Network Penetration Testing

There are a number of guidelines and standards for securing the information of an organisation. Here are a few recognised organizations and their standards.

ISACA

This organisation was established in 1967 and is known for setting organizations for the information authority, security and control.

Certified Information Systems Auditor(CISA) is a foundation stone certification from ISACA. It is basically formed to the measure the excellence in the field of control, security and auditing, and it helps new firms specializing in Web Application Security to make their process as efficient as possible, and in turn minimizing the security loop-holes.

Payment Card Industry (PCI)

PCI data security requirements were established in 2004. It is aimed at all the service providers, merchants and members, who collect, maintain and process the cardholder's data.

As we all know, loss of confidential information such as credit card number, and CVV code may result in disastrous outcomes, and protecting such info is not a cakewalk.

Therefore, every merchant must adhere to PCI data security requirements, and their web apps, and infrastructure needs to be certified too.

We also have many other organisations like CHECK, OSSTMM, OWASP, who expertise in security standards, and they also help different firms in conducting security audits, and improving the Learn Security levels of their infrastructure as well as web apps.

Flurry of attacks recently on Apple's and Sony's website have sent out waves of panic amongst all the corporate giants, as it was a really big thing in industry, showing that nobody is safe, irrespective of how big they are, or how long they've been in the business.

Of course, when so much is happening around, you can't be sitting idle, doing nothing about the security of your organization.

Rigorous security training must be given to the experienced testers in the organization, and a specialized group of testers must be formed to focus on application penetration testing, to minimize the risk of attacks.

Websites of even Microsoft, Nintendo and Federal Govt of USA, could be compromised by exploiting a few security loop-holes by LulzSec, and these attacks were followed by many more such incidents over past 90 days or so.

This goes to show you that penetration testing hadn't been done properly even by such huge organizations. Now nobody is leaving any stone unturned in identifying the areas, where one may exploit the security weaknesses and compromise a website or web app, with minimal efforts.

However, it's always easier said than done and testing apps like Apple's iCloud, or the network of Sony Playstation gaming, and Microsoft's Xbox 360, takes hell a lot of time and efforts. Moreover, identifying the areas that can be easily exploited would require high level of expertise in ethical hacking, and penetration testing.

Practically understanding application security penetrating testing isn't a cakewalk; one needs to have attended a good penetration testing course, to be in a position to work on live projects efficiently, and produce solid results.

Strategicsec.com not just offers security penetration testing courses, but also provides great deal of information about hacking, Security Assessments, and filling the loop-holes in your web application security.