The term "Ethical Hacking" refers to security professionals who employ their
hacking skills for defensive purposes. It involves using computer and
networking expertise to help organisations test their network security for
potential gaps and vulnerabilities.
Ethical Hackers perform hacking with the permission of the network or system
owner and without the intention of causing harm. They usually employ the same
tools and techniques as hackers, with the important exception that they do not
damage the system and report all vulnerabilities to the system and network
owner for remediation, thereby increasing the security of an
organization.
Although this is a beneficial practice, attackers are usually more interested
in using newer, lesser-know vulnerabilities (known as zero-day exploits), and
so these by-the-numbers system audits are not sufficient. That is where
Ethical Hacker comes into the picture as what and how they are doing is
completely open, transparent and always legal. That is why performing an
ethical hack is necessary for an organization.
Ethical hackers determine the scope of the security assessment according to
the client's security concerns. One should know the penalties for unauthorized
hacking,
- No ethical hacker should begin the test without receiving a signed legal document giving permission to perform hacking on the organization.
- Maintain confidentiality during the test, as one can gather information that might contain sensitive information.
- Execute the test within the set boundaries but not beyond them. For example, one should perform DoS attacks only if they have previously agreed upon this with the client. This may cause a loss of revenue or goodwill to clients' customers.
However, there are limitations too. There probably won't be much to
learn unless the company first knows what it wants and why it hired an
outside professional to hack its systems in the first place. Thus it is up
to the organization to place the right safeguards on the network, an ethical
hacker can only help to better understand the security systems.
We hope this helps. If any suggestions or doubts you can add a comment and
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