Penetration Testing & VAPT

What Is EASM? External Attack Surface Management Explained

What external attack surface management finds, how discovery works, how it differs from vulnerability scanning and VAPT, and where to start.

Why Vexta's Findings Never Leave Your Machine

Vexta stores every scan, finding and asset in a local database on the machine it runs on, with no findings sent to a cloud backend, so client data stays where it was collected.

Deploying Vexta on an Air-Gapped or Offline Network

Vexta runs as a single self-hosted binary with modest hardware needs, and its core scanning features do not depend on internet access, making it practical to run on an air-gapped or segmented network.

Automating Vexta with Its REST API: Jobs, Scans and Assets

Vexta exposes a REST API under /api/v1/ to create scans, poll job status, pull scan data and assets, and trigger AI insight or takeover verification, so scanning can be driven from your own tooling.

How Vexta Keeps an Authorized Scan Polite and In Scope

Vexta routes every request through a centralized HTTP client with adaptive rate limiting, jitter and scope enforcement, so scans stay gentle on the target and every request is logged.

Vexta's Audit Log and Active Session Management

Vexta logs every login, logout and password change, and lets an owner or admin see every active session on the instance and revoke any of them on the spot.

Vexta's Per-Host Recon Depth on Every Asset Row

Every row on Vexta's Assets tab carries identity, ports, banners, an OS guess with its evidence, a TLS summary and a screenshot, so a hunter isn't reopening five tabs to piece a host together.

Vexta's Cloud Configuration Auditing for AWS, Azure and GCP

Vexta enumerates AWS, Azure and GCP resources, tests S3 bucket permissions directly, and adds every cloud resource it finds as a node in its attack graph.

Vexta's Education Module: Why Every Finding Explains Itself

Every Vexta finding includes a plain-language answer to what the vulnerability is and why it matters, plus the relevant CWE and OWASP references, attached directly to the finding.

How Vexta's Update System Keeps Your Scanner Current

Vexta checks for updates every 24 hours and lets you pick a stable, beta or dev channel, with auto-download separated from apply so you decide exactly when a new build takes effect.

Vexta's Script Engine: 26 Bundled Checks Without an Nmap Dependency

Vexta runs a built-in script engine across every open port it finds, 26 bundled checks in pure Go, with an NSE-style filter language and no external nmap install required.

Vexta's DNS Resolver Pool for Reliable Recon

Vexta keeps a self-validating pool of public DNS resolvers, ranked by latency and reliability, so subdomain enumeration and takeover checks don't silently fail on a dead or throttled resolver.

Vexta's Per-Host Screenshot Snapshot Bundle

Vexta bundles a host's screenshot, identity, OS guess, open ports, TLS cert, tech fingerprint and NSE script output into one document, one click per row.

Vexta ASPM: Asset Criticality Levels and SLA Bands

Vexta's ASPM module classifies every asset by criticality and chains it to nearby findings, so a bug near a crown-jewel asset gets a different SLA than the same bug on a brochure site.

How Vexta's CISA KEV Coverage Tracker Works

Vexta shows what percentage of the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog it currently probes for, right at the top of the dashboard, and keeps that number synced daily.

Reliability Badges and False-Positive Tracking in Vexta

Vexta labels every finding with a reliability badge and tracks each detector's false-positive rate over time, so a hunter knows how much to trust a result before spending time on it.

Per-Finding Triage State in Vexta

Vexta tracks a status, note, and assignee on every finding, open through paid or wontfix, visible as a badge and editable from the CLI or dashboard.

Cross-Scan Finding Deduplication in Vexta

Vexta fingerprints every finding by target, type, URL, parameter, and payload signature, so repeat scans flag re-discoveries instead of duplicating them.

Finding Lifecycle Metrics: MTTR and KPIs in Vexta

Vexta tracks MTTR, defect density, recurrence rate, and SLA breaches per finding, computed from real scan and fix data rather than a separate tracker.

Compliance Mapping in Vexta: OWASP, NIST, PCI-DSS, SOC 2

Vexta auto-tags findings to OWASP, NIST 800-53, PCI-DSS, and SOC 2 controls and builds a compliance-specific PDF report with evidence per control.

Wordlist Management in Vexta: Custom Lists for Recon

Vexta lets a hunter upload, edit, and pick custom subdomain, directory, and parameter wordlists per scan, so recon fits the target instead of a generic list.

Vexta Notifications: Getting New Findings into Slack, Discord or Email

Vexta pushes new findings out to Slack, Discord, Telegram, Pushover, email, Google Chat, Microsoft Teams or a custom webhook, with multiple instances of each channel and templated messages.

