Security in Computing 5th Edition by Shari Lawrence Pfleeger, Charles P Pfleeger, Jonathan Margulies

Exercise 17

A port scanner is a tool useful to an attacker to identify possible vulnerabilities in a potential victim’s system. Cite a situation in which someone who is not an attacker could use a port scanner for a nonmalicious purpose.

Step 1 of 2

Port Scanning

A port scanner is defined as a software program that is used to check which all ports are open and what services are being run on the system. Port scanner help perform port scanning. It implies that the ports of the system are scanned to look for open doors and windows in the system.

Port scanning is performed for a particular IP address. Using the address, the attacker can find out different things such as what operating system is installed in the system, what services are being run, and what applications are active.