This video provides an overview of the entire course.

The aim of this video is to explain how to install Kali Virtual Machine.

• Download the VMware workstation player

• Complete the installation

• Log in with the configured ID and password   

The aim of this video is to explain setting up Metasploitable2.

• Get to know what Metasploitable2 is

• Learn why it is needed

• Go through the steps to set up 

The aim of this video is to learn to set up Kali VM after installation.

• Install VMware tools in kali Linux

• Set up the VM settings

• Run the command and update the machine

The aim of this video is to learn to install third-party software on Kali VM.

• Learn how to install the Debian package

• Install the tar.gz or tar.bz2 package

• Run the command

To start with Penetration Testing, it is essential to understand  what it is and how it is different from Vulnerability Assessment. Also, a  Pentester needs to know the various types of Pentest.

• Get to know about Penetration Testing

• Explore the difference between Penetration Testing and Vulnerability Assessment

• Differentiate between Black Hat, White Hat, and Grey Hat Penetration Testing

As a Pentester, it should be a practice to follow well-known  standards and methodologies to have the maximum benefit from an  activity. In this video, we will discuss about the two most well-known  standards—OWASP and PTES—to get in line with industry standards.

• Get introduced to the OWASP methodology

• Learn about the PTES methodology phase-wise

Before starting with the testing activity, all relevant  information with respect to the client’s requirements and expectation  from the activity should be well-defined. Gathering the client’s  requirements also helps the pentester define the flow of the testing  activity in a better way.

• Draw a questionnaire to devise all information from the client

• Identify the internal and external stakeholders to understand their requirements

• Get the identified requirements validated by the client

Once the client’s requirements have been gathered, it is necessary  to understand and define what needs to be tested and what not. Defining  the scope helps in developing transparency between the client and the  pentester and also setting the expectations right.

• Define what needs to be tested and what not

• Prepare a questionnaire to get clarity on scope

• Get the questionnaire validated by the client

As a pentester, having all the required tools at one place is the  best thing to happen. Kali OS provides a suite of pentesting tools, all  at one place.

• Understand the categorization of tools included in Kali

• Add/edit repositories in Kali

• Update and upgrade the OS for latest packages

When gathering information about the target device, port scanning  is an essential step. Nmap is the best available tool to perform port  scanning on the target device.

• Get introduced to Nmap as a pentesting tool

• Understand the various features provided by Nmap

• Run a sample scan using Nmap to understand its working

When a pentester finds a vulnerability, it has to be checked for  false positives and also to understand what impact it will have on the  device if exploited. The Metasploit framework provides the pentester  with the platform to exploit the vulnerabilities reported by the  scanning tools.

• Get introduced to the framework and its components

• Launch Metasploit either through the console or GUI

• Configure and run a exploit as sample

At times, a pentester would like to analyze the traffic being sent  and received in the network. Wireshark serves the purpose to work as  network packet analyzer. It can capture the packets and display them in a  detailed way.

• Set up Wireshark to get started with using it

• Select an interface and start to capture the packets

• Analyze the packets to find more information

When pentesting web applications, the pentester would like to read  through the HTTP packets being sent and received between the  application and the web server. Burpsuite is the best available proxy  tool to intercept and read these packets.

• Confirm Burp’s proxy listener is active and working

• Set up Buprsuite and the browser to work as proxy

• Start intercepting and analyzing the traffic

For a successful penetration test, it is essential to gather as  much information as possible about the target. Reconnaissance is the set  of process and techniques to discover and collect the required  information.

• Understand the difference between active and passive reconnaissance

• Determine the scope to conduct reconnaissance for Penetration Testing

• Discover information about the target and map the network

At times, a pentester would be having either the domain name or  the IP address of the target device and they would like to perform a  name server lookup. NsLookup is a nice tool to query the DNS and obtain  the domain name or the IP address.

• Get familiar with the working of NsLookup

• Query the mail exchange server records

• Query the name server record

Sometimes a pentester would like to display the route and measure transit delays of packets across an Internet Protocol network, or they  may want to gather information about the IP ranges around a given host.  Traceroute can be used to perform these activities.

• Run Traceroute on the target’s IP address

• Understand the number of hops between the tester and the target

• Change arguments to get more information using Traceroute

There would be scenarios when information about the target may be  available on the web. As a pentester, we should gather this information  also.

• Use Whois lookup to gather information such as domain name and IP address block

• Use Netcraft to see detailed information about a web server involved with a website

• Use Archive.org to get back-dated data about a website

When gathering information about the target by scanning, a single  scan may not yield juicy information. So, it’s necessary to run various  scans using Nmap to gather more information.

• Scan a single or multiple IP address

• Scan to perform host discovery

• Use Nmap scan to perform OS detection on the target

When a particular type of scan is blocked at the target end, it is  essential to have other scan type to execute. Nmap can scan in various  ways to help a pen tester.

• Run TCP connect scan and TCP stealth scan

• Execute UDP scan to determine information about UDP ports

• Run version detection to get version information about the services running on target

Scanning large networks manually can be tedious at times. The NSE  allows the pentester to write and use scripts to automate various  networking tasks.

• Understand the usage of NSE

• Perform a walkthrough of different categories of the scripts

• Run a script to understand its use

At times, using multiple scan type of Nmap may not yield much  information about any firewall before the target device. Nmap has more  advanced scan types for such situations. Multiple options can be  combined to run custom scan.

• Running scan using multiple scan options in one command

• Next run a detailed scan for any particular port or service only

• Cloak the scan with decoys to perform stealth scan

Scan results may be needed for future reference or for pushing  into other tools to make the next step of penetration testing easy. Nmap  allows to exports the results in formats which can be used later.

• First, we save the scan result in the default nmap format

• Next, we save the results in XML format

• Finally, we save the results in the grep format

Need a GUI for performing Network scanning? Zenmap is the solution. It’s the official GUI for Nmap Scanner.

• Understand the advantages of Zenmap over Nmap

• Walkthrough of Zenmap interface and options available

• Run a scan using Zenmap and analyze the results

While performing pen testing of a network, we may want to read  from or write to the network connection using TCP or UDP. Netcat is a  feature-rich utility which can be used to debug or investigate about the  network.

• Understand the features of Netcat

• Understand usage of Netcat with few examples

• Perform Banner grabbing using Netcat