Pen Testing Tools aren't always the best solution

Fave raves - Network World

Now I know that Core Impact is a really cool tool, though I've not had a chance to play with it directly, but it's not always the right tool for the job.... Like in this case, we have a network manager who's using this as what looks like a vulnerability management tool and even saying you can give it to a junior engineer to use... D'oh!

Surely the best way as a network manager to do this is through patch management or vuln. scanning tools which you run regularly over your whole estate, not through pointing a Penetration testing tool at some servers...

No matter how many exploits Core have for their product they're never going to find as many holes as a tool that authenticates to the box and enumerates missing patches and security policy non-compliances..

Apart from anything else actually exploiting vulnerable services always runs a risk of crashing the service or indeed the server, which a patch scanning/security config scanning tool wouldn't.

The really bizarre part is that core actually use this as a case study on their site...

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This page contains a single entry by Rory2 published on February 28, 2007 10:27 AM.

Security products != Secure products was the previous entry in this blog.

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About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by Rory2 published on February 28, 2007 10:27 AM.

Security products != Secure products was the previous entry in this blog.

One of those Articles... is the next entry in this blog.

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.