# Web Application Security Specialist

## For whom?

* **Test Engineers** who want to add security testing to their skillset.
* **Web Application Developers** who want to secure their web applications.
* **Engineers** who want to become a penetration tester.

## What is Web Application Security Testing?

Web Application Security Testing is actually penetration testing web sites and its methodology consists always of the following steps [web-security-testing-methodology](https://mw1po.gitbook.io/devsecops/it-security-roles/web-application-security-testing/web-security-testing-methodology "mention")

A lot of the mentioned tools have integrated automated testing such as automated checks against vulnerability databases, predefined attack payloads and predefined attacks that one can use out-of-the-box. 

It's a good starting point for anyone who wants to begin with penetration testing.

Important terms in Job offers.

### Most popular tools of the trade

* nmap
* wireshark
* owasp zap
* Metasploit
* burbsuite
* nessus

### Programming languages in demand

* Python
* Java
* Shellscript

### Keywords

* vulnerability scanner
* network scanning
* networking
* reverse engineering

### Get the tools - Pentesting OS compairison

How to get to the tools? By using an especially for the purpose of penetration testing designed OS. The most popular pentesting OS on the market as of today are listed here. As a pentester, you should have seen an instance of each. Install all of them in virtual machines and play with it. If you plan to certify in pentesting, I recommend to use the OS of the school. EC-Council uses parrot, Offensive-Security kali for instance. BlackArch is the most difficult to manage.

| criteria                   | kali               | parrot          | blackarch                                  |
| -------------------------- | ------------------ | --------------- | ------------------------------------------ |
| RAM usage                  | 450MB              | 550MB           | 170MB                                      |
| Based on OS family         | Debian             | Debian          | Arch Linux                                 |
| Recommended user interface | Gnome\&xfce        | KDE\&Mate       | <p>XFCE or </p><p>none (light version)</p> |
| Anonymous mode             | no                 | anonsurf        | tor                                        |
| Space on disc              | 1GB                | 320Mb           | N/A                                        |
| Tools preinstalled         | 400                | 600             | 2676                                       |
| Updates                    | frequent,stable    | frequent,stable | very quickly,instable                      |
| Configuration              | easy               | easy            | hard                                       |
| Used by school             | offensive-security | EC-council      | N/A                                        |

So, to be good at web application security testing, you should know in that exact order: common vulnerabilities and attacks, where to find them, choose a penetration testing OS, know the tools and apply them according to your methodology.

### More methodologies

OWASP has also defined a Web Testing Framework that you can use to conduct a guided pentest. Follow instructions on <https://github.com/owtf/owtf>

{% embed url="<https://hackmethod.com/hacker-methodology/?v=11aedd0e4327>" %}

##

## Automated Web Application Security Testing

Different types of testing:

SCA, Software Component Analysis

SAST, Static Application Security Testing

DAST, Dynamic Application Security Testing

OAST, Out-of-Band Application Security Testing

System Hardening

System Compliance Testing