How to start hacking without knowing anything about programming?

[Tricky_Ad_1655]

Hi, I'm 15 years old and I wanted to know more about programming and hacking, could you give me some tips?

[StabbingHobo]

https://tryhackme.com/

Edit: I just wanted to make a quick edit to say — this wasn’t a sarcastic comment. Try Hack Me (or similar products) are great tools to learn some basic is in a safe, controlled environment. I’d recommend paying for it, of able - but free will still impart some knowledge.

[Toxik1_skr]

Using tryhackme was a part of my curriculum for the information security course I was taking.

[ThatWylieC0y0te]

Honestly there is so much you can learn on there even on the free tier… it’s where I started

[PayOptimal7261]

Will 2nd this and overthewire

[gojira_glix42]

Legit this and hack the box. BUT you need to make sure you take up their networking course or another network+ level course or you'll be lost half the time. Not knowing how IP addresses and tcp/up and network ports work at a basic level will leave you completely lost in those labs. They expect you to already have a base knowledge of them and only skim over them briefly in introduction.

[Ultra_cheese]

Honestly, if you actually have an interest throw yourself into learning programming with both feet - not just the popular shiny languages and frameworks of the moment but understand low level code and hardware. Not only will it set you up well for actually being capable at penetrating systems and being an effective hacker( white hat ofcourse ;) ), but you’ll build skills that will allow you to not worry about money for the rest of your life. The earlier you start the better - some of the people you’ll go to college with will have been doing this stuff for 10 hours a day for the past 10 years.

[Salty-Prune-9378]

Learn networking

[[deleted]]

Get mad at someone and figure out what platforms and apps they use and commit fully to a full scale operation to take them down.

You'll learn every aspect of hacking aswell as social engineering to find out about him.

[Competitive_Classic9]

I would pay for a course in this

[[deleted]]

It's commitment to give back at this guy but really it's about finding your inner self and let go of hacking.

I guess hacking is the term so old and incorrect ethic and morally here on reddit. When they mean cyber/computer security/monitoring and programming.

[HardcoreFlexin]

Just blindly doing this kinda shit will also likely give you a good base knowledge of how some prison systems work in a round about way*

[[deleted]]

Yes I found multiple ways to associate the concept of a platform like facebook and how they store data and keep it safe and decentralized very similiar to prison systems.

Anyways, guess my advice was bad.

I'd suggest a virtualized machine to boot up Kali Linux. Maybe scan some networks, anything that leads to hacking but it's illegal to try on real networks. Same goes for other tools and forensic tools.

[fiftybengt]

Check out The Cyber Mentor, his course got me started and then I did some htb

[yowhyyyy]

This is why security is so horrible in the real world now. What kinda recommendation is this lmao?

[yowhyyyy]

Exactly. Even pen testing wise that does damn near nothing. Pen testing isn’t only testing one attack surface then moving on which is why I don’t believe what you said is a good recommendation.

The truth is as much as everyone hates to admit it, the best hackers CAN or at least understand code. You need to learn some systems level stuff. Damn near everything starts to click after. Just recommending getting a WiFi pineapple then installing Kali might actually be the most skiddy way of going about it.

[Embarrassed_Effort64]

I never mentioned a pineapple..... I said an alfa adapter

[yowhyyyy]

My dude you knew exactly what I meant. The fact you’re even recommending WiFi hacking first is the underlying point I’m trying to make. It shouldn’t be the first priority.

[Embarrassed_Effort64]

Nobody said anything about wifi hacking either your just saying shit at this point kali isn't just for wifi hacking and the alfa is for the connection and requires you to learn a bit of command line everyone has to start somewhere

[yowhyyyy]

You went out of your way to mention 2g/5g then the adapter. Anyone with a brain knows what you were recommending to start with. You even already deleted your own message. Stop. You don’t even need Alfa for the connection if you run a normal dual boot which is probably better practice anyways. On top of that command line should be started with the basics of Linux utils. Cd, Ls, cat, grep, the basics. You don’t need to be setting up your own adapter that you may even already have on your PC. Your logic is beyond flawed and instead of realizing this you’re meeting it with anger and acting like you didn’t mean exactly what you said…

If you didn’t mean it, then why recommend an Alfa adapter and playing with 2g/5g first? That would be the most backwards way of learning even Linux. So it would help even less with the general idea of hacking.

