How Do Hackers Use Metasploit: A Look at the Toolkit?
How Do Hackers Use Metasploit? The image that comes to mind when you think of the word hacker is that of a person locked up in a dark room, his fingers dancing across a variety of screens, hacking into systems as they do in the movies. However, hacking in the real world is not exactly like that. Metasploit is one of the tools that appear in the movies and the real world. Metasploit, which was initially developed as a tool of cybersecurity professionals, is currently employed equally by ethical hackers and cybercriminals. How Do Hackers Use Metasploit? Let us have a brief tour, even when you are not very tech-savvy.
So, What Is Metasploit?
Metasploit is an open-source penetration testing framework that enables the user to find, exploit, and confirm vulnerabilities on systems. It is like a security testing digital Swiss Army knife. Professionals use it to burn it up and evaluate their defenses, identify weak points and patch them up before actual attackers can exploit them. But when in the wrong hands, it can get abused. And this is the reason why there is the dark side of Metasploit.
Interesting Read: Types of Cyber Attacks Explained
How Do Hackers Use Metasploit?
First, hackers use Metasploit to identify vulnerabilities in websites and then confirm them. After that, they target websites for hacking and other illegal activities. Commonly, they follow the mentioned steps:
Locating Vulnerabilities through Scanning
Once a hacker has decided to utilize Metasploit, the initial step he takes is to find out the vulnerabilities of the targeted system. Imagine a person who opens all the doors and windows of a house in order to understand which of them are not locked. Metasploit can be used perfectly well along with such tools as Nmap to scan a target machine, identify open ports, services running and potential software vulnerabilities. All this information is important since it assists the hacker to select the appropriate form of attack in the future. Having vulnerabilities in the list, the hacker is ready to proceed to the actual business, i.e., exploitation.
Choosing and Launching Exploits
Metasploit is your new best friend when it comes to cracking in. It is stuffed with ready-made exploits, or chunks of code that exploit particular vulnerabilities in software. Imagine that you have identified a target whose computer is using an old version of Windows that has a bug with a publicly documented exploit, simply download the exploit of that version of windows in Metasploit, load it, and the framework does much of the hard work. That reduces the threshold even newer hackers can use to execute rather sophisticated attacks. Hope you are understanding how do hackers use Metasploit.
There is a downside to that convenience. Just as issuing a toddler a rifle, Metasploit can fundamentally reduce the barrier to entry to cybercriminals who are then able to use advanced methods without necessarily having to develop them themselves.
What Next: Payloads
As soon as an exploit is successfully landed, you need to make a decision what to do with the foothold. That is where payloads come in. Payload, is simply what you want to do once you are in. Perhaps it is a backdoor, a second user account, a file grab or complete control. Meterpreter is one of the more popular ones. Imagine Meterpreter as a remote-control tool that allows you to poke around the system of the victim, download files, take screenshots, or execute commands as though you are behind the keyboard.
Maintaining Access and Covering Tracks
Hackers do not only kick down the door, but they also sit on the sofa. Once they have broken into a system, they will usually add backdoors or rootkits with Metasploit to help them re-enter without having to go through the same exploit grind. They can erase logs or adjust settings so they cannot be traced. Metasploit does that all but doing it without authorization is simply illegal.
Used for Good or Bad—Intent Matters
Metasploit is not a crime. It is simply a tool and like any other tool it can be used to do good or bad. It is used by ethical hackers aka white hats in order to identify the flaws before the criminals and patch them quickly. Some companies even pay them to conduct authorized security tests using Metasploit. However, when it falls into the wrong hands, specifically malicious hackers, the black hats, and they use it to gain illegal access, it amounts to a crime.
The actual distinction is consent. Unless you own the system or have been specifically authorized to root around, playing with Metasploit is essentially hacking, except that it is not the cool type.
Conclusion
Above, we have discussed how do hackers use Metasploit. Metasploit is a cybersecurity tool that is quite potent. No matter whether you are a novice in ethical hacking or you simply want to know how attackers do their stuff, it is always good to understand how Metasploit works. Nevertheless, such knowledge should be accompanied by responsibility. Either use it ethically and legally or it may turn out to be more harmful than beneficial.
Metasploit is a tool of eavesdropping and theft in the wrong hands or a tool of system protection, network fortification, and keeping ahead of cybercriminals in the right ones.