A Complete Guide to the Phases of Penetration Testing
Tags: penetrationtesting, softwaretesting
Published: 2022-05-19 12:25:44


Penetration testing is considered to be an efficient testing method when it comes to identifying vulnerabilities in IT security systems. The ethical hacker performs pen testing in a tactical manner to identify security loopholes and thus fix them at the earliest. To carry out the pen testing process in a streamlined and efficient manner, a phased approach is implemented. In this article, you will get to know the six phases of penetration testing.

## [What is Penetration testing](what is penetration testing	)?

It is a testing method where an application or infrastructure is assessed for vulnerabilities so that these vulnerabilities can be exploited. The security features of system components are defeated by carrying out manual testing rigorously. These vulnerabilities may exist due to reasons such as disclosure of sensitive information, poorly designed architecture, insecure code and misconfiguration. Penetration testing is also known as “Pen Testing.”

An actionable report is developed wherein details pertaining to each vulnerability that has been used to gain access to a target and the specific steps that are required to exploit them along with the key details to fix them are mentioned.  


![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/2teec7o2pi0xi0u5c2v9.jpg)

## Following are the six phases of penetration testing:

**1. Strategic planning:**

In this phase, the pen testing company will focus on the goals and objectives the customer would like to achieve, consider legal implications and also outline the logistics of the test. The pen testing team will work closely with the client company to understand and analyze the best pen testing strategy, organizational culture and also know if there are any risks that need to be addressed.

The team must decide whether they want to perform a grey box, black box, or white box pen test. The goals must be aligned with the testing outcomes.

**2. Gathering Open Source Intelligence:**

Crucial and important intelligence about the organization is gathered by the pen testing team and also identifying potential targets to exploit. Depending upon the type of pen testing, varying degrees of information are provided by the penetration tester about the organization. In another scenario, crucial information needs to be identified on its own, so that vulnerabilities can be uncovered and the specific entry points in the environment can be scrutinized.

**Following are a few intelligence gathering techniques:**

• Social engineering 
• Dumpster diving
• Internal Footprinting - packet sniffing, reverse DNS, port scanning
• Internet Footprinting - social networks, email addresses
• WHOIS lookups/Domain name searches
• Search engine queries 

**3. Identifying vulnerabilities:**

During this phase, the targets are identified by the tester and the attack vectors are mapped. The information that has been gathered in the previous phase informs and ascertains the method of attack during the testing activity.

**Following are the specific areas that are identified and mapped by a tester:**

3.1: Business assets – categorize and identify high-value assets
• Technical data
• Customer data
• Employee data.

3.2: Threats – Categorizing and identifying internal and external threats
• Internal threats – Vendors, employees, management etc.
• External threats – Network traffic, Web applications, Network protocols, Ports etc.

**4. Analyzing the exploitation activity:**

When there is a map of all entry points and possible vulnerabilities, the testing activity for the exploits that have been found within your data, applications and network is initiated by the pen tester. The goal is to assess how far the ethical hacker can go into the environment so that high-value targets are identified.

If a scope has been established, then the pen tester will go as per the guidelines that have been documented during the initial scoping.  

Following are some of the key exploitation tactics:
• Zero-day angle 
• Wi-Fi attacks
• Memory-based attacks
• Network attacks
• Web application attacks.

**5. Understanding and analyzing post-exploitation activity:**

After the exploitation phase has been successfully completed, the next step is where the specific methods that are used for gaining access to the organization’s important information are documented. The value of the compromised systems needs to be determined by the pen tester and also any associated value that has captured the sensitive data.

The impact of accessing data is not properly quantified by some pen testers and is unable to provide specific recommendations on how the vulnerabilities can be remediated within the environment. A penetration testing report should be prepared by the team that clearly shows specific solutions for fixing security vulnerabilities.

Once the specific recommendations pertaining to pen testing are completed, the environment should be cleaned by the tester and the access need to be reconfigured that has been obtained to penetrate the environment.

**Following are a few clean-up activities:**

• Rootkits that have been installed in the environment need to be eliminated
• User accounts need to be removed that have been created to connect to the compromised system
• Settings can be reconfigured back to the original parameters
• Removing any temporary files, scripts and executables from the compromised systems.

**6. Assessing reporting activity:** 

All the written recommendations are documented, so that the findings can be tactically reviewed. The detailed explanations and findings presented in the report will offer more opportunities and in-depth insights to significantly improve the security aspects. The detailed report also includes the overall security risk score.

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/vmlresayft2v3lh6ikss.jpg)

**Conclusion:** 

If you are looking forward to implementing pen testing for your specific organization, then do get connected with a premium **[software testing services company](https://www.testingxperts.com/services/test-automation/gb-en)** that will provide professional consultation and support on developing a crystal-clear pen testing strategy. 

_**About the author:** I am a technical content writer focused on writing technology specific articles. I strive to provide well-researched information on the leading market savvy technologies._