A report from 2018 found that there were 75 records stolen by hackers per second. This high rate of breaches to any organization’s security is considered to be a big threat to their operations and success. Another study from 2018 found that over 88% of enterprises in the United States had more than a hundred thousand folders open to the public out of every million folders. This easy access to their information makes it very easy for a hacker to breach their firewall and other security because the protection in place is sub-par, to say the least.
Companies have become more aware of the importance of protecting their online resources and information from hackers in the last two years and have invested in vulnerability scanning and penetration testing to protect themselves from further breaches by black hat hackers. This article on vulnerability scanning vs penetration testing discusses what they are and their main differences.
What Is Vulnerability Scanning?
Organizations participate in vulnerability scanning and undergo the process to find all the parts of their network web applications that can be exploited or breached by hackers. It is used to scan for all weaknesses in the systems of a company. The systems include all equipment used in communication, their networks as well as their web applications and computers.
A vulnerability scan can be conducted internally by the IT department of the organization or the company can choose to work with a third-party provider specializing in web security to perform the scan.
How does a Vulnerability Scan Work?
The vulnerability scanner scans for all the vulnerabilities that exist in any application or server. The software first checks for all information about the gaps in security in various applications or services and looks for different paths that hackers can use to exploit the organization’s existing programs. It is run on the possible attack surface, and the scan then tries to exploit each path and vulnerability that has been found.
There are two ways in which a vulnerability scan can be conducted. There are authenticated and unauthenticated scans that can be run by the testers. Authenticated scans are done by logging into the network as a user and looking for vulnerabilities from the user’s end. It focuses on finding vulnerabilities in case the hacker gains access as a user. The unauthenticated approach is used to find vulnerabilities in case the hacker gains access to the network as an intruder.
What Is Penetration Testing?
Penetration testing or ethical hacking is conducted as a process in which security professionals try to exploit the vulnerabilities in a system, network, or server. It is a simulated attack on a company’s server to expose all vulnerabilities that are easy to exploit. It is a way to measure an organization’s level of security and can be used as a means to improve it.
Penetration testing should ideally be performed by white hat hackers or cybersecurity professionals who do not have much knowledge of the security measures in place at an organization. Third-party contractors or professionals are usually hired to perform pen-testing activities so that they can find the flaws that exist in the organization’s security measures and improve upon them.
There are many types of penetration testing done by ethical hackers, such as:
- Open box penetration testing
- Closed box penetration testing
- Internal penetration testing
- External penetration testing
- Covert penetration testing
What Is The Penetration Testing Process?
Ethical hackers first gather all the information they can to plan their attack, after which the hacker tries to gain access to the company’s servers and systems and maintain it with different ethical hacking tools available in the market. There is multiple software available to assist ethical hackers that can simulate attacks or employ phishing methods to gain access. Once the hacker has access to the company’s system, they then remove any hardware that has been used to cover their tracks and avoid detection.
Once the penetration testing is complete, the white hat hacker informs the organization of the vulnerabilities that he/she has detected and gives suggestions on how the company can upgrade its security.
Vulnerability Scanning vs Penetration Testing
More often than not, organizations that do not have much knowledge of security systems and protection end up confusing vulnerability scanning and penetration testing to be the same. They do not engage in performing both but instead choose to go with just one. Even though both penetration tests and vulnerability scans are related to each other, they are not the same in any way. There are both important parts of cybersecurity and should be conducted hand-in-hand to protect the assets of the company.
When it comes to vulnerability scanning, its biggest role is to identify all existing and potential vulnerabilities to an organization’s security. This can include finding loopholes in the company’s firewall, servers, networks, applications, and routers. The scope of a vulnerability scan ends with identification itself. It can find all the vulnerabilities in an organization but cannot identify the ways in which these vulnerabilities can be exploited.
This is where penetration testing comes in. It uses all the identified vulnerabilities that were found in the vulnerability scan and creates simulated cyber attacks on the organization’s servers, applications, firewalls, and more. Ethical hackers attempt to attack each and every vulnerability that has been detected to generate reports on how exposed the organization is to different types of risk.
Both vulnerability scans and penetration tests are focused on three main factors:
- The scope of the risks and threats to the cybersecurity of an organization
- The cost and time for the scans or tests
- And how important each vulnerability or risk is to every asset of the company
Penetration testing is mainly conducted annually by employing third-party professionals who have the knowledge and expertise to expertly hack into an organization’s systems and servers and help the company employ measures to safeguard against them. Vulnerability scans are usually conducted more regularly and can be performed internally by the company’s IT department itself.
Final Thoughts
Vulnerability scanning and penetration testing are two sides of the same coin. Both are extremely important to companies because they help organizations find potential threats to their cybersecurity strategies and ways in which they can safeguard against them. They are crucial in reducing and eliminating risks to their cybersecurity, which is why only trained professionals should be in charge of conducting them.
Training in popular IT Security and Governance certifications for the IT teams in the company and for ethical hackers and vulnerability scanners are deemed important to help manage the risks towards cybersecurity for any organization. That’s it, folks! I hope you found this article on ‘Vulnerability Scanning vs Penetration Testing’ interesting and informative.
