What Is it Like Being on a Penetration Testing Team?

Introduction

Working on a pentest as a freelancer can be one of the most flexible opportunities a pentester can take up. As a result, many freelance and new pentesters often wonder what takes place daily or on a project basis during team-based engagements. Multiple questions normally arise: for instance, do things get monotonous? What does a pentester within a team mostly work on and do activities differ much?

In this article, we’ll answer the most common questions asked about teamwork during a pentest.

What Do Penetration Testers Spend Most of Their Time Doing? How Does This Vary?

As a pentester working in a team, tasks will vary depending on the pentesting role assigned to you and what the company does in terms of penetration testing. For instance, the following are some roles that pentesters might find themselves in:

Red/Blue/Purple Teaming

Penetration testers working in teams will divide objectives amongst themselves, such as social engineering attacks, host scans, exploit execution, Wi-Fi attack, and much more during a job. Such jobs normally take weeks or months and pentesters will find this particular task being their day-to-day job for the duration of the project.

Bounty Hunting

Even though most bug bounty hunters are individual security researchers, there are many companies that are specifically focused on bounty hunting. Pentesters working in teams in such companies will be involved in daily attempts to find security loopholes. This is normally restricted by a scope that must be adhered to and is mostly done remotely.

Course Writing

Many organizations have a function responsible for conducting cybersecurity training for its clients. Penetration testers might be assigned to roles (in teams) that require developing course content. Content might range from actual publications to videos and, in some cases, webinars where students join in. This is a labor-intensive exercise and (Read more...)