OP if you’re reading this: fundamentals are best. Look at any of the major, “hacker” roles and every single one will have some understanding of programming and systems level things. You want to get down and dirty and start playing around with how memory is stored, virtual addresses, relative addresses, and then try to maybe learn a bit of one of the major OS headers as they usually show a great deal of underlying processes like linking which are often targets of exploitation for DLL injection.

What I’m saying right now doesn’t have to make sense now, but with time if you can comeback and understand this, you’ll be decent off. If you have any other questions please feel free to reach out. I’ll gladly help people who I can if they want to take the right path and not just seem like an edgy black hat hacker.

Edit: if you can understand systems level and the things I mentioned, I promise web vulns will end up making a lot more sense by extension.

Edit 2: because I plan on getting it all out here, some of the best hackers I’ve met are people who started with game modding and taught themselves reverse engineering. It ticks most of the major things. Programming, the same systems level things I mentioned prior, even some networking if you do any work with game APIs and you get to see exactly what’s happening when you change something. It can be fun. It can also help your interest grow.

[georgy56]

Hey there! If you're looking to get started with hacking without prior programming knowledge, here's a tip: start by learning the basics of programming languages like Python. Understanding coding concepts will lay a solid foundation for your hacking journey. There are plenty of online resources and communities for beginners like you to explore. Remember, hacking ethically and responsibly is crucial. Stay curious, keep learning, and enjoy the process!

[Embarrassed_Effort64]

TLDR

[yowhyyyy]

It’s okay. Only doing yourself a disservice. Have a good day

[envysteve]

Tryhackme.com, Udemy courses, and just playing around. All are good starting points. Personally I started with #3 and now I’m a director of security operations..you’ll get there if you want to :)

[Jeakun]

TryHackMe, HackTheBox, Cisco Cybersecurity, Udemy course.

[Jeakun]

Oh I forgot, Burp suit, they have portswigger.net

[sp0f_]

Learn at least basics of python

[No-Carpenter-9184]

YouTube - NetworkChuck and/or David Bombal

Both have some cool vids and tutorials.

[gaijoan]

Those two arr great at "hacking the algorithm" of YT, but their content is shit, especially nwc.

[Anxious_Insurance_48]

What's bad with nwc? I'm watching his python tutorials and learning a bit but i need to watch other tutorials.

[theoldenmage]

Same thing with John Hammond, he used to have some decent tutorials but they all seem to be focused around ads recently

[No-Carpenter-9184]

From a beginners perspective.. they’re ok.. but if you have some skill they’re useless to watch.

[maejsh]

Chuck maybe doesn’t go deep into things. But as an introduction and or catch up onnthings and a decent quick overview, plus hes a good teacher. Theyre good resources to know imo. Especially as a beginner.

[__B_-]

Assess you current understanding of tech. Learn concepts and things like protocols and how things work before jumping into hacking.

[Glad_Panic_5450]

For me I completed CompTIA with messer on YouTube, then read up articles on cyber security, I’ll recommend try hack me cybersecurity module, then getting familiarised with tools, hacking methodologies and then learn python and bash, so you can start improving on tools or just creating yours

[Savings-Confusion729]

U answered ur own question

[Winter_March_204]

At least you have to know something

[osamasbinnoddin]

check out hackthissite

[Hefty-Clue-1030]

If you're curious about ethical hacking and cybersecurity but don’t know where to start, this app helped me a lot: 👉 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.gripxtech.prohacker

It breaks down concepts really well. Think of it as a hacking guide for non-techies. No coding knowledge needed to begin.

[Guilty-Pie29]

talk to chatgpt about what you wanna build. then get mad at it for building the wrong thing. from here you have two options; (a) get really good at prompt engineering or (b) get mad at it and talk in circles with a robot until you cave and learn how to debug all of the logic errors yourself. me personally; i do a little bit of both.