Targeted Subscans in Vexta: Rescan One Endpoint Without Redoing the Whole Job

Vexta's targeted subscans run a single module, like a port scan or a directory bruteforce, against one subdomain, endpoint or IP, instead of forcing a full rescan to check one thing.

Scheduled Scans in Vexta: Cron Jobs and the Scan Queue Explained

Vexta can run scans on a cron schedule in the background, tracking each one through a job queue with real-time progress, so a hunter does not have to remember to kick off the same scan every week.

Vexta's 7 Team Roles: Who Gets to Scan, Fix, Bill or Just Watch

Vexta's role-based access control splits a team into 7 roles, from Owner down to read-only Viewer, so a scan platform used by more than one person does not need to give everyone the same keys.

The Vexta Dashboard: Running and Reviewing Scans Without a Terminal

Vexta's web dashboard covers the whole scan lifecycle across 17 pages, from launching a scan to reading its attack graph, with real-time updates and no command line required.

Vexta Scan Profiles and the Finding Query Language

Vexta ships Stealth, Standard and Aggressive scan profiles plus a SQL-like query language for filtering findings, so a hunter can match scan behavior to a program's rules and cut straight to what matters.

Bring Your Own Key: How Vexta's AI Vulnerability Triage Works

Vexta's AI triage runs on your own Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini or Azure key, is cost-capped per scan, and is entirely optional; turn it off and Vexta still scans, verifies and ranks findings on its own.

SARIF and JUnit XML: Running Vexta Findings Inside CI/CD

Vexta exports scan results as SARIF 2.1.0 for GitHub and GitLab code scanning, and as JUnit XML for Jenkins, CircleCI and TeamCity, so a finding shows up where a developer is already looking.

Vexta's Report Engine: HTML, PDF, Word and Google Docs, One Click Each

Vexta turns a finished scan into an HTML report with charts, a print-ready PDF, a hand-rolled Word document, or a native Google Doc, all carrying the same executive summary and per-finding evidence.

Reproducible Vulnerability Evidence: Inside Vexta's Full HTTP Exchange Archive

Every proof Vexta captures comes with the exact request and response that produced it, hashed into a tamper-evident chain, so a finding can be independently replayed rather than taken on trust.

How Vexta Verifies a Vulnerability Fix Before You Close the Ticket

Vexta's reverify workflow re-tests a previously discovered vulnerability against the live target and reports back fixed or still_vulnerable, so a hunter never has to take a developer's word for it.

Software Composition Analysis in Vexta: 7 Ecosystems Covered

Vexta parses dependency manifests across npm, pip, gem, Go, Composer, Cargo, and Gradle/Maven, matching every component against a local CVE mirror with KEV and EPSS context built in.

Secret Detection in Source Code: How Vexta Finds Leaked Keys

Vexta scans source code and extracted JavaScript for hardcoded API keys, tokens, passwords, and dangerous function patterns, then feeds anything it finds back into credential testing.

Vexta's Offline CVE Scanner: 10,000+ Templates, No Network Needed

Vexta bundles over 10,000 detection templates and a local NVD, EPSS, and CISA KEV mirror directly in the binary, so scanning and CVE matching work with no live connection to any external feed.

Vexta Attack Path Chaining: From One Finding to Full Impact

Vexta builds a live attack graph from every host, credential, and finding it discovers, then chains them to show the shortest path from an external host to a crown-jewel asset.

Vexta's Bug Bounty Report Submission to HackerOne and Bugcrowd

Vexta connects directly to HackerOne and Bugcrowd for scope import and report submission, and caches program data locally so browsing programs never waits on an upstream API.

Vexta's Proof-of-Concept Generator for Bug Bounty Reports

Vexta builds a complete reproduction package for every finding, so a hunter can move from confirmed vulnerability to a submittable report without reconstructing the exploit by hand.

Vexta's Intercepting Proxy and Repeater, Built Into the Scanner

An intercepting proxy for pentesting lets you see, pause and replay a request before it reaches the server. Vexta ships one built in, plus an always-on history of every request the scanner itself makes.

Blind SSRF Detection: How Vexta's Built-In OOB Callback Server Proves It

Blind SSRF detection means proving a server made an outbound request even when the HTTP response shows nothing. Vexta's built-in out-of-band callback server catches that proof directly.

