Ethical Hacking Concepts to Master before Interviews ✅
1. Networking Fundamentals: TCP/IP, OSI model, routing, DNS, HTTP/HTTPS
2. Operating Systems: Linux internals, Windows architecture, command-line mastery
3. Footprinting & Reconnaissance: passive/active recon, OSINT tools, subdomain enumeration
4. Scanning & Enumeration: Nmap, Netcat, SNMP/SMB enumeration, banner grabbing
5. Vulnerability Assessment: CVEs, CVSS scoring, Nessus/OpenVAS, misconfig detection
6. Exploitation Basics: buffer overflows, privilege escalation, Metasploit
7. Web Application Security: OWASP Top 10, SQLi, XSS, CSRF, SSRF, RCE
8. Secure Coding & Mitigation: input validation, sanitization, parameterized queries
9. Password Attacks: brute force, dictionary, rainbow tables, cracking (Hashcat, John)
10. Wireless Security: WPA2/WPA3 cracking, rogue APs, deauth attacks
11. Malware Analysis: reverse engineering basics, static/dynamic analysis, sandboxing
12. Social Engineering: phishing, pretexting, baiting, awareness countermeasures
13. Exploit Development: shellcoding, custom payloads, buffer overflow exploitation
14. Post-Exploitation: persistence, lateral movement, data exfiltration
15. Cryptography: symmetric/asymmetric, hashing, certificates, TLS handshake
16. Cloud Security: misconfig exploitation, IAM abuse, SSRF in cloud services
17. Container Security: Docker/Kubernetes misconfigs, escaping containers
18. Red Team vs Blue Team: adversary simulation, defense evasion tactics
19. Incident Response Basics: log analysis, forensics, detection/containment workflow
20. Tools & Frameworks: Burp Suite, Wireshark, Hydra, Nikto, Gobuster, Empire