The concept of having antivirus software is nothing new. It is a common security control that's used to protect users against malware and other types of malicious software. Historically, it has been focused purely on the prevention of virus infections. In your penetration testing engagements, finding a customer who doesn't have an antivirus is extremely rare to almost impossible.
In this chapter, you will learn about the evolution of antivirus technologies and how they are becoming more sophisticated. You will learn about various techniques that you can leverage for antivirus evasion, and also learn about the tools that can help you utilize those techniques. You will learn how to encode payloads to avoid detection and, finally, explore the online tools that can be used to check the detection rate of your payload.
As you progress through this chapter...