Behavioral Anomaly Detection: How Vexta Flags a Response That Doesn't Fit

Anomaly detection in web application testing means comparing a live response to how that endpoint normally behaves. Vexta builds a running baseline per endpoint and flags outliers for a closer look.

Continuous Bug Hunting Automation: Vexta's AI Loop and Hunt Mode

Continuous bug hunting automation means a scanner that keeps testing an authorized target over time and reasons about what to try next. Here is how Vexta's AI discovery loop and continuous-hunt mode do that.

Why an Exposed JavaScript Source Map Is a Bug Hunter's Shortcut

A public source map can hand over a site's original, unminified code, and whatever secrets got baked into it. Vexta reconstructs that source automatically and scans it for hardcoded keys and hidden endpoints.

WAF Detection in Vexta: Spotting a Firewall and Throttling Automatically

WAF detection in a vulnerability scanner means recognizing a firewall is in front of a target before a scan runs into it. Vexta fingerprints the WAF and throttles itself automatically to stay quiet.

How Vexta Tests for Business Logic Flaws Like Mass Assignment

A business logic bug rarely throws an error, it just quietly does the wrong thing. Vexta probes mass assignment across every write endpoint and negative-quantity abuse on money fields, gated behind explicit consent.

Vexta's WordPress, Drupal and Joomla Vulnerability Scanner

Most CMS risk lives in plugins and modules, not core. Vexta fingerprints WordPress, Drupal and Joomla, then enumerates plugins, themes, modules and extensions against an embedded CVE database.

How Vexta Detects HTTP Request Smuggling and Race Conditions

Request smuggling and race conditions both come down to two systems disagreeing about timing or framing. Vexta tests CL.TE/TE.CL/H2.CL desyncs and uses single-packet and last-byte-sync techniques to make races reproducible.

How Vexta Tests SAML and OAuth Single Sign-On for Auth Bypass

A flaw in single sign-on does not compromise one page, it compromises the front door to every app behind it. Vexta runs OIDC and SAML misconfiguration detectors plus a dedicated SAML signature wrapping check.

How Vexta Tests GraphQL APIs for Introspection and Auth Bypass

GraphQL hides its attack surface behind a single endpoint. Vexta uses the API's own introspection system to map it, then checks for batching abuse, denial-of-service and field-level auth bypass.

How Vexta Fuzzes REST APIs Using Their Own OpenAPI Schema

Vexta reads a target's own OpenAPI or Swagger definition and fires type-aware payloads at every declared route and parameter, so API testing does not depend on a hunter guessing endpoints.

Attack Surface Change Detection: How Vexta Tracks What's New Since Last Scan

Vexta diffs assets and endpoints across scans and fingerprints JS files by hash, so a hunter can see exactly what changed on a target since the last pass.

GitHub Dorking for Bug Bounty: How Vexta Hunts Leaked Secrets and Endpoints

Vexta runs configurable GitHub and GitLab code search dorks for leaked secrets, exposed configs, and internal endpoints as part of its passive recon pipeline.

Subdomain Takeover Detection: How Vexta Finds the CNAMEs Nobody Is Watching

Vexta enumerates subdomains through a seven-stage pipeline and fingerprints CNAMEs against 30+ cloud and SaaS providers to catch subdomain takeover before an attacker does.

Passive Recon for Bug Bounty: How Vexta Pulls From 40+ Sources Before Sending a Packet

Vexta's reconnaissance engine builds a target's attack surface from more than 40 passive OSINT sources before any active probing starts, so scope mapping starts quiet.

The Vexta Confidence Score: A Vulnerability Prioritization Score That Uses Six Signals

Vexta's Confidence Score combines severity, detector confidence, proof status, reachability, EPSS, and CISA KEV into one 0-100 number, so a hunter knows which finding to open first.

How Vexta Verifies Every Vulnerability It Finds

Vexta's Proof-of-Exploitation engine re-tests every finding with a safe, non-destructive probe and returns proven, refuted, or unproven, so a hunter never has to guess which alerts are real.

VAPT for NBFCs: RBI Cyber Resilience Master Direction Compliance

Bug Bounty Programs: Picking Targets, Reporting, and Earning Real Money

Cloud Pentesting: AWS, Azure, GCP — Lessons from Real Engagements

Mobile App Pentesting: iOS and Android Methodology

Network Pentesting: Tools, Workflow, and Reporting

Web Application Pentest Methodology: A Step-by-Step Walkthrough

Setting Up a Home Hacking Lab: Zero to Practical in 30 Days

OSCP vs CEH vs CompTIA PenTest+: Which Cert Lands Jobs