Google News
logo
Ethical Hacking Interview Questions
Ethical Hacking is an authorized practice of bypassing system security to identify potential data breaches and threats in a network. The company that owns the system or network allows Cyber Security engineers to perform such activities in order to test the system’s defenses. Thus, unlike malicious hacking, this process is planned, approved, and more importantly, legal.
 
Ethical hackers aim to investigate the system or network for weak points that malicious hackers can exploit or destroy. They collect and analyze the information to figure out ways to strengthen the security of the system/network/applications. By doing so,  they can improve the security footprint so that it can better withstand attacks or divert them.
 
Ethical hackers are hired by organizations to look into the vulnerabilities of their systems and networks and develop solutions to prevent data breaches. Consider it a high-tech permutation of the old saying “It takes a thief to catch a thief.”
 
They check for key vulnerabilities include but are not limited to :
 
* Injection attacks
* Changes in security settings
* Exposure of sensitive data
* Breach in authentication protocols
* Components used in the system or network that may be used as access points

Now, as you have an idea of what is ethical hacking, it's time to learn the type of hackers.
Hacking experts follow four key protocol concepts :
 
* Stay legal. Obtain proper approval before accessing and performing a security assessment.

* Define the scope. Determine the scope of the assessment so that the ethical hacker’s work remains legal and within the organization’s approved boundaries.

* Report vulnerabilities. Notify the organization of all vulnerabilities discovered during the assessment. Provide remediation advice for resolving these vulnerabilities.

* Respect data sensitivity. Depending on the data sensitivity, ethical hackers may have to agree to a non-disclosure agreement, in addition to other terms and conditions required by the assessed organization. 
Ethical hackers use their knowledge to secure and improve the technology of organizations. They provide an essential service to these organizations by looking for vulnerabilities that can lead to a security breach.
 
An ethical hacker reports the identified vulnerabilities to the organization. Additionally, they provide remediation advice. In many cases, with the organization’s consent, the ethical hacker performs a re-test to ensure the vulnerabilities are fully resolved. 
 
Malicious hackers intend to gain unauthorized access to a resource (the more sensitive the better) for financial gain or personal recognition. Some malicious hackers deface websites or crash backend servers for fun, reputation damage, or to cause financial loss. The methods used and vulnerabilities found remain unreported. They aren’t concerned with improving the organizations security posture.
An ethical hacker should have a wide range of computer skills. They often specialize, becoming Subject Matter Experts (SME) on a particular area within the ethical hacking domain.
 
All ethical hackers should have :
 
* Expertise in scripting languages.
* Proficiency in operating systems.
* A thorough knowledge of networking.
* A solid foundation in the principles of information security.

Some of the most well-known and acquired certifications include :
 
Footprinting refers accumulating and uncovering as much as information about the target network before gaining access into any network. The approach adopted by hackers before hacking
 
Open Source Footprinting : It will look for the contact information of administrators that will be used in guessing the password in Social engineering

Network Enumeration : The hacker tries to identify the domain names and the network blocks of the target network

Scanning : Once the network is known, the second step is to spy the active IP addresses on the network. For identifying active IP addresses (ICMP) Internet Control Message Protocol is an active IP addresses

Stack Fingerprinting : Once the hosts and port have been mapped by scanning the network, the final footprinting step can be performed. This is called Stack fingerprinting.
While assessing the security of an organization’s IT asset(s), ethical hacking aims to mimic an attacker. In doing so, they look for attack vectors against the target. The initial goal is to perform reconnaissance, gaining as much information as possible.
 
Once the ethical hacker gathers enough information, they use it to look for vulnerabilities against the asset. They perform this assessment with a combination of automated and manual testing. Even sophisticated systems may have complex countermeasure technologies which may be vulnerable.
 
They don’t stop at uncovering vulnerabilities. Ethical hackers use exploits against the vulnerabilities to prove how a malicious attacker could exploit it.
 
Some of the most common vulnerabilities discovered by ethical hackers include:
 
* Injection attacks
* Broken authentication
* Security misconfigurations
* Use of components with known vulnerabilities
* Sensitive data exposure

After the testing period, ethical hackers prepare a detailed report. This documentation includes steps to compromise the discovered vulnerabilities and steps to patch or mitigate them.
Limited scope : Ethical hackers cannot progress beyond a defined scope to make an attack successful. However, it’s not unreasonable to discuss out of scope attack potential with the organization.  

Resource constraints : Malicious hackers don’t have time constraints that ethical hackers often face. Computing power and budget are additional constraints of ethical hackers.

Restricted methods : Some organizations ask experts to avoid test cases that lead the servers to crash (e.g., Denial of Service (DoS) attacks). 
Ethical Hacking is performed by Ethical Hackers to assess and provide a report based on the insights gained during the hack. Cyber Security is managed by Cyber Security experts whose responsibility is to defend the system from malicious activities and attacks.
The types of hackers are :
 
Black Hat Hackers or Crackers :  Illegally, they hack sytems to gain unauthorized access and cause disruptions in operations or steal sensitive data.

White Hat Hackers or Ethical Hackers : These hackers hack systems and networks for the assessment of potential vulnerabilities or threats legally and with prior permission.

Grey Box Hackers : They assess the security weakness of a computer system or network without the owner’s permission but bring it to their attention later.
Aside from these three types, there are also other types of miscellaneous hackers.

Apart from the above well-known hackers, there are miscellaneous hackers based on what they hack and how they do it :
 
Hacktivist : The person who utilizes technology for announcing social, religious, or political messages. Mostly hacktivism includes website defacement or denial-of-service attacks.  

Script Kiddie : The one who enters into the computer system using the automation tools written by others and has less knowledge of the underlying concept, hence the term kiddie.
 
Elite Hackers : This is a social message among hackers that describes the most skilled ones. Recently identified exploits will circulate among these hackers.

Neophyte : They are also known as green hat hacker or newbie who has no knowledge about the workings of technology and hacking.

Blue Hat : The one who is outside of computer security consulting firms try to attempt a bug test to a system before its launch to find out the weaknesses and close the gaps. 

Red hat : They are a blend of both black hat and white hat hackers, usually employed by top security agencies, government agencies, etc., that fall under the category of sensitive information.
Brute force hack is a technique for hacking password and get access to system and network resources, it takes much time, it needs a hacker to learn about JavaScripts. For this purpose, one can use tool name “Hydra”.