Fatemah Alharbi is a doctoral candidate at the University of California, Riverside, in computer science, specializing in computer and network security 
Alharbi grew up in Saudi Arabia and never thought she would become a white-hat hacker. She was simply interested in addressing attacks and vulnerabilities.
During her doctoral studies at UC Riverside, however, she collaborated with professors who engaged in hacking with the aim of promoting system security.
Alharbi, along with some colleagues, wrote a paperthat will be presented at the IEEE International Conference on Communications, or INFOCOM, in Paris in April. The paper shows how hackers can use the Domain Name System, or DNS, to gain control of information. This hacking technique is called DNS cache poisoning.
DNS connects domain names to their corresponding IP addresses. Hackers can enter a malicious IP address for a web server they control. When this happens, instead of being taken to the site you typed in, you will be taken to a site controlled by the hackers, which looks like the real thing.
If you browse the site and enter passwords and other information, hackers will be able to access them and steal them.
Alharbi tested this attack on Microsoft Windows, macOS, and Linux. In all cases, the attacks were successful.
Alharbi and her colleagues notified companies, and Apple issued a patch to address the vulnerability in macOS.
Alharbi has achieved a lot in the field of IT. Her latest research, which discovered the above vulnerability, led Apple to publicly congratulate her and many companies to request cooperation with her.
Last year, she received an invitation to attend the Grace Hopper Celebration, the world's largest gathering of women in technology.
“Over 20,000 women participated and it was one of the best experiences of my life,” she said.
