Flowing through the net is an all day activity. Many people don't leave their workplaces anymore. The virtual world offers all somebody needs. Intruding an other system however is nothing one should do while taking lunch. A hack is always risky. If you are not afraid about intruding someone else's system anymore, you are dead.

The story of a successful one is usually at least a 2 step approach. First you spy on the system. Find weakpoints. Monitor defenses. Note updates. Learn as much as you can without being seen.

It is of course normal that the defenses of a place are very carefully adapted to the system itself. So the home team already got an advantage here, but if you know what you are up to you can try to use the defenses against themselves. Of course some people just take a big gun and ram through the main portal. However, unless you plan to hack the diary of a kid, that is not recommended behavior.

Once you got enough information about the system it is time to load up an intrusion AI. You should by now know which one would be suited best for the task.
Also one better prepares the procedures that might be useful; all the libs usually have a huge procedure cache, space is not the problem here.

Like a predator the hacker will wait outside the security perimeter. Then when the system is at low protection it is time to make ones run. No matter how well picked, one will always encounter security bots, more likely even a human beings. Now the tricky part starts. It is obvious that sooner or later an intruder will be caught. So to make your day you have to get in, disable the defenses for a second, grab your data and then move your butt out of the region fast.

No matter from which side one views a hack (attacker or defender) the basic principle is always the same. Get rid of your opponent(s) fast. Getting rid as in disconnect him. Doing so by attacking his sockets, by intruding his lib or by crashing his deck is purely a matter of taste. Of course some attack forms are more mean then others.

Whatever you decide for, make it fast. Don't toy with your prey. Once the opponent is out you got your will. If you are the defender - congrats; you will probably not see the attacker again, especially if you damaged his deck. If you are the attacker - quick - grab the data and run. Other defense mechanisms will soon start up. Cover your traces any enjoy the data packets you menaged to take. Just hope they are the right ones, for same backdoors won't work again...