligence and knowledge in the field but they are using it for the benefit of government organizations and other organizations.
While most of the people visiting us today may already know this much difference in hacking and ethical hacking, so we will keep exploring further. Read on to understand the difference.
White Hat Hackers v/s Black Hat Hackers
| White Hat Hackers | Black Hat Hackers |
| Increases the security framework | Reduces security by stealing data |
| Develops a high-security structure | Gains access to accounts and sensitive data |
| Updates and regularly checks the security | Steals valuable data from the organization |
| Develops systems like firewall, ad blocker, etc. | Gains access to restricted areas |
Hackers Vs Ethical Hackers: Continued
While we have already explained the difference in a table format above, the topic is yet to conclude.
Let’s understand the story of hackers and ethical hackers in detail:
There are two people Jack and James. Both of them studied in the same engineering college and understood the concepts of coding from the same set of lecturers. However, since hacking illegally into the system seemed like an easy route, Jack chose to take it. He is now a known hacker who can easily get into any system and steal information.
He has already faced 4 lawsuits for cybercrime and he may face another one soon enough.
On the other hand, James is more knowledgeable than Jack and he has intricate knowledge of various coding languages. His company asked him to head the security unit of the country, which is why he has to travel a lot to coordinate with the teams. During one such visit, James was urgently called to City X to look into a matter.
One of the government officials had visited James company for help so they called in their favourite person. The government database was being attacked and there was no way to stop the hacker. Many experienced professionals gave up because the hacker just won’t stop!
So, James stepped in and used various white hat techniques to close the door and push the hacker out. Of course, it took him a considerable amount of time but he was able to do it.
James received a promotion, appreciation, and recognition. James is happily helping others. Jack, on the other hand, has been identified and soon he will be presented in front of the judge. Now, there is no way for jack to get out of the situation because he can’t hack his way through this issue.
You get the point!
White hats are good hackers who would help the organization keep the reliability, security and integrity of the company intact. But, black hats are evil-minded people who will steal away your money, customer data, and utilize it wrongly.
White hats have a high industry demand and basically, many developers and testers look up to them. This is because even after knowing how to hack into any system, these individuals utilize their knowledge in the right direction.
You can find ethical hackers under different job roles, such as red team, blue team, cybersecurity professionals, network security professionals, etc. All these people are ethical hackers just with a different job name.
Conclusion
Ethical hackers offer a safety net to your organization. They will keep your network, email, systems, and database security. You can run up to them as soon as you start noticing any glitch. In fact, in the presence of these people, glitches are addressed even before you notice.
Hackers are different. Their only motive is to encroach information.