Penetration Testing (aka Ethical Hacking) is a substantive test of the net security posture resulting from the security controls applied.  It is typically applied to one (or more) domains to assess the net security posture (trustworthiness). For example: 

• Network Penetration Testing (Internet/Extranet/Intranet) 
• Application Penetration Testing
• Database Penetration Testing
• People (e.g. Social Engineering)
  
• Physical Security Testing
• Wireless (WLAN) Penetration Testing ("War Driving")
• Voice Penetration Testing (War Dialing/VoIP Hacking) 
  

Penetration Testing is most frequently performed to:

• Substantiate the net effectiveness of a mature control environment
  
• Prove to a third party that an environment is secure/trustworthy
• Quickly assess the security of a less mature control environment (in a sense a technical risk assessment)
  
• To validate that significant changes did not have unanticipated results
  

If you require additional information please call 888-PivotPoint and ask to speak with our Practice Area Manager or send us an email.

Check out our "slidepaper" on Network Vulnerability Assessments from the Maximum Assurance Series. (PDF of the video content)

Click below to watch a brief video on Network Vulnerability Assessment: Key Decision Points