Hi, I often get questions or see people write things like; "Hey I found some open ports, maybe they are hackable" or "The target got open ports, so hacking it is easy" and more stupid things like that.
First. A open port means nothing. It CAN mean everything, but not necessarily. In order for a open port to be interesting, it needs a service/program or whatever you choose to call it, listening on the port. If there are no programs using the port, its not interesting. It is not the port itself that are being hacked when you hack on a specific port. Its the software using the port. A port is nothing more than a value on a packet.
So how do you go from open port to hacked? Its quite simple, here it is..... CODE FLAWS!
Hacking services are the same as exploiting code flaws. If the coder of the service forgot to check/secure his buffers/user input that would be a code flaw most likely leading to a bufferoverflow. With a successful bufferoverflow there are some serious great ods you will pwn the system. If you know what you are doing that is.
My 11 cents.