Ethical hacking can take persistence. Time and patience are important. Be
careful when you’re performing your ethical hacking tests. A hacker in your
network or a seemingly benign employee looking over your shoulder may
watch what’s going on. This person could use this information against you.
It’s not practical to make sure that no hackers are on your systems before
you start. Just make sure you keep everything as quiet and private as possible.
This is especially critical when transmitting and storing your test results.
If possible, encrypt these e-mails and files using Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) or
something similar. At a minimum, password-protect them.
You’re now on a reconnaissance mission. Harness as much information as
possible about your organization and systems, which is what malicious hackers
do. Start with a broad view and narrow your focus:
1. Search the Internet for your organization’s name, your computer and
network system names, and your IP addresses.
Google is a great place to start for this.
2. Narrow your scope, targeting the specific systems you’re testing.
Whether physical-security structures or Web applications, a casual
assessment can turn up much information about your systems.
3. Further narrow your focus with a more critical eye. Perform actual
scans and other detailed tests on your systems.
4. Perform the attacks, if that’s what you choose to do.