Phase II - External Vulnerability Assessment
This step identifies not only hosts and open ports, but also any other associated external vulnerabilities. The report will provide solutions and recommendations to provide information on eliminating discovered vulnerabilities.
The assessment attempts to identify vulnerabilities in the hosts selected for testing. The assessment will identify out-of-date software versions, applicable patches or system upgrades, and validate compliance with, or deviations from the organization's security policy. To accomplish this, the assessment identifies operating systems and major software applications running on hosts and matches them with known vulnerabilities.
Ask the company performing the security assessment if they solely rely on automated scanning tools or they have creative staff employed to take personal view of your Internet footprint. People are much better at detecting security holes then scanners, especially in web based applications.
Vulnerability assessment provides the following information:
- Identifying active hosts on a network with active services (ports) on hosts
- Identifying application and banner grabbing
- Identifying operating systems
- Identifying vulnerabilities associated with discovered operating systems and applications
- Testing compliance with host application usage/security policies
- Establishing a foundation for penetration testing
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