Top Cyber Security Tools for Beginners

Cyber Security refers to a subject that takes care of the security of IT assets from bad people. Any organization needs to deploy different tools for different types of attacks.

For instance, networking tools are deployed at the premises to mitigate denial of service attacks. For the identification of any web vulnerability, different security scanning tools are available.

Types of Cyber Security Tools

Cyber Security is a broad term that covers everything related to securing IT assets from bad people. There are a lot of tools available to secure the data and IT infrastructure from attacks. We will discuss 4 types of cyber security tools in brief that are used for the protection of IT assets.

Further, You may refer to the Most Asked Cyber Security Interview Questions & Answers.

Application Security Tools

Most of the attacks are carried out by exploiting vulnerabilities available in the web application. Those vulnerabilities arise due to exploits available on the open web. Also, on a daily basis, tons of zero-day vulnerabilities are found in the world by security researchers and hackers.

It is not easy to find vulnerabilities by manual methods. There are a lot of tools available in the market to find vulnerabilities in the web application. Open-source tools are also available to find issues in web applications.

Network Security Tools

Network Security Tools covers most of the tools that help in securing IT infrastructure. Network security monitoring tools, Network Intrusion Detection, Firewalls, Managed Detection Services, Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), Privilege Access Management (PAM), etc.

Antivirus Softwares

Antivirus software is the most used program to find malicious software on desktops, laptops, and servers. You have encountered many antivirus software to use your system to get rid of malicious programs.

Vulnerability Assessment Tools

Any website deployed on the servers also has vulnerabilities. To identify those vulnerabilities in the operating system, virtualization software, firewalls, routers, etc, vulnerability assessment tools are required.

Both commercial and open-source tools are available to identify vulnerabilities in the IT assets.

Top Cyber Security Tools for Beginners

These tools are used by cyber security professionals to carry out different tasks to ensure Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability of the system. Here, we will discuss some tools that are used by beginners in the field of cyber security.

BurpSuite

Burpsuite is the most popular tool for identifying web vulnerabilities. This tool has many features even in the community edition. This tool helps to enhance the pace of the testing process by providing an Intruder, Repeater, Sequencer, Decoder, and many more features.

The Burpsuite Pro version (commercial) has an automated application scanner that provides a list of vulnerabilities in the web application. Pro-exclusive BApp extensions are also may be used to automate the process. Overall, Burpsuite is a must-use tool for beginners to hone their skills in cyber security.

OWASP ZAP

OWASP ZAP is an open-source web application scanning tool that can test the web application. This tool has most of the features available in Burpsuite. For a detailed comparison, you may refer to the blog Burpsuite vs OWASP ZAP.

Refer to How to download OWASP ZAP vulnerability scanner to install on your system.

Tenable Nessus

Tenable Nessus is a vulnerability scanner to identify issues of operating systems, devices, and applications. This tool is used by most security professionals to carry out Vulnerability Assessment (VA) activity.

More than 157,000 plugins are available that automatically update in real-time to find vulnerabilities in the IT infrastructure.

Security Auditors also use Nessus as 450 compliance and configuration templates are available. You can compare Nessus with another tool Nexpose by following the link.

NMap

NMap is the most popular port scanning tool to identify open ports in a network. This tool also provides common vulnerabilities available on the device.

Nikto

Nikto is a free application security scanner that provides basic vulnerabilities in web applications. The main advantage of using Nikto as it is very easy to use.