5 Key Steps to Identify Penetration Testing Specialists          

Penetration testing is an effective technique for identifying areas in a system that are vulnerable and through which intruders, unauthorized users can get inside. It is well known that the provision of this kind of testing allows you to find out the current assessment of security, vulnerability and identify, and subsequently eliminate weaknesses. But it is worth noting that not everyone can conduct such testing, because in order to obtain an accurate result, a clear understanding of what is happening and knowledge of various types of tests are necessary. Testing is carried out by specially trained people for this. The procedure is carried out through deliberate attacks on the system, which make it possible to identify these weakest areas, as well as to detect gaps in the program for their further elimination and increase in the security level of the system as a whole.

Not infrequently, application penetration testing services are resorted to as an additional check in combination with other methods, which allows you to most accurately assess the effectiveness of the security complex and its ability to deal with various kinds of attacks.

Causes of vulnerability

The security of the system can be shaken due to the influence of various factors and at different stages. Key reasons include:

• errors were made during the design process. Often this happens at the design stage;
• failures during network connection;
• the work was performed by insufficiently qualified, poorly trained employees;
• communication errors;
• incorrect setting of functions and tasks;
• high level of complexity of the program

It also happens that the cause of a system vulnerability is a deliberate mistake by an employee who specifically decides to leave a loophole for hackers.

When is software testing required?

Penetration testing, also known as “pentesting”, will help any enterprise to identify security gaps and reduce to zero threats of penetration into it, theft of confidential information, unauthorized financial transfers, and so on. This technology will be useful for:

1. Startups. Young enterprises that plan to cooperate with other companies, before concluding a cooperation contract, will definitely ask if a penetration test was carried out. This will help ensure their high level of security.
2. Medium business. Such companies are constantly working on expansion, so the enterprise environment will often change, new businesses will be added. And each time you will need to contact the company’s software security testing services.
3. Large enterprises. In this case, you will need enterprise application development services and penetration testing services. Large corporate companies need this to avoid large financial losses, maintain status as well as a strong reputation.

This is not just a valuable measure for any enterprise, but also a forced one, unless, of course, one wants to discover the loss of important data or bare zeros on a corporate account one day.

Five Important Steps of Penetration Testing

Every experienced software security analyst knows what steps need to be taken to conduct a detailed analysis of the program, identify any existing gaps in the system or confirm their absence. To do this, the professional goes through the following steps:

1. Planning. This time is for listing goals, documenting them, and calculating scope, timing, and rules for future testing.
2. Intelligence service. Collection and analysis of key information about software and infrastructure, respectively.
3. Search for errors. The main stage, which is intended to assess vulnerabilities and identify weak areas in the program through testing, various forms of verification and research.
4. Exploitation. This is the final active step, in which all the problems and vulnerabilities that have been found are used to calculate the true level of risk and all possible problems for the program that could happen if these holes were not calculated. In this way, false test results can be minimized.
5. Report. After the procedure is carried out, a detailed report is compiled with the results.

When all reports and documents are prepared, the performer will be able to review and analyze them with the client in order to give a full assessment and explain everything in simple terms.

Types of Security Code Verification

Testing can be manual or automatic. In the first case, a standard program is used to check the system. It is represented by the above five-step scheme.

As for automatic analysis, in this case special technologies and tools are used.