What is a war dialer?

War dialer is a computer program that will call a preset book of phone numbers looking for computers, fax machines and other data devices. These programs are generally used for illegal or unethical practices and can be a common hacker tool. Because the basic technology uses phones and modems, practice is less common than in the 80s and 90s when this communication device was more frequent. A war dialer is similar to another obsolete hacking method called demon dialing, as well as other processes that are still used, such as port scanning and war control. In the Wargames , the program was used to dial all phones in one city. While previously there were programs of mass dialing phones, "Wargames Dialer" at that time became a popular name. Given the internet shortcut and the limit of eight characters on file names, the name eventually became a war dialer, and programs were often called ‘Wardial.exe. '

War dialer acts as an automatic phone. The program receives a preset list of numbers, often all phone numbers in one code or city. The program then dials the numbers one by one and is looking for data receivers. Common data devices such as fax or fax, machine or computer modem will answer one ring. If the phone rings twice, the dialer simply hangs and calls another number; If the data device responds, the number is recorded and disconnected.

Programs like this are not illegal in itself, but many people consider them unpleasant. The dialer calls the numbers in order, so the sequential phones can have a few minutes of false phone calls. If the dialing works long enough, it will also call the numbers all night. When you complete the dialing, the user will have a list of data devices. This list is also legal, but they are a springboard for other operations that are not.

Several other hacker processes are similar to war dialing. The almost outdated process called the Demon dial includes a single number call again and again. Dial servers have a code that prevents a drop when the signal is lost for a small time. If Demon Dialer returned the number when someone else disconnected, dialing would get access to his account.

There are two active hacking methods similar to war dialing. When the computer is scanned a port, the ports of the computer are pinged one by one because they are looking for those that are open. The hacker can use this list to find out whether specific programs are running on the machine or the likely access point is if they decide to invade. War ride includes going up and down streets looking for wireless internet hot spots. These places are cataloged and stored for later use.