Web application pen testing can be highly beneficial for your business if you develop proprietary web applications in-house or use an app provided by third party vendors. It can help to reduce the financial and reputational costs of a security weakness being uncovered in your app after it’s gone to market or has been shared with your customers. While web application pen testing provides many advantages, your business may benefit from other types of security assessments. Depending on your organisation’s specific requirements, other types of assessments include mobile application security testing, agile pen testing, cloud penetration testing and scenario-based testing. A good offensive security provider should be able to advise you on the most appropriate choice of assessment for your organisation.

The information needed to help scope a web application security test typically includes the number and types of web applications to be tested, number of static and dynamic pages, number of input fields and whether the test will be authenticated or unauthenticated (where login credentials are unknown/known).

After each web application security test, the ethical hacker(s) assigned to the test will produce a custom written report, detailing any weaknesses identified, associated risk levels and recommended remedial actions.

The time it takes an ethical hacker to complete a web application penetration test depends on the scope of the test. Factors influencing the duration include the number and type of web apps assessed, plus the number of static or dynamic pages and input fields.