What Are Pen Tests and What Is Their Goal?

In the current century, security is an essential aspect of every activity. It concerns even the simplest things, for example, when we leave home and nobody is in a flat or house, a closed door is a must. The same situation is relevant for a car. Or one more example, people do not tell every stranger the pin code of their credit cards.

But if to think broader, huge corporations do the same - they just 'close their door not to have their data stolen'. In the IT field, a special attention is paid to the system security. The specialists of software testing company perform a set of special tests in order to define security vulnerability.

The test team executes compliance audit, access control testing, security assessment, penetration testing, vulnerability scanning, etc. Each such procedure possesses a special purpose, algorithm of execution and other specific features. It is important to clearly understand the types of security testing and distinguish each of them. Now it is the time to review the peculiarities of pen testing.

What Is the Specifics of Penetration Testing?



The goal of penetration testing is not just to detect the system vulnerability but also to define its details in order to prove that the attack of such a type is possible in a real-life condition.

Pen testing evaluates the level of security effectiveness under the conditions of a real world. It is impossible to be fully protected from every threat of skilled hacker or malware.

Automated tools and frameworks can be used during penetration testing but their effectiveness is rather doubtful. It can be explained by human nature. Hackers do not follow the standard patterns - they think outside the box and the machine cannot predict unusual human actions.

While conducting penetration tests, different attack vectors can be applied for checking the same target. At the same time, such tests can explore one target by following one attack vector.

The factors mentioned above should be taken into account by the test team. It is obvious that security testing should be included into SDLC. But why is it necessary to perform exactly penetration tests?

The Reasons for Executing Penetration Testing:



detecting of higher-risk system vulnerabilities,

evaluating the security strength against specific attack vectors,

checking the work of network defenders,

discovering of system weak points that may be omitted by automated tools or scanning frameworks,

providing the re-creation of the attack chain,

ensuring the validation of new security controls.

There are a lot of reasons to perform penetration testing. And it is easy to understand that pen tests are worth being invested in.

To perform mobile, desktop or web site testing efficiently these methods should be adjusted for each company and each project.
QATestLab is independent, offshore software testing company located in Kiev, Ukraine. QATestLab performs testing of products on each stage of software development cycle.


 By Nataliia Vasylyna



Article Source: What Are Pen Tests and What Is Their Goal?