Did you know that more than 5 billion records were breached last year, costing organizations $4.24 million? With the massive rise in cyber attacks in 2021, the expected evolution of cybercrime, and the increased adoption of digital transformation, the cybersecurity landscape will be more volatile in 2022 and beyond - causing an increase in the volume and complexity of attacks.
In preparation for the 2022 cyber forecasts, organizations need a robust penetration testing policy to stay a thousand steps ahead of malicious cyber actors. Read on to know what penetration testing is and why your organization needs it.
What is Penetration Testing?
Penetration testing, also known as ethical hacking, is a security process where ethical hackers simulate a cyber attack for the purpose of testing computer systems, applications, networks, websites, etc., to know if there are exploitable vulnerabilities. Pentesting helps companies to score the integrity of their security policies and enables them to implement remediation strategies to reinforce security and ensure best practices across the board.
Penetration testers use strategies and tools made for exploiting systems to evaluate the robustness and effectiveness of security frameworks. The result of the test is used to design effective security mechanisms.
Why is Penetration Testing Important?
Here are the top benefits of security penetration assessment:
Attack Prevention
The major objective of pentesting is to assess the integrity of security mechanisms and to discover weaknesses in the security architecture. This helps companies to spot and plug loopholes before cybercriminals take advantage of them. Without security assessment, most organizations would trust their systems without knowing there are exploitable vulnerabilities.
Preparation for Attacks
Simulating cyberattacks and instituting remediation processes in controlled environments enables organizations to learn how to respond to cyber-attacks. This makes attacks less frustrating and demanding to contain.
Financial Benefits
Spending money and time on penetration testing is worth it because it can save you the cost of cleaning up an attack and business problems that come with a security breach. For instance, if your business is down for 48 hours because of a vulnerability a malicious hacker exploited, you will lose money and customers.
Penetration Testing Methodologies
There are different approaches to penetration tests. Each approach has a distinct cost implication. The methodologies of penetration testing include:
- Black Box Pentest
- Gray Box Pentest
- White Box Pentest
Black Box pentest: In this approach, the test is performed just like the way a real attacker would. Little or no information about the target system is given. The tester is only provided with the target organization’s URL or IP address. The attack surface is large and the ethical hacker has to conduct research and attack the system based on their findings.
Gray Box pentest: Here, ethical hackers start looking for vulnerabilities, with and without the target organization providing relevant details.
White Box pentest: Unlike black-box penetration testing, the tester is given as much information as possible about the target system.
Not sure Which Pentest Suits You Best?
If you are not sure which pentest methodology or type suits you best, we are here to help you. Contact us today! At WebSec, we specialize in pentesting and other superior information security services by delivering unbeatable high-quality work at the best rates. With us, you are sure of flexible and comprehensive pentesting.
You can find more information about our pentesting services here.