Ethical Hacking Interview Questions and Answers

A hacker is an outsider to exploit the digital loopholes and tries to get access to any network/system in an unauthorized manner. The actions that are considered as part of hacking are to steal any confidential information, blocking access to critical data, insert any kind of malware, disturb the configuration of the network, locking etc.

Yes, Hackers can be classified into various groups depending on the method that they use for hacking.

Yes, here are the few groups in which hackers can be classified:

As per a research conducted by IBM, the cost of a data breach is going to increase up to $3.94 millionin the upcoming future, and hence there will be a huge number of vacant job positions that demand a highly skilled Ethical Hacking professional.

A network sniffer is a piece of software code that intercepts the data on a network and collects sensitive data from the internet traffic and decodes it to human-readable data.

Yes, there are many sniffers available and they differ based on the facilities that they offer. Some of them are WinDump, Diff, Wireshark, Ettercap, MSN Sniffer, EtherApe.

Spoofing is a misleading act of gaining access to any targeted system by communicating as a trusted source by hiding one’s own identity. Spoofing can be done to hack the system, inject malware, or even to steal sensitive information.

Yes, Spoofing can be done in different ways like phone calls, emails, websites, IP addresses, Domain Name Service (DNS), etc.

Phishing is the act of sending out attractive or tempting information as bulk emails, text messages, or even phone calls to a targeted number of audiences to gather their sensitive information like credit card numbers, bank account numbers, ATM pin, etc.

Hackers use the technique of port scanning to get information of available open ports & services on a specific host, in order to find information for malicious purposes.

SQL Injection is a technique of web hacking that is used to gain access to sensitive and valuable data from a database by altering the original SQL statement. It is done by injecting some malicious SQL statements to get control of the database behind any web application. Usually, hackers do this to get access to the database or to surpass the security measures of any particular application.

Generally, footprinting is a method to gather all relevant information about any system or network, to find a way to penetrate into that system. This includes collecting all information about the organization, users, networks, hosts, etc. before invading the system.These are commonly asked Ethical Hacking Interview Questions and Answers for Fresher and Experienced candidates

The full form of DDoS is “Distributed Denial of Service” attack.

The DDoS attack is an attempt by any hacker to disrupt the regular traffic of any targeted network or server by infusing a huge amount of fake client requests to keep the server busy, thereby denying its services for actual and useful client requests.

There are mainly three different types of DDoS attacks and they are:

Here are the steps that are performed by the hacker:

Here is the brief description of each of the steps:

A keylogger or keyboard logger is monitoring software that records and remembers every keystroke that is pressed on the keyboard. Generally, keyloggers are used by companies and their security staff to check and troubleshoot if there is any problem with their network/systems.

Hackers use keyloggers to gather IDs and passwords of the users to gain access to their accounts in an unauthorized manner.

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Penetration testing is done to assess the security of IT systems. Some of the tools used for penetration testing are:

Ransomware is a malware which hackers use to restrict the original users from acquiring access to their system and personal files. They then demand a ransom which is generally the amount of money or very sensitive information to allow their access again.

Ransomware attacks can be categorized depending upon the severity of the attacks

Basically, brute force is a trial and error technique for hacking passwords in order to gain access to any network or system. It can be implemented only if the hacker has a good knowledge of JavaScript and it is a very time-consuming process. Tools like hydra available for brute force.

Trojans are also malicious software which is developed by hackers with the intention to gain access to specific targeted systems. Some of the trojans are:

The white hat hackers are the specialist of security who is trained and certified in penetration testing. They are legally authorized to protect the information of systems of any organization.

Grey Hat hackers are the ones who want to learn the art of ethical hacking but sometimes they violate the standards even though they do not have any intention of performing any malicious activity.

Yes, there are plenty of Operating systems available that are generally used for hacking. These are

There are some specific languages used for hacking:

Here are some of the attacks that are famous for attacks.

DOS or the Denial of Service attack is a malicious act of flooding a targeted network with tons of unused traffic in order to jam the network. This may not cause any serious effect on security or information but makes the website inaccessible by customers. The website owner of that network may have to pay loads of money and time to restore accessibility.

