This course will provide students with an introduction to the processes and procedures for performing a technical security audit of systems and networks. Students will explore state-of-the-art auditing techniques and apply appropriate tools to audit systems and network infrastructure components. In addition, students will write and present their audit reports on vulnerabilities as well as recommendations to fix any problems discovered.

The process and methodologies employed in negotiating a contract, performing a penetration test, and presenting the results will be examined and exercised. Students will be exposed to tools and techniques employed in penetration testing. Assignments will explore the difficulties and challenges in planning for and conducting an assessment exposing potential vulnerabilities. Students will develop a metric used to evaluate the security posture of a given network and will develop a coherent and comprehensive report of their findings to present to their client. Particular attention will be paid to the ramifications of the findings toward the security of the targets.