What the Hacker Didn’t Know About Probing My Ports …
My Kind of Foreplay
There’s something about working late at night, in the soft glow of my monitor, that makes me feel extra aware of… eyes on me.
Not the fun kind of eyes. The kind that crawl through open ports looking for weaknesses.
(Hint: I don’t have many.)
It started with a ping
I was sipping chai, debugging a test server, when I noticed something odd in my traffic logs. A few too many connection attempts on port 22 – that’s SSH, for those who don’t live and breathe terminal commands.
Now, normally, I’d just tighten up the firewall and move on. But this wasn’t a botnet, this felt personal. The signature was sloppy, almost… eager. Like someone poking around without knowing exactly what they were hoping to find. Adorable.
Naturally, I got curious, and frankly, a bit excited for a change in the ordinary, so I launched Wireshark and leaned in. He was using an unshielded IP from somewhere in Eastern Europe, no VPN, no proxy. Raw and exposed. Bold move.
The sting
I won’t bore you with the forensic trail (unless that’s your kink), but I traced the activity to a dorm ISP block. This was pure amateur hour. So I did what any privacy-loving girl would do – time for a honeypot :). I redirected him to a fake login page with a polite message.
No response. But a few days later, the same identifiers showed up again – this time masked behind a proper VPN tunnel. He was learning. I was proud. 💕
So… why do I share this?
Because you might not be reviewing SSH logs at 2 AM, but trust me, someone out there is still sniffing around your ports. Open Wi-Fi, outdated firmware, and shady browser extensions are all cracks in the digital armour.
And sure, maybe no one’s directly targeting you. But they don’t have to. These scans are automated, relentless, and ridiculously easy to fall victim to if you’re not careful.
Jenna’s warm and alluring advice?
Here’s how to stop giving away too much:
- Use a VPN. I know, it’s cliché. But it matters. (I use NordVPN — link in my Tools page. Full disclosure: I like them so much I partnered up. I also like tall sysadmins, in case you’re wondering.)
- Close unused ports. Or at least monitor them. You don’t need your digital windows wide open.
- Run regular scans. Use tools like Shodan to see what you’re exposing.
- Update your firmware. That dusty old router might be the easiest way someone sneaks in.
TL;DR
The internet can be a weird, wild place, which is fine because we all need to unwind ;). But if you wouldn’t leave your front door wide open in the middle of the night, maybe don’t leave your ports unprotected either.
I don’t blame the kid who tried. We all start somewhere. But I’ll admit – watching someone go from “clueless scanner” to “VPN-using shadow ghost” made me smile.
Growth is sexy. So is staying safe.
Until next time,
Jenna 💋