Enumeration In Penetration Testing

Enumeration plays the most important role in penetration testing, it is the first task of penetration testing. If you want to perform penetration testing on targeted devices, websites, mobile applications, or any system you want to penetrate, you need to perform strong enumeration.

So let’s move on to the basics of enumeration. In this article, we will be discussing enumeration into penetration testing, and we will also discuss enumeration tools that help you to perform strong enumeration. In the last section, we will discuss how you can create your own enumeration tools and what things you will need to make your own enumeration tool. 

There are many tools available in the market for performing enumeration, but we will discuss the topmost easy and common tool used in penetration testing.

There are a few following main tools used for enumeration in penetration testing.

1. Nmap – Mainly used for port scanning.
2. MessScan – Mainly used for scanning a large number of device ports.
3. Custom script or github script – There are lots of tools available on GITHUB for website directory enumeration, website username enumeration, and some other enumeration tools which are freely available which anyone can use.

Not only the above tool, but there are lots of tools available for different purposes.

Let’s discuss in detail about remuneration tools.

1. Nmap

Nmap is widely used in penetration testing and each and every penetration tester knows about these tools. you can perform strong enumeration on any server or network. it is provides a lot of features like port scanning, network scanning, vulnerability scanning, os detection, service version detection, system bios scanning, etc.

it has a scripting engine, it provides a lot of scripts for scanning different vulnerabilities.

You can install this on all the OS platforms like Windows, Linux, and mac and you can also install it on android using termux. You need to just install the termux application from the playstore and type the command for installing it.

2. MasScan

It is a software tool that provides the facility to users to perform enumeration on port scanning in bulk, and masscan is faster than nmap, but if you want verbose output, then namp is best.

If you want to scan the entire internet then it will scan the whole internet in just a few minutes but Most penetration testers prefer nmap for port scanning and network scanning.

3. Github script or Custom script

Github is the most popular platform for testers and security researchers. Not only that but it is also used for other purposes like development, open-source projects, etc.

There are many scripts available for enumeration in GitHub, so anyone can use them for free. Let me explain some of the scripts with an example.

Suppose, for example, that you are testing a WordPress website, then you need to perform some of the following things.

1. Enumerate the WordPress version.
2. Check how many plugins are installed on that particular website.
3. Which theme is used on the website?
4. How many users are currently part of this website? And who is?
5. Checking WordPress plugin or theme version with the vulnerability.

So for that, you need one tool which scans all our above needs. In that case, there are lots of scripts available to check the above points.

Let me explain an example of some tools of WordPress enumeration.

• WPScan

This tool is widely used for enumerating WordPress website, and it comes with pre-installed in Kali Linux, so if you are using Kali Linux then you don’t need to install that tool on kali Linux, just simply type wpscan command in the terminal and you will get instruction about that tool and how to use it.

Otherwise, if you are using any other OS distribution, then you need to download or clone the repository from GitHub. You already need to install some dependencies.

• CMSeek

This tool will help you in enumerating themes, plugging, user info, etc.\

• Nikto tool

Nikto is the most powerful tool and widely used in penetration testing. It is used for checking vulnerability and enumerating website information about the server, website, and its vulnerability.

• Dirsearch 

Dirsearch is a powerful tool for enumerating website directories or hidden directories of websites.

• Sqlmap

Sqlmap is a powerful tool for checking and enumerating SQL vulnerabilities in websites.

All the above tools are available in Github for free, so you can install it in your computer according to the operating system you used only, you need to install the dependencies for that tool.

How to create your own enumeration tool?

The good thing is that if you are thinking about creating your own enumeration tool, let’s discuss what you will need for creating your own tool.

According to our suggestion, you should know about one programming language and have logic-building skills and a hacking mindset.

Python is the best programming language for creating your own tool. It provides many packages for building up your own tool.

If you want to start in python for creating tools, then we suggest creating basic tools like a port scanner, website directories searching, etc.

But you can create tools in any programming language, but only thing is you 

 need to just check a dependency with the system of the programming language.

Conclusion 

In simple words, enumeration in penetration testing plays an important role, or it is the first step for performing penetration testing. You can use enumeration tools like nmap, masscan, or any other tool for your enumeration purpose.

You can create your own tool using programming languages like python and customize it according to your need.