In this chapter, we will discuss the information gathering phase of penetration testing. We will describe the definition and purpose of information gathering. We will also describe several tools in Kali Linux that can be used for information gathering. After reading this chapter, we hope that the reader will have a better understanding of the information gathering phase and will be able to do information gathering during penetration testing.
Information gathering is the second phase in our penetration testing process (Kali Linux testing process) as explained in the Kali Linux testing methodology section in Chapter 3, Penetration Testing Methodology. In this phase, we try to collect as much information as we can about the target, for example, information about the Domain Name System (DNS) hostnames, IP addresses, technologies and configuration...
