Introduction
Penetration Testers (pen testers) are one of the most important jobs within the field of cybersecurity. They carry out simulations and tests of cyberattacks to identify vulnerabilities and evaluate the effectiveness of security systems (What is a penetration tester: Skills and career paths, 2023). By utilizing social science principles, penetration testers gain the ability to understand an attacker’s way of thinking by understanding human behavior in addition to using technical skills to strengthen security measures.
Social Science Principles
The social science principles that penetration testers apply includes ethical neutrality. This is shown in the way they have to use their skills as ‘white hat’ hackers to exploit an organization’s systems to ensure that it is secure (Thomas, et.al., 2019). The next principle they use is skepticism, this is seen in their constant planning, designing and testing of the security methods they use and create, because nothing is ever truly secure (What is a penetration tester: Skills and career paths, 2023). Another principle these professionals make use of is relativism, this is depicted in the way how all digital devices and systems are connected, and how penetration testing can be done in a variety of fields (Fatima et al., 2023).
Key Concepts Applied in Career
Key concepts that show up in a penetration tester’s career includes being systematic thinkers when trying to hack into systems, being team players when working with other cybersecurity professionals both technical and non-technical and being good communicators to convey the issues found to an organization or team. Other factors include cost/benefit analysis of security systems which can cause some limitations due to budget constraints (Cure, 2020). Pen testers also make use of risk assessment to examine risks identified from their testing and create reports and suggestions to better secure an organization’s digital security (What is a penetration tester: Skills and career paths, 2023).
Marginalization and Challenges
In penetration testing, like the broader cybersecurity community, women are still seen as a minority, leading to biases in treatment towards them in comparison to their male counterparts (Moisset, 2021). Other challenges pen testers face includes limited scope, meaning resources, limited access to all areas of an organization, restrictions with methods used during exploits and to certain approved tools and framework (Cure, 2020).
Societal Impact
Through the identification of vulnerabilities before cyber criminals can leverage them, penetration testers are contributing to society every day of their job. Their work helps to secure critical infrastructures, businesses and consumers from potential cyber-attacks that may occur (What is a penetration tester: Skills and career paths, 2023). As cyber threats continue to grow with the development of technology, the role of penetration testers will become even more crucial to combat these challenges.
Conclusion
To summarize, penetration testers offer an invaluable contribution both the field of cybersecurity and to our tech-driven society. Their work creates a fusion of technical expertise along with social science principles to identify threats factoring human behavior and structural vulnerabilities. As a result, cyber professionals help to safeguard digital systems of organizations and for individuals across many different industries.
References
Cure, A. (2020, April 2). Major limitations of penetration testing you need to know. Cypress Data Defense RSS. https://www.cypressdatadefense.com/blog/limitations-of-penetration-testing/
Fatima, A., Khan, T. A., Abdellatif, T. M., Zulfiqar, S., Asif, M., Safi, W., Hamadi, H. A., & Al-Kassem, A. H. (2023). Impact and research challenges of penetrating testing and vulnerability assessment on network threat. 2023 International Conference on Business Analytics for Technology and Security (ICBATS), 1–8. https://doi.org/10.1109/icbats57792.2023.10111168
Moisset, S. (2021, June 29). Epic women in Cyber - Gemma Moore. Medium. https://medium.com/epic-women-in-cyber/epic-women-in-cyber-gemma-moore-768afc4b5dbc
Thomas, G., Burmeister, O., & Low, G. (2019). The Importance of Ethical Conduct by Penetration Testers in the Age of Breach Disclosure Laws. Australasian Journal of Information Systems, 23. https://doi.org/10.3127/ajis.v23i0.1867
What is a penetration tester: Skills and career paths. Explore Cybersecurity Degrees and Careers | CyberDegrees.org. (2023, January 20). https://www.cyberdegrees.org/jobs/penetration-tester/