Rating: 
Summary: Not for the beginner
Review: This book has helped me out a great deal in understanding how hackers do what they do. Now I more aware of what I can do to prevent being hacked, or is crackd?
This book is not for beginnners in the aspect that alot of it is command line programs, however, it is easy to understand how it works.
Rating: 
Summary: Take the time and you will learn.
Review: When I first saw this book at the store I skimmed through it expecting to find cliche' information for the newbie. Make no mistake, this book does *not* hold your hand through every tiny step, which is a good thing. Maybe that's why the other person only gave two stars? Some of the tools covered have been around for years and others are still in beta. Some of them are on the CD, most are free downloads on the net (visit antihackertoolkit.com for links to everything discussed). What the other reviewer said has some truth. The authors don't explain EVERY tool in extreme detail. However, they do way more than just re-hash the MAN pages. I know this for a fact because I read the MAN pages for every one of these tools after reading about it in the book. The authors pick the more robust and reputable tools and provides example scenarios using multiple machines (sometimes Win32, sometimes Linux, sometimes both) and you can see everything in action. There is no possible way the authors can through everything in b aby steps. It's up to you to take the information you learn from this book and make the most of it. There could easily be a 500 page book written on just netcat and nmap, but instead the authors teach you the foundation of what you need to know, provide some REALLY GOOD examples you can do at home, then you need to get creative. Believe me, the authors do an excellent job at getting you inspired. You won't want to stop! And if you really are in the hacker-mentality you will explore the web, perform searches on google, read newsgroups, and contunously dig for more information about the topics you're interested in. No one should have to tell you to do this as "hackers" already turn to every resource available for their information. Prior to reading this book I had not touched any of the Hacking Exposed series, which this book stems from. I relied on newgroups, 2600 Magazine, and a myriad of web sites. I knew about most of these tools and used about 40% prior. However, this book brings it all together, educates on pro-active and re-active hacking and counter-measures, and will leave you more than satisfied for getting your money's worth. Hey, you might even have a slightly bigger ego by the time you're done! If there is one word of advice about this book I can pass along - read it more than once! You will be so anxious to get to the end because of everything covered but I promise you that if you read it a second time you will pick more things up, similar to watching the same movie over and over, you always notice subtle (but interesting) details you didn't catch the first time.
Rating: 
Summary: Somewhat [weak] "tool book"
Review: While I admit that my low grade for this book stems from my prejudice against "tool books" (also known as "rephrase the man page"), the book indeed contains the biggest collection of command line options and screen shots gathered under one cover that ever saw the light of the day. The authors boast an impressive skill using (or, maybe, just describing) tools from Sub7 to snort and all the way to Outlook Express (by the way, featured as a forensic tool). This book, as other "tool books" currently in publication, is a list of network and system softwares with short (from one to several pages) descriptions. The descriptions provide little insight on how to use the tool BEST and how it compares to other methods of doing the same job. Tool books also get old very fast, thus providing publishers with a steady stream of revenue from selling "new" editions. The book also has minor problems with presentation style. While Windows email forensics can indeed be done with the help of Outlook, it probably does not earn make it title of a "Internet activity recovery tool". While snort (deemed to be "hard to use" by the authors) is indeed a sniffer, it most common use is for intrusion detection. Case studies in the book are somewhat fun and strive to illustrate the tool usage. In fact, without them the book will suffer significantly. Another advantage is an amazing breadth of coverage: from wireless tools to phone scanners and web exploit to forensics kits, the book has it all. Be aware, that a large portion of the tools (such as X Window system, VMWare, Midnight Commander and QuickView) are not security tools, but can be used while doing security projects. Overall, the book will save some time searching the web for the same information and might appeal to those with little or no security experience. It will also be useful for people too lazy to type "toolname -h" (for UNIX tools) or click "Help" (for Windows tools). The book seems to be written by knowledgeable people and the information contained therein is mostly accurate. ...
Rating: 
Summary: OK as reference
Review: While reviewing the second edition of the AntiHacker Toolkit, I managed to keep my general disdain towards tool books (see my review for a first edition) in check. Thus, I managed to find the book more valuable than the first edition. I liked that the authors framed the book as being "about tools" and not "about security". The book will not teach you security concepts, but rather what the current tools are and (to some extent) how to use them. The book offers coverage of Windows and UNIX, attack and defense (and investigation) tools. As the authors state, it does indeed make a good companion for "Incident Response" by providing a bit more details on the tools. Reading up on the methodologies before starting on the tools is a good idea. I also liked that they highlighted the changes and new material added for the second edition. However, if the book offers to cover a laundry list of tools, some omissions look pretty suspicious. Where is Bastille in "Host Hardening"? Where is "scanrand" in scanners? Some tools (such as Nessus and Snort as well as commercial scanners) would have justified a bit more details (due to their relative complexity and diverse functionality). The book will make a valuable addition to a library of a security professional. Although most or even all of the information there is available online after some googling, having it in one place is not a bad idea. Anton Chuvakin, Ph.D., GCIA, GCIH is a Senior Security Analyst with a major security information management company. He is the author of the book "Security Warrior" (O'Reilly, 2004). His areas of infosec expertise include intrusion detection, UNIX security, forensics, honeypots, etc. In his spare time, he maintains his security portal info-secure.org
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