What is Ethical Hacking | Ethical Hacking ???

 Ethical Hacking

Ethical hacking and ethical hacker are terms used to describe hacking performed by a company or individual to help identify potential threats on a computer or network. An ethical hacker attempts to bypass system security and search for any weak points that could be exploited by malicious hackers. This information is then used by the organization to improve the system security, to minimize or eliminate any potential attacks. Ethical hacking involves an authorized attempt to gain unauthorized access to a computer system, application, or data. Carrying out an ethical hack involves duplicating strategies and actions of malicious attackers. This practice helps to identify security vulnerabilities which can then be resolved before a malicious attacker has the opportunity to exploit them.

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Also known as “white hats,” ethical hackers are security experts that perform these assessments. The proactive work they do helps to improve an organization’s security posture. With prior approval from the organization or owner of the IT asset, the mission of ethical hacking is opposite from malicious hacking. 

Key Concepts Of Ethical Hacking

1. Stay legal - Obtain proper approval before accessing and performing a security assessment.
2. Define the scope - Determine the scope of the assessment so that the ethical hacker’s work remains legal and within the organization’s approved boundaries.
3. Report vulnerabilities - Notify the organization of all vulnerabilities discovered during the assessment. Provide remediation advice for resolving these vulnerabilities.
4. Respect data sensitivity - Depending on the data sensitivity, ethical hackers may have to agree to a non-disclosure agreement, in addition to other terms and conditions required by the assessed organization. 

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How Are Ethical Hackers Different Than Malicious Hackers ?

Ethical hackers use their knowledge to secure and improve the technology of organizations. They provide an essential service to these organizations by looking for vulnerabilities that can lead to a security breach. An ethical hacker reports the identified vulnerabilities to the organization. Additionally, they provide remediation advice. In many cases, with the organization’s consent, the ethical hacker performs a re-test to ensure the vulnerabilities are fully resolved. Malicious hackers intend to gain unauthorized access to a resource (the more sensitive the better) for financial gain or personal recognition. Some malicious hackers deface websites or crash backend servers for fun, reputation damage, or to cause financial loss. The methods used and vulnerabilities found remain unreported. They aren’t concerned with improving the organizations security posture.  

What Skills and Certifications Should an Ethical Hacker Obtain ?

An ethical hacker should have a wide range of computer skills. They often specialize, becoming subject matter experts (SME) on a particular area within the ethical hacking domain.

All ethical hackers should have :

■ Expertise in scripting languages.

■ Proficiency in operating systems.

■ A thorough knowledge of networking.

■ A solid foundation in the principles of information security.

Some of The Most Well-Known and Acquired Certifications Include :

● EC Council: Certified Ethical Hacking

● CertificationOffensive Security Certified Professional (OSCP) Certification

● CompTIA Security+

● Cisco’s CCNA Security

● SANS GIAC

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What Problems Does Hacking Identify ?

While assessing the security of an organization’s IT asset(s), ethical hacking aims to mimic an attacker. In doing so, they look for attack vectors against the target. The initial goal is to perform reconnaissance, gaining as much information as possible. Once the ethical hacker gathers enough information, they use it to look for vulnerabilities against the asset. They perform this assessment with a combination of automated and manual testing. Even sophisticated systems may have complex countermeasure technologies which may be vulnerable. They don’t stop at uncovering vulnerabilities. Ethical hackers use exploits against the vulnerabilities to prove how a malicious attacker could exploit it.

What are Some Limitations of Ethical Hacking ?

1. Limited scope : Ethical hackers cannot progress beyond a defined scope to make an attack successful. However, it’s not unreasonable to discuss out of scope attack potential with the organization.  
2. Resource constraints : Malicious hackers don’t have time constraints that ethical hackers often face. Computing power and budget are additional constraints of ethical hackers.
3. Restricted methods : Some organizations ask experts to avoid test cases that lead the servers to crash.

What Constitutes Ethical Hacking ?

For hacking to be deemed ethical, the hacker must obey the following rules -

1. Expressed (often written) permission to probe the network and attempt to identify potential security risks.
2. You respect the individual's or company's privacy.
3. You close out your work, not leaving anything open for you or someone else to exploit at a later time.
4. You let the software developer or hardware manufacturer know of any security vulnerabilities you locate in their software or hardware, if not already known by the company.

The term "ethical hacker" has received criticism at times from people who say that there is no such thing as an "ethical" hacker. Hacking is hacking, no matter how you look at it and those who do the hacking are commonly referred to as computer criminals or cyber criminals. However, the work that ethical hackers do for organizations has helped improve system security and can be said to be quite effective and successful. Individuals interested in becoming an ethical hacker can work towards a certification to become a Certified Ethical Hacker, or CEH. This certification is provided by the International Council of EC-Council (E-Commerce Consultants).

Every ethical hacker begins their asset hacking (excluding social engineering techniques for this discussion) by learning as much about the pen test targets as they can. They want to know IP addresses, OS platforms, applications, version numbers, patch levels, advertised network ports, users, and anything else that can lead to an exploit. It is a rarity that an ethical hacker won’t see an obvious potential vulnerability by spending just a few minutes looking at an asset. At the very least, even if they don’t see something obvious, they can use the information learned in discovery for continued analysis and attack tries.

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Ethical Hacking Tools :

Ethical hackers usually have a standard set of hacking tools that they use all the time, but they might have to look for and stock up on different tools depending on the particular job. For example, if the penetration tester is asked to attack SQL servers and has no relevant experience, they might want to start researching and testing different SQL attack tools. Most penetration testers start with a Linux OS “distro” that is specialized for penetration testing. Linux distros for hacking come and go over the years, but right now the Kali distro is the one most professional ethical hackers prefer. There are thousands of hacking tools, including a bunch of stalwarts that nearly every pen tester uses.

The most important point of any hacking tool, beyond its quality and fit for the job at hand, is to make sure it does not contain malware or other code designed to hack the hacker. The vast majority of hacking tools that you can get on internet, especially for free, contain malware and undocumented backdoors. You can usually trust the most common and popular hacking tools, like Nmap, but the best ethical hackers write and use their own tools because they don’t trust anything written by someone else.