Working Procedure of Vulnerability Scanning
The process of Vulnerability Scanning involves multiple systematic steps. All of them are explained below in brief:
- Finding and Creating an Asset Inventory: The first step of the scanning is to identify the assets of the system that will be scanned and then their details such as the Operating System, Network, Servers, Ports, Workstation, etc are mapped within the scope of the scanning.
- Initiating the Scanning: The next step is the initiation step, here the scanning tool i.e. scanner starts scanning the assets that were marked and gathered in the previous step for the known vulnerabilities. Various scanning techniques like Port Scanning, Service Identification Vulnerability detection, etc are being used by them.
- Detection of Vulnerability: Now the scanner detects vulnerabilities by comparing the characteristics of the target asset with a database of known vulnerabilities stored in them. If the match is found, it means that there is a known vulnerability present in that particular asset. The vulnerabilities database is regularly updated so that it doesn’t become outdated and can detect updated vulnerabilities too.
- Risk Assessment: After detection of vulnerability, the scanner assigns a score to each of the systems where vulnerability has been detected, this score signifies the level of risk the asset currently has. This number helps in prioritizing the mitigation process as those with higher risks are considered earlier. The assigned number is calculated and assigned based on the impact of that vulnerability and how much it can be exploited by the hacker.
- Report Generation: A detailed report is generated at the last depending on the explored vulnerabilities, their severity, and some recommendations to remove them. This report is useful for understanding the entire security scenario of the system or the applications by the security teams, using this report they can plan the next process which is to mitigate those vulnerabilities.
- Remediation Planning: Based on the Vulnerability Report, the security team of the organization develops the step-by-step process to mitigate the identified vulnerability. This may include applying and developing the patches, reconfiguring the settings of those applications, and implementing additional security controls.
What is Vulnerability Scanning in Security Testing?
Detecting and dealing with system vulnerabilities is the most important thing for any organization or systems administrator. Unauthorized hackers may exploit these flaws to obtain access to the system and abuse it in their ways. Detecting and mitigating vulnerabilities in different systems, applications, or network devices is done step-by-step through vulnerability scanning, one of the security scan domains. In this article we will take a closer look at Vulnerability Scanning explaining its importance (why it’s necessary), giving a brief overview of how it works, discussing its types and more common examples of vulnerability scanning results.
Table of Content
- Importance of Running a Vulnerability Scan
- Types of Vulnerability Scanning
- Vulnerability Scanning Process
- Working Procedure of Vulnerability Scanning
- Common Vulnerabilities Found in Vulnerability Scanning
- Vulnerability Scanning Best Practices
- Conclusion