There were a large variety of websites that explained techniques for hacking and cracking, one example being www.hnc3k.com. This site offered tutorials on hacking and cracking as well as downloadable applications for creating viruses.
The following hacking/cracking techniques were explained:
• MS-DOS hacking
• Hacking CGI
• Hacking with XP
• How to deface a website
• Bypass-black ice defender and zonealarm (firewalls)
• How to crack Visual Basic v5.0 – v6.0 Applications
It appears that the only way to prevent utilization of these techniques on your PC’s is to make sure that you are running up to date security/virus detection applications, and utilizing a robust firewall. Clearly however just from perusing media articles these measures are often not enough and a determined hacker will still be able to bypass these measures.
No, I do not believe that these detailed instructions should be freely available on the internet, as it encourages amateur hackers and crackers.
No, if network administrators were going to monitor hack sites that is all they would spend their days doing given the proliferation of sites. They should rather subscribe to a authoritative security advisory service to keep updated on current and new hacking/cracking activities, and to get advice on problem solving with regard to these activities. However, one of the risks of going to a hack site is that you may be opening yourself up to being hacked, or having your PC/networks infected with viruses/spyware/Trojans.