What Is Web Application Penetration Testing, Its Steps, Methods, & Tools!
As the name suggests, web application penetration testing is all about testing the security of a web application. It is a process of identifying, exploiting and reporting security vulnerabilities in a web application during the application development phase and providing remediation by mainly focusing on the environment in which the web application is going to be used and the most appropriate measures to be taken for final setup of the web app.
Why Is It So Important?
There are many reasons why web application penetration testing is so important as below:
- Web applications are increasingly being targeted by hackers. This is because they are often seen as an easy way to gain access to sensitive data.
- Web applications are often complex and may have many security vulnerabilities or faults in the code itself that are not immediately apparent during the application testing and development phase.
- Web application penetration testing can help to identify these vulnerabilities before they are exploited by hackers. By doing so, organizations can take steps to fix the vulnerabilities and make their applications more secure.
- Web application penetration testing can also help to improve the overall security of the internet by making it more difficult for hackers to target vulnerable applications.
What Are The Steps, Methods, and Tools For Doing Web Application Penetration Testing?
The goal of doing web application penetration testing is to identify security weaknesses and recommend solutions to mitigate the risks. There are several steps and methodologies for web application penetration testing as follows:
- The first step is to identify the target application and determine the scope of the test.
- The next step is to gather information about the application, such as the technologies it uses and the business logic. This is the most crucial phase of doing web application penetration testing which is also known as the reconnaissance phase to identify and list any vulnerabilities to the application. There can be two types of reconnaissance as below:
- Passive Reconnaissance: Gathering information directly using the most valid available information on the Internet through research without interacting with the target application is passive reconnaissance which can be done using a tool called Wayback Machine.
- Active Reconnaissance: In active reconnaissance, you need to probe directly the target system to gather more information about any actual application vulnerabilities. Some of its examples include DNS forward and reverse lookup, fingerprinting of web applications using Nmap, use of Shodan network scanner tool, DNZ zone transfer, etc.
- Once the information is gathered, the next step is to check for common vulnerabilities, such as cross-site scripting and SQL injection. If any vulnerabilities are found, the next step is to exploit them and determine the impact on the application. Some of the most popular open source tools generally used for web application penetration testing include:
- Burp Suite
- SQLMap
- Hydra
- Metaexploit
- W3af
- John Ripper
- Ratproxy
- Skipfish
- Watcher
- Finally, the results of the penetration test should be reported and the remedial measures that can be taken to eliminate these vulnerabilities must be discussed with the client in order to secure the web application.
Legacit – The Team Of Highly Skilled & Experienced Web Application Developers Known For Developing The Most Robust, Highly Dynamic, and Safest Web Apps!
Overall, web application penetration testing is an essential part of keeping our applications and data safe from any external harm. By identifying and fixing security vulnerabilities, Legacit is a great team to work with because of their innate capabilities and extreme development skills in making any web application securer in order to make the internet a safer place for everyone around.