5 Automated tools that Ethical hackers should use

Protecting confidential data of an organization is a challenge in the cyber-world. Lots of hackers try to exploit cyber security of an organization for stealing theirs confidential/private data.

For protecting theirs confidential data from Black Hat hackers, an organization hires Ethical hacker or a group of Ethical hackers. Automated Tools can make the life of an Ethical hacker easier. Today, we will list 5 best automated tools that enable Ethical hackers to do their job efficiently.

1.  Network Mapper(Nmap)

It is the finest tools ever created for the Ethical hackers and is mainly used for port scanning. It  is a command line tool developed for Linux/Unix operating system whereas window version is also available now.
Nmap is an effective in finding hosts and services on the network. The Ethical hacker can create valuable network maps for future references. Nmap provides number of feature that can be extended by scripts. The scripts provide advanced vulnerability and service detection.

 2.  Nessus

Nessus is the one of the best vulnerability scanner. It is developed and designed by tenable network security. The tool is used for discovering critical bug in the system.
Nessus can detect unpatched services, misconfiguration, a weak password and many more system vulnerabilities.

 3. WireShark

WireShark is the world's predominant open-source network packet analyzer. It filters what's happening in a network at subtle level.
WireShark has many more functionalities, some of them are listed below:

• Live capture and offline analysis of packet.
• It is a platform independent.
• It captures files compressed with Gzip and decompressed it on the fly.
• It has decryption support for many protocols such as Kerberos, IPsec ISAKMP, SSL/TLS, SNMPv3, WEP,and WPA/WPA2.
• WireShark has an ability to export output in CSV, PostScript®,  XML or plain text.

 4. Nikto

Nikto is an open source licensed under the GPL web server scanner. It is the best tool for a web server penetration testing.
Nikto checks outdated versions of over 1250 servers and also checks the server configuration items. It has functionality to received and print server cookies.

5. Kismet

Kismet is foremost wireless hacking tools used by pen tester. It is capable of network detection, packet sniffing and works like an Intrusion Detection System for 802.11 wireless LANs.
Kismet identifies the wireless network by passively collecting packet from the network, through which it can detect the hidden networks.

Image courtesy:  nytimes