How to Choose Your Pentest Partner

Starting this Article from the lines

“We are stronger together than we are alone” — Walter Payton.

How to Choose Your Pentest Partner in 2023

A penetration testing partner servers as a new set of eyes to your Application and Cloud infrastructure. They can provide you with an unbiased review of your company’s security posture and provide helpful reports on how to improve it.

A professional pentest partner is equipped with well-versed methodologies and advanced skills that are required to implant are liable IT penetration test. But before choosing a Pentest partner in 2023,there are certain things you must keep in mind:

Establish your needs

You must have a baseline understanding of your budget ,testing requirements, and objectives. This piece of information will ensure and guide you towards the right pentest partner. You must evaluate the terms and cost of the pentest provider. Sometimes the offer is too good to be true, in that case, you must be cautious as quality pentest can be expensive. Pentest adds value to the company and secures your sensitive data. Remember that, some pretest providers conduct glorified vulnerability assessments in the name of penetration testing, which is why their offers might seem comparatively cheap.

While looking for a pentest partner, you must categorize your assets based on how critical it is for your company. For a critical asset, you must conduct an in-depth and manual effort pentest every quarter. For internal applications or infrastructure, you can choose to perform an Automated vulnerability scanning along with a penetration test annually.

Find a long-term and quality partner

After establishing your requirements, it’s time to shop for suppliers. Look for providers you can establish long-term relationships with aspenetration tests must be conducted annually. While looking for a penetration testing technology partner, look for someone whom you can trust and hold expertise in this department. Your partner must understand your requirements and can help you determine the right tests to meet your objectives and budget. You need a team that has the potential to add value to your cyber security strategy and can grasp the complexities of penetration testing.

Credentials and reputation

You must also focus on the vendor’s real knowledge rather than checking their credentials. By focusing on certifications, you might end up eliminating top-notch penetration testers who developed their credentials through practical knowledge. Penetration testing, as an industry hasn’t managed to reach a meaningful certification structure. Penetration testing is a methodology and previous experience-based technical skill which elevate with every passing experience.

Engage and ask necessary questions

Once you have a list of potential pentest providers, it’s time to engage and ask crucial questions to figure out the right fit for the job. Here is a list of questions you might consider asking:

- The methodology they will use for the pentest. This question will clarify the doubts regarding the expertise and knowledge of the penetration test provider.

- Ask for a sample report. To ensure that the test fits the purpose it is helpful to review the test report beforehand.

- Consequences of the test. A genuine penetration test provider will provide remediation guidance in their report, and discuss the results with you.

Once you find answers to all these questions and are satisfied with the answers, you can finalize your preference and discuss terms and scope with your Pentest partner.

How to get into bugbounty hunting

Once you get a Pentest Partner exchange the knowledge with the source and You too get the unique,new methods from the partner.

1. Follow Ethical Process always.
2. Share the commercials equally as per the work distribution.
3. Collaborate and then target the system by module by module/role by role wise
4. Have a common group mail id for communication
5. Write the vulnerable report and share your options and send with both approvals
6. Whenever reverting back to any mails talk before, think, and take suggestions and revert back.
7. Thank Each other for findings
8. Continue the same bonding and longer lasting

What NOT TO DO while choosing a pentest partner?

There are many penetrations testing companies that employ several commercial pentest tools like Netsparker, Acunetix, Core Impact, or Intruder for various platforms and frameworks. This application of a commercial tool is a way to lure the organization wherein these commercial tools are of no use. A successful pentest depends on the methodology and manual efforts.Overall Automated scanner report depended guy should be avoided

So, what is penetration testing or pentest?

Pentest can be defined as the process in which a skilled tester uses a combination of manual exploitation techniques and tools to discover the real-world vulnerabilities in your Application and Cloud infrastructure. This testing is done to uncover potential flaws that compromise the security’s main pillars or CIA — Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability.

Suggestions are most welcomed,

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