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Here are a few types of DOS attacks:

The CIA Triangle is the foundation of three pillars

Encryption is used to maintain confidentiality whereas hashing is used to maintain the integrity of the data.

ncoding is the process of using an algorithm for the conversion of a human-readable data to some unreadable values which may seem junk to anyone, but after decoding retains its original meaningful form.

Vulnerability is said to be a security loophole or weakness in the network or system and exploitation is the completion of a successful attack with the help of that particular vulnerability.

A firewall is a software or hardware wall installed in every system which acts as a filter and has the authority to allow or deny any traffic in order to protect the organization from outside attacks.

bot is simply a piece of software or script that is designed by the hacker in order to attack at a faster speed than hum

SSL or Secured Socket layer is a type of secured communication system that is based on the peer-to-peer model. Here each connection is directly linked with a particular SSL session. An SSL session is a link created with the help of a handshaking protocol, between a client and the server.

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SSL is meant to provide a secure connection between a browser and the server. Here are some of the components of SSL:

Here are some of the best password cracking techniques used by hackers:

Adware is an unwanted software that is used to automatically display advertisements, online or offline, on your mobile or computer screens without any option to disable it. This happens usually when you are using a Web browser.

Data Breach is a part of the cyber attack process which enables hackers to get access to any computer or network, in an unauthorized manner. And this helps them to steal confidential, private, or sensitive data of the customers or users.

Although there are hundreds of types of attacks that are performed by the cybercriminals, the most common of them are:

Someone who is weak even in the basics of programming skills and performs cyber attacks using the very basic and simple software is known as a Script Kiddie.

Crypto-jacking, also known as malicious crypto mining is a kind of an online threat that uses various resources of machines in order to mine digital money such as Cryptocurrency. It is a simple process that doesn’t require any special machines as they can be carried out just on a computer or even a mobile device.

There are several ways to protect your PC from hackers, the most important methods are:

Cowpatty is a C-language based technique which is used to perform brute force dictionary attacks on the WPA- PSK protected Wi-Fi networks. These are the Commonly asked Ethical Hacking Interview Questions and Answers for Experienced candidates in an Interview.

In the Pharming technique, the attacker or the hacker makes concessions in the DNS (Domain Name Service) servers or even the user’s computer in order to redirect the user to a malicious website.

By using the defacement technique, the hacker is overpowered to replace the original website by a forged website that may or may not look similar to the original website, and can contain the hacker’s name, images, messages, and even a piece of background music.

Social Engineering is the term used to hack humans and get personal or sensitive information like card numbers, passwords, etc. directly from the victim.

A Trojan is malicious software or code that seems very legitimate but is designed to unauthorizedly take control of the system. It is specially designed by hackers to disrupt or steal personal data or sensitive information from the computer/network.

This type of Trojan creates a hidden backdoor in the network or a system, which eventually provides unauthorized access to the hacker so that he can operate on that system remotely. This act is done to inject malware into the system or to steal data that can be sold in black markets.

These are a type of Trojan who specifically attacks online game players. The target of such malware is to purloin sensitive information like credit card details by hacking the account details of the gamers.

The Fake Anti-Virus Trojans pretend to be some antivirus software and then ask the users to pay money for scanning & detecting viruses and then removing them, which may or may not be fake.

The XSS or Cross-Site Scripting is a type of injection attack that occurs on the Client-side. In XSS, the hacker injects a malicious piece of code or script to an original web application, which eventually leads to disclosure of various cookie information, defacement, and more.

Here are three types of Cross-Site Scripting:

The various types of cookie attributes:

Cyber Kill Chain is a series of steps that determine and identify the stages of any cyber attack from an early stage. And it is very useful for the understanding of APTs i.e. Application Persistent Attacks, various security breaches, and helps us tackle ransomware attacks.

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There are a total of 7 stages in a Cyber Kill Attack. These are:

Generally, there is a vulnerability in a system that is unknown to the security personnel and the attackers use that loophole to hack on to the system. The time duration between the actual attack and the security team getting aware of that vulnerability is known as the Zero Days.

