4 Areas that every Penetration Tester should be able test

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What is a Penetration Tester?

Almost every week you hear a story about a company getting hacked with millions of customer data stolen. You might also hear of another company discovering a huge vulnerability in their network that would have caused a lot of damage and cost a lot. But how do vulnerabilities where hackers can breach a network get discovered? That is where a penetration tester comes into play.

A penetration tester is an ethical hacker that tests a network, including everything from the individual computer system down to its applications, even physical security. They are normally hired by organizations and companies to test the security of their building and/or network.

4 areas a penetration tester tests:

Security policy
Cyber awareness of employees
Physical security
Vulnerability patches

Once the penetration tester is finished with what they were hired to do, they will create a report and present it to leadership with thorough findings and recommendations on how to mitigate vulnerabilities.

A Day in the Life of a Penetration Tester

The following video is a great representation of the daily activities of a licensed penetration tester:

How to Become a Penetration Tester

A penetration tester will use real-world scenarios and/or tricks to try and exploit any vulnerability they can find. The way they perform their test should be as real as possible to imitate what someone with malicious intentions would do. In order to become a penetration tester, you need to have a lot of technical knowledge including programming and scripting. But most importantly you need to be licensed.

“With the Equifax incident and the multitude of other data security breaches in recent years, the need for skilled, vetted penetration testers has increased for the world’s organizations. The LPT (Master) exam simulates a real-world environment and requires candidates to correctly identify any security threats and weaknesses against social, physical, network and application attacks.” – EC-Council’s President, Jay Bavisi

Obtaining the Licensed Penetration Tester Master (L|PT Master) proves that you have the real-world know-how of penetration testing. One of the main goals of the L|PT (Master) program is to not just test your knowledge of penetration testing but to put the pressure of being watched while you do so. The L|PT (Master) exam is built on EC-Council’s Advanced Penetration Testing Cyber Range (ECCAPT), which consists of the following:

100% hands-on
180 machines
250 GB of RAM
Over 4TB of storage
5 to 8 subnets in every range
Over 15 Windows and Linux flavors

5 Reasons why L|PT (Master) is the best penetration testing certification

When comparing the L|PT (Master) exam to another penetration testing exam, there are a few notable differences. Here are 5 things the L|PT (Master) teaches every candidate:

The APT Penetration Testing Methodology
To use a wide array of penetration testing tools
To achieve consistent results
To achieve specific objectives
To produce an accurate penetration test report, complete with effective remediation recommendations

Get ahead of other penetration testers in the industry!

Take the advanced penetration testing challenge now. Become an LPT Master

Faqs

What does a penetration tester do?

Penetration testing, also called pen testing or ethical hacking, is the practice of testing a computer system, network or web application to find security vulnerabilities that an attacker could exploit. Penetration testing can be automated with software applications or performed manually.

Can penetration testers work from home?

Freelance pentesters have the liberty of working from wherever they want unless they get subcontracted to work on on-site jobs that require them to travel. Otherwise, they can work from the comfort of their homes if they have reliable Internet connections, or from cafes or malls.

Are penetration testers in demand?

It’s no secret that the security industry suffers from a severe skills shortage. Amongst the many cybersecurity positions companies are currently challenged to fill are penetration testers’ roles. However, of all the skills that are in high demand and short supply, pen-testing shouldn’t be one of them.