Book Image

Python Ethical Hacking from Scratch

By : Fahad Ali Sarwar
Book Image

Python Ethical Hacking from Scratch

By: Fahad Ali Sarwar

Overview of this book

Penetration testing enables you to evaluate the security or strength of a computer system, network, or web application that an attacker can exploit. With this book, you'll understand why Python is one of the fastest-growing programming languages for penetration testing. You'll find out how to harness the power of Python and pentesting to enhance your system security. Developers working with Python will be able to put their knowledge and experience to work with this practical guide. Complete with step-by-step explanations of essential concepts and practical examples, this book takes a hands-on approach to help you build your own pentesting tools for testing the security level of systems and networks. You'll learn how to develop your own ethical hacking tools using Python and explore hacking techniques to exploit vulnerabilities in networks and systems. Finally, you'll be able to get remote access to target systems and networks using the tools you develop and modify as per your own requirements. By the end of this ethical hacking book, you'll have developed the skills needed for building cybersecurity tools and learned how to secure your systems by thinking like a hacker.
Table of Contents (14 chapters)
1
Section 1: The Nuts and Bolts of Ethical Hacking – The Basics
4
Section 2: Thinking Like a Hacker – Network Information Gathering and Attacks
8
Section 3: Malware Development

Setting up VirtualBox

As mentioned earlier, we will be configuring our setup for penetration testing (pen testing) in this chapter. The first thing we will need is virtualization software. Virtualization software helps us to run a complete OS on top of our existing OS. The main advantage of virtualization is that you can run a complete OS without needing to buy additional physical hardware, such as a PC, while enjoying all the features that come with such hardware. Once we move forward, you will understand these advantages in more detail. Here's a list of popular virtualization software:

  • VMware Workstation Player
  • VirtualBox

Though there are other options available, I recommend using one of these. I will be using VirtualBox in this book since it is free. VMware Player is also free, but it can't be used commercially without proper licensing.

To download VirtualBox, go to the following link: https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads.

There you will...