Here are a few common types of Vulnerabilities:

Hashing is a process of generating a string of text using a very complicated mathematical function, and this string is computed at both ends to ensure that the transmitted data has not been altered.

The type of data gathered in the Enumeration phase includes:

Here are the elements that a hacker tries to know:

MIB or the Management Information Base is a virtual database. Basically, it consists of all the formal descriptions of every network object that is possible to manage using the SNMP. It is a hierarchical database and all the objects of the database are assigned an OID (Object Identified) and are handled using these OID’s only.

Here are some of the computer-based social engineering attacks:

Some methods which are used to prevent or avoid ARP Poisoning are:

SNMP is the short form of simple network management protocol that is a part of TCP/IP protocol, and it is used for monitoring as well as managing different host routers and devices on a network remotely.

Some of the spoofing attacks are:

A worm is also a type of malicious software with the specialty of self-replication. Once executed it keeps duplicating itself on the system as well as on any network.

As the name of this malware suggests that it is specifically designed to spy any organization person by getting access to the complete system files camera and voice inputs and outputs and keylogging as well.

A botnet is generally a network of various bots. And the specific purpose of creating a botnet by hacker is to use it as a source for any DDoS or DOS attack.

A spam email or an SMS, that is an advertising or marketing information, which is sent to a huge number of users without taking their consent but is not intended for anything malicious.

Scanning which is done on the hacker’s side is the process of getting information on the IP of the various hosts of the network along with its TCP and UDP Port numbers, operating system details as well as protocol version using some specific scanning tools.

Various types of scanning are

Yes, a Vulnerability Assessment is a process of searching for flaws and loopholes in any network or application whereas penetration testing is the process of searching vulnerabilities that are exploitable just like a real hacker.

Spoofing, Tampering, Reputation, Information Disclosure, Denial of Service and Elevation of Privilege is acronymed as STRIDE

The various types of hacking are:

Foot-printing is the process of gathering all the data and information about the targeted network or system even before trying to access and acquire that system

Here are the techniques:

Network sniffing can be used for both ethical and unethical purposes. For ethical use, the network administrator can use the network sniffers for analysis of the network and as a monitoring tool. And for unethical purposes, the hackers can use network sniffers unethically for identifying the targeted systems on a network and gather information and hijack sensitive data.id.

Here is the list of such programs:

Most of the hackers use Python language as the scripting language and the main reason is that it has some very powerful libraries which are pre-assembled in it and provide very intense functionality that is very valuable for hackers

Here are some countermeasures:

Access Control is the act of restricting or permitting users to access particular resources

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The term Cyber-extortionist is the term used to describe the type of cyber attack whose purpose is to demand money and get monetary benefits from the victim, for example, ransomware;

To detect vulnerabilities for prevention from attacks, we can use Nessus or Acunetix software.

Usually, web application firewalls are used to detect such vulnerabilities. And we can also use software like Zap, Burp-Suite for the same.

A different method is used to mitigate any SQL Injection.

Some of the advantages of Ethical Hacking are:

Some of the disadvantages of Ethical Hacking are:

When the hackers exploit the vulnerabilities in a DNS in order to divert the original traffic of a server to a different false server, this is known as DNS cache poisoning. This act is also termed as DNS Spoofing

A rough DHCP server is the services that are set up by hackers for the purpose of man in the middle attack, sniffing, or reconnaissance. These servers can be a modem or a router and are not discoverable by the network administrators

NTP is an abbreviation for network time protocol and it is used to synchronize various computers that are on a network. It takes NTP less than 10 milliseconds to maintain time on a public internet connection. It uses UDP port number 123 for its general communication purposes.

Scanning takes place in the ‘pre-attack’ phase of the pen test.

Attack event when is Wi-Fi alternative to the phishing attack. In this attack, the connection of the users is monitored and then the information is stolen from that monitored and recorded data.

In the MITM Attack, the hacker obstructs the communication between two ends of a connection. The main purpose is to intercept useful information.

TFA is an abbreviation for Two Factor Authentication. It is an authentication and security procedure that is used to assure that only the original account holder accesses the account. The user is given access to any account only if he is able to present any evidence that he is an authentic user.