Use Cases
Internal Vulnerability Scanner
Use a specialized scanner to prove what a bad actor with internal access can do – and how to stop them
Internal vulnerability scans are vital to your penetration testing engagements. They pierce deeper inside a network than an external vulnerability scan to identify any security risks. This allows you to remediate vulnerabilities within your internal environment before malicious hackers and data thieves can gain access to, modify, or destroy confidential information.
Internal vulnerability scans operate inside the business’s perimeter to identify and prioritize security issues based on their credibility. They examine your security profile from the perspective of an unauthorized insider – someone with access to systems behind the security perimeter.
Pentest-Tools.com supplies your security team with an arsenal of powerful pentesting tools for your entire workflow. It's easy to integrate our tools into your systems because we've built them with internal vulnerability scanning capabilities from the start.
Internal scanning as a priority, not an afterthought
A wide range of highly relevant tools for internal vulnerability scanning
Custom specialized features for internal scanning tasks
At a glance
How we outmaneuver other internal vulnerability scanners
Here are a few ways that Pentest-Tools.com gives you an edge when it comes to your internal vulnerability scanning requirements.
Comparison
Other internal scanners
Pentest-Tools.com
Flexibility
Speed
Range
Coherence
Automation
Security
Boost your vulnerability management workflow with our internal scanner
Pentest-Tools.com’s integrated internal vulnerability scanner means you can optimize your workflow with connected capabilities and ready-to-use automation features.
The greatest benefit of using the Pentest-Tools.com Network Vulnerability Scanner is that it provides you with a full picture of your attack surface. This includes every public, private, hidden, or even forgotten point from which unauthorized users could try to gain entry, make changes, or extract data.
The Pentest-Tools.com internal vulnerability scanner enables you to conduct a full network vulnerability assessment. The combination of tools on the platform is sufficiently wide in range and flexible in application to cover every stage of this type of pentest engagement.
As well as providing a big picture assessment of your infrastructure's security posture, a Pentest-Tools.com network vulnerability scan detects many kinds of security issues in your internal networks and locally running software that bad actors could chain and exploit. Individually or collectively, these vulnerabilities can add up to a situation that can cause critical business risks:
- Missing security patches for operating systems and other apps
- Outdated network services and other software
- Open ports
- Weak credentials
- Misconfigurations
An internal vulnerability scan using Pentest-Tools.com will expose, map, and report them, then issue you with guidance for mitigating them all!
Internal security testing to achieve and maintain compliance
Another major headache that internal vulnerability scans solve is fixing vulnerabilities that help organizations achieve and maintain compliance with regulatory requirements and security standards specific to their industry, such as GDPR, HIPAA, PCI DSS, and others. A typical example is when weak credentials detected by our scans cause privilege escalation and potential unintended access to sensitive information.
Pentest-Tools.com helps you stay mindful of the business need for security controls that help detect sensitive data exposure and eradicate this damaging, non-compliance consequence and many others.
For example, the PCI DSS requires mandatory, regular testing for systems' and networks' security. In practice, this involves that:
How we protect sensitive data that internal scans reveal
Privacy concerns over the sensitive client data found in internal pentests is wider and more immediate than PCI DSS. That is why Pentest-Tools.com is located in the European Union.
Top vulnerabilities discovered through internal scans
Internal vulnerability scans provide useful insights to improve hardening measures and patch management processes. They help you detect security vulnerabilities before malicious hackers can exploit them and they also help you keep track of patch management processes in networks. When new vulnerabilities emerge, you get real-time alerts and recommendations for further hardening measures.
Among the many issues discovered in your network's attack surface during Pentest-Tools.com scans, missing security patches are included. Internal vulnerability scans help you verify that patches have been properly implemented. Unpatched software creates security gaps that a malicious outsider could use to gain access to an internal network.
Two of the most common vulnerabilities detected during an internal scan are:
- Missing third-party patches
- Unpatched, known high-risk vulnerabilities
A malicious hacker can reach an internal system by tricking an employee to click a link that leads to a web page that exploits known unpatched software on an employee’s device. Outdated software or the lack of hardening of internal systems can abet an attacker to move around internal systems once they gain initial access.
Internal vulnerability scans have the benefit of identifying at-risk systems while providing insight for patch management processes. Use our Network Vulnerability Scanner through VPN to answer questions such as:
- What is the top missing patch?
- Is there a lack of third party patches?
- What are your timelines for patching well-known vulnerabilities with high-risk rankings?
Having a well patched and hardened internal environment helps organizations avoid these types of cyber attacks and can prove important for compliance with many security standards.
Our most used Pentest-Tools.com feature
We use the Pentest-Tools.com network scanners for perimeter testing, to see if there are any changes in our clients' internal network from month to month, such as with their ports. We scan using the Pentest-Tool.com VPN Agent.
We then take the results in the general security dashboard and show them to our clients because it is so easy for them to understand. Internal network scanning has become our most used Pentest-Tools.com feature. This feature was how we found Pentest-Tools.com in the first place and why we went with it.
![Wojciech D](jpg/g2-reviewer-53d73.jpg)
Keith Gatt
Defense contractor
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How does your VPN Agent feature guarantee security?
The Pentest-Tools.com internal network scanning feature hinges around the effectiveness of our VPN Agent. It is this VPN Agent that allows you to run internal pentests from anywhere, as if you were on-site, without investing time in scripts and configurations (and their maintenance). The VPN Agent comes with flexible deployment options, such as Virtual Machine, Docker Container, and AWS Cloud. And it can easily adapt to a variety of environments and types of internal networks.
So, how does it work to achieve this? How can our VPN agent give you secure access to the full range of Pentest-Tools.com tools for internal vulnerability scanning?
