Pentesting Fundamentals for Beginners
No one-stop application or course can prepare anyone for entry as an Ethical Hacker or pass a cybersecurity exam. Exam preparation involves months of research and extrapolating information from multiple sources. Prepping for any cybersecurity exam takes months of studying, and as such, this course should be treated as just one of many sources an exam taker would need in preparing for entry into the field as a Hacker or sitting their first cybersecurity exam.
This course is strictly hands-on. When discussing pentesting documentation and frameworks, I have provided videos with PowerPoint slides. The remainder of the course is lab work.
The knowledge pool for Hackers is only so deep. The materials within this course focus on the Knowledge Skills and Abilities (KSAs) identified within the Specialty Areas of most exam providers.
This course does not provide you with any specific answers to any exam.
Hacking fundamentals do not change from one exam to the next. You can expect to see questions about Nmap, what commands were used to generate a specific output, and which tool you would use regardless of the exam vendor.
You’ll be expected to know which Pentesting Framework would be used to meet a specific condition.
You’ll be expected to know what information should be delivered in an executive summary. You’ll be expected to know how to scope an assessment and identify the document for what purpose.
You’ll be expected to know the OWASP Top 10 and identify the hacking methodology used to exploit each.
These are just a few fundamentals that remain constant from one Ethical Hacking exam vendor to the next.
This course provides the fundamental knowledge every ethical hacker is expected to know. Throughout this course, you will learn cybersecurity tools, reverse shells, scripting basics, identifying output, and what commands were used to generate the output.
This course is strictly hands-on and applied learning. This course is designed to teach you many skills expected of an Ethical Hacker. When starting or sitting their first cybersecurity exam.
This course is dynamic and is updated as new material becomes available.
Course Objectives
- Demonstrate the use of offensive security tools and techniques.
- Proficiency in using the CLI (Command Line Interface) of Linux.
- Use Linux as a hacking platform.
Who should take this course?
Network administrators, cybersecurity students, entry-level penetration testers, anyone who wants to be an ethical hacker, concerned parents, concerned spouses, law enforcement, and anyone with a solid background in technology.
Anyone who has technophobia (the fear of learning new technology). Anyone not having a good understanding of the OSI model or the TCP/IP suite.
What are the course requirements and knowledge level?
- A good understanding of basic networking concepts, the TCPI/IP stack, how devices communicate, and basic troubleshooting of network connectivity issues.
- How to use a computer, a mouse, and a keyboard.
- How to configure a static IP address on a Network adapter.
- How to check for connectivity using PING, IPCONFIG, and IFCONFIG.
- This course will not cover the OSI model, IP addressing, or basic networking concepts. However, students are expected to have these skills when they enroll.
​Hardware
- Desktop or laptop capable of virtualization. (Virtualization enabled BIOS).
- At least 4 GB of RAM (8 GB or more of RAM recommended).
- Administrative access to the host operating system. (You own the machine).
- Good, reliable Internet access.
Software
- Any 64-bit Windows operating system. (Windows 10 preferred)
- A current 64-bit version of Mac or a Linux operating system.
- An installation of Virtualbox (Links provided in the lab).
- An installation of 7zip (Links provided in the lab).
- Copy of Kali ISO or Kali VMWare or Virtualbox image. (Links provided in the lab).
- Copy of Windows XP SP2 (Links provided in the lab).
- Copy of Server 2008 SPI 32-bit (Links provided in the lab).
- Copy of Metesploitable2 (Links provided in the lab).
