There is no one-size-fits-all answer to the question of what a penetration tester roadmap should look like. The best way to approach this question is to ask yourself what your goals are as a penetration tester. Do you want to become a certified ethical hacker? Do you want to move into a management role? Do you want to become a security analyst?
If you are not able to find your own penetration tester roadmap so don’t worry, just keep reading this article and surely you will get good amount of value.
As a penetration tester, you’re always looking for new ways to improve your skills and keep up with the latest security trends. But with so many different resources out there, it can be tough to know where to start.
That’s why we’ve put together this penetration tester roadmap, to help you map out your journey to becoming a top-notch pentester.
Table of Contents
What is a Penetration Tester?
Penetration testing is one of the most popular job in cyber security. A penetration tester is someone who tries to find vulnerabilities in systems, networks, data by utilizing various methodologies and tools in order to find these vulnerabilities.
Essentially they are hired on as hackers. They can also help resolve security weaknesses. They are known by a variety of different types of names like ethical hacker, pentester, cyber security analyst.
These pentesters are really needed oftentimes a company doesn’t know they have vulnerabilities or in hiring someone to actively check for these vulnerabilities and then they can secure their systems better.
Penetration Tester Skills
To become a pentester you’re going to need a really good knowledge on I.T and infrastructure fundamentals and then on top of that you’re going to need to know owasp top 10. You’re going to need to know about vulnerability assessment scans whether that be for websites, web applications, wireless assesment so you’re really going to need to know about that.
You also need to know how to present these findings to execute leadership in a way that they can understand. It’s debated whether or not you need programming, honestly it’s depend on the role but some really good pentesting tools that you should look into is Kali Linux and that comes with a full suite of different pentesting tools.
Where can you work as a Penetration Tester?
The culture of a pentester is that they’re definitely not going to an office. Most pentesting jobs that I saw are remote and that is because companies would rather hire really good pentester that are remote than just ones that will come into office because they are close by.
This is definitely a topic in cyber security but most of the time pentesters do not go to the office if that’s something that you’re interested in getting a entry level remote as a junior penetration tester it might be something to look at.
Must Read: Get Job on Google as a Pentester
What is the Salary of Penetration Tester?
The salary honestly depends on a lot of different things but according to talent.com an entry level pentesting job in USA will pay about $97,000. The more experience you get you can make upto $156,000. I’m sure there are many pentesters making less than ninety seven thousand dollars, always remember to negotiate your salary as there’s always a range that they’re trying to get you at and they will search you at the bottom.
Let me also give you an idea of salary of pentester in India. According to ambitionbox.com, the salary of penetration tester ranges between ₹ 2.0 Lakhs to ₹ 22.3 Lakhs.
The best negotiating tip that I have ever found was when they ask you what your salary requirements are never say I want this amount, say the market value of my skills places me about to this amount.
How to become a penetration tester?
How exactly do you become a penetration tester or ethical hacker? If you really want to know in detail about this then you should read our detailed guide to become a penetration tester. Well here I’ll tell you an overview to become a penetration tester.
The first step us you’re going to need a good basics of networking. If you have never worked in I.T then maybe you should get yourself a help desk job for about six months and then switch to penetration testing because it’ll make everything so easy.
The second step would be to learn cyber security basics. The best way to do this I found is the Comptia Security+ , getting this certificate also would be very good for you and it does teach you really well.
So once you learn the basics of I.T, you have a good basics of what exactly I.T security is. After that you’re going to learn pentesting skills and there are many different ways to do this. The most structured way is to get a pentesting certificate and some really good pentesting certificates are OSCP, PNPT, CEH and GPEN.
Do you need a degree to become penetration tester?
You do not need a college degree to become a penetration tester. A really good way to gain experience as a pentester without job is to do bug bounty hunting. Look for active projects that you can do such as the PNPT which walks you through different labs.
Conclusion: Penetration Tester Roadmap
In this article you saw Penetration Tester Roadmap : Salary, Certifications, Skills, Degree needed. If you want to become a pentester, or ethical hacker, there are a few things you need to do. First, you need to have a strong understanding of computer systems and how they work. Second, you need to have a solid understanding of networking concepts. Third, you need to have a strong understanding of security concepts.
I hope you got the answer “What is the roadmap for penetration testing?” If you still have any doubt related to penetration tester roadmap then make sure to clear it by leaving a comment below.