The VPN Agent ensures a secure connection between our scanning servers and your target internal network by creating an encrypted tunnel between the Pentest-Tools.com scanning engines and your network. Our scanners are then able to reach the hosts from internal networks or protected network segments through this VPN tunnel. Every packet leaving or reaching the network you need to audit is fully encrypted, so no one else can access the network through this channel.
To put our VPN Agent to work, simply create a VPN profile, select a deployment method, run the agent, and test the connection to ensure that Pentest-Tools.com automatically connects to your target’s infrastructure. That's it! You are now ready to scan your list of internal network targets as you would with an external target.
![VPN Agent platform image](png/vpn-agent-platform-image-1f1d9.png)
![VPN Agent platform image](png/vpn-agent-platform-image-244ff.png)
![VPN Agent platform image](png/vpn-agent-platform-image-3f31c.png)
Tools to use after running the Network Vulnerability Scanner
Reconnaissance Tools
Web Vulnerability Scanners
Network Vulnerability Scanners
Offensive Tools
Why security and IT pros are switching to Pentest-Tools.com for internal vulnerability scanning
The internal network scanning feature and the value of our tools for compliance purposes are just two of the compelling reasons why professional pentesters and security experts are investing in Pentest-Tools.com.
We typically use Pentest-Tools.com to validate the web applications we build internally or for our customers. Not only do we use the tools to validate the security infrastructure, but also to show the customer the quality of the work done. Recently, these test reports are helpful to validate the data security also for GDPR compliance.
Infrastructure testing for open ports
Internal Vulnerability Scans usually begin with reconnaissance to gauge and map all network entry points in a target system. The first priority is often to check for open ports that may expose assets to attackers with local network access. Of course, these ports should not be publicly accessible at all and pose a great risk to internal security.
You need to know if the network perimeter has any open ports and, if so, where they are. In other words, you not only need port discovery, but also mapping. Pentest-Tools.com has multiple ways of solving this problem of accurate port detection and checking for you.
As part of our suite of Reconnaissance tools, Pentest-Tools includes a separate Port Scanner and a UDP Port Scanner, to account for differing port scan techniques. These online port scanners detect open ports and running services. They also perform OS fingerprinting on target IP addresses or hostnames. Finally, they check firewall rules and verify whether your services are accessible from the web.
Both port scanners are based on Nmap, the world's most famous port scanner. Using an online and optimized version of the Nmap port scanner, rather than one on a local machine, produces an external view of our systems. For internal vulnerability scans, it is vital that firewalls and network restrictions are included in scan results, to gain the vantage point of a malicious hacker.
Network perimeter assessment with a top quality scanner
The next stage in an Internal Vulnerability Scan involves using network vulnerability scanners for infrastructure testing. The Pentest-Tools.com solution for assessing the network perimeter is the Network Vulnerability Scanner. Its role is to discover critical vulnerabilities in widely used software, outdated network services, missing security patches, and badly configured servers.
The network perimeter is what divides your internal network assets from the outside. A network vulnerability scanner accesses and exposes internal network services. It then maps all those services and reports on any detected vulnerabilities. This is a sample Network Vulnerability Scanner report:
Two even more specialized network vulnerability scanners
The Network Vulnerability Scanner with OpenVAS is considered one of the best open-source network security scanners available. To make your workflow even more powerful, Pentest-Tools.com includes two additional network vulnerability scanners in your arsenal:
- The SSL/TLS Scanner – SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) and TLS (Transport Layer Security) are security protocols that use cryptographic methods to produce secure communications across a network. This scanner discovers relevant configuration issues and vulnerabilities associated with these protocols, such as POODLE, Heartbleed, DROWN, ROBOT, and others.
- The DNS Server Scanner – DNS (Domain Name System) Zone Transfer is a type of database transaction that enables administrators to replicate DNS databases across DNS servers. The DNS Server Scanner checks whether the name servers of the target domain are vulnerable to DNS Zone transfer. It also retrieves the full DNS Zone file and checks for other vulnerabilities in DNS servers.
An automatic exploiter tool that validates internal vulnerabilities
Sniper - Automatic Exploiter provides you with a way to get proof for validating that critical, high-impact CVEs (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) are exploitable on the target system. You can run full, controlled, automatic exploitation while leaving the target system unaltered and clean.
The Pentest-Tools.com Sniper automatically filters out the noise that vulnerability scanners create so you can gain Remote Code Execution (RCE) and evidence of exploitation in under two minutes. It’s also helpful for weeding out false positives. At the end, Sniper provides a list of tool activities, extracted data (called artefacts), and exploitation details.
How does it work with internal vulnerability scans? Sniper Auto-Exploiter:
- Mimics real-world internal exploits and attack techniques to determine the truly vulnerable systems
- Gains RCE (Remote Code Execution) on vulnerable targets
- Automatically runs post-exploitation to extract interesting data as solid proof for vulnerability validation
A weak password auditor for strong authentication
Default passwords and other weak credentials pose a larger problem for internal networks than most business leaders realize. They are frequently and consistently in lists of top ten internal vulnerabilities. And a single weak password could expose the entire network to security threats involving data-hungry malware.
Finding them manually is ineffective and time consuming, especially if you want to cover the entire attack surface. With the Pentest-Tools.com Password Auditor, you can automatically find weak passwords in network services (e.g. SSH, FTP, MySQL), web pages (web forms), and web applications. It also helps you quickly detect services that require authentication (login forms and other password protected pages).
Common Questions
Internal vulnerability scanning FAQs
Scanning internal networks with Pentest-Tools.com is available for higher tier options. This option will enable you to scan targets from your private network through the VPN agent to reach internal hosts. You can compare plans to view what features are included in each package and which suits your needs best.