What is Penetration Testing?
Penetration testing, aka “pen test” or ethical hacking, is an authorized simulated cyberattack on a computer system, performed to evaluate the security of the system. This testing is meant to identify both weaknesses & strengths of the system and typically leads to a full risk assessment.
This testing is different from Internal Vulnerability Scanning, which is used to identify, rank, and report vulnerabilities. The penetration test goes a step further and exploits the vulnerabilities to give more insight and analysis into the associated risks and additionally, the strengths of the system overall.
Penetration tests are just one part of a full security audit. They are typically conducted on a regular schedule or after system upgrades, but each department has their own specific protocols and guidelines for running penetration testing.
What are the Benefits to Penetration Testing?
1. Reveal Vulnerabilities
The results of a pen test confirm the real threats to a system and allow a company to arrange for remediation. A penetration test explores the weaknesses that a system has, including those activities within your internal network from employees that may create a risk.
By running these tests, it allows for continual improvements to the system and ensures that external and internal threats are considered when updating.
2. Show Real Risks
A pen test is run to show how a real-world risk would occur. It is created to act as if a real cyber hacker would -- analyzing the likelihood of an actual exploitation.
By showcasing the actual risks in a real-world scenario, the company can identify which upgrades are most necessary and focus attention on circumventing those issues first.
This is a great way to reveal which software upgrades the system requires and to plan improvements in both the short and long term.
3. Industry Compliance
Security breaches are expensive to remediate and can cause a lot of hardship for a company. Testing the system and remaining up-to-code on regulations and certifications ensures that these unnecessary expenditures that are not incurred (because your system is prepared for stopping a potential breach).
The industry standards require a certain level of penetration testing to remain compliant. By not maintaining basic standards set by the industry, you may risk the security of the entire company. This could cause you to overlook the potential for penalties and fees.
4. Maintain Trust
When security breaches occur, it is not just internal issues that arise. A company will incur network downtime and other costly remediation efforts. The hacked data may also include sensitive information about the company and customers. These issues and breaches lead to a breaking of trust.
An inherent part of doing business with a customer is building their trust. Companies go to great lengths to develop those relationships and in an instant, that trust can be broken!
Penetration testing is crucial in testing the limitations of the system and taking necessary precautions against a breach in security.
By assessing risks on a regular basis, the company can maintain trust with the customers and communities that they serve.
5. Ensure Network Uptime
An added benefit to maintaining compliance efforts and running regular penetration testing is to reduce network downtime (which is quite costly to an organization overall). A continual assessment and analysis of the threats a system has, allows for proactive thinking.
Penetration testing acts as a real-world scenario to identify those threats and weaknesses. Downtime negatively affects customer trust and is very costly to an organization both as a brand and financially.
Continual improvement efforts ensure that the network remains up and running, able to combat possible threats, even when they do happen. The more uptime a network has, the better it is for the company’s overall well-being.
Regular Penetration Tests for the Win
Penetration testing is not something that a company should overlook. By analyzing the potential threats and risks, as well as the strengths that a software has, the company can improve and counteract any gaps or issues.
Customer trust, reduction of downtime, compliance, and eliminating costly breaches are just a few of the benefits to regular pen tests.
A company is only as good as its weakest link, and by investing in the security of the company systems, one can identify and rectify those weak links before a threat occurs.