Wireless Network Penetration Test

Wireless networks are a convenient and easy method for your staff to access your organisations network, but since they can often be accessed from outside of your physical premises, wireless networks can introduce a significant risk if not configured correctly.

Wireless networks are widely used by laptops, printers, smartphones, tablets and IoT devices within organisations and can often be installed to cover general office space, meeting rooms, secure areas, reception spaces and even reach outside of your building into public spaces.  Incorrectly configured WiFi networks can put sensitive data at risk, as the data can sometimes be exposed to unauthorised devices or eavesdroppers.

Unsecured wireless access points present a significant security risk to organisations data, due to the potential for data leakage and attackers gaining access to corporate networks from outside of the physical office space. Targeted attacks against corporate wireless users are also on the rise, whereby attackers set up a rogue access point in an adjacent office or car park, in an attempt to coerce users into connecting to their malicious access point instead of the legitimate access point in their office space.

Typical vulnerabilities that are often found in wireless networks include:

• Easily-guessable user credentials or Pre-Shared Keys (PSK) meaning attackers can guess login details and connect to your network from the car park
• Poor segregation between wireless clients potentially allowing visitors to connect to your employees wireless devices
• Lack of network segregation between different wireless networks (SSIDs) allowing less secure guest networks to connect to internal networks that you thought were protected
• Sensitive information exposure resulting in data theft or the failure of a compliance audit
• Weak network traffic encryption allowing attackers to read network traffic remotely
• Wireless clients susceptible to rogue wireless access points controlled by an attacker resulting in credential theft or data loss
• Unexpected or undocumented wireless devices connected to the network

Our Wireless Network Penetration Test will assist you in identifying the level of access that a malicious user could achieve if they have been able to position themselves within range of you organisation’s wireless access points.

Methodology

Depending on the types of wireless networks in use, our consultants will use a combination of automated and manual testing, with the goal of achieving network connectivity to your organisation’s network through vulnerabilities that may be present.

Our typical methodology for a Wireless Network Penetration Test includes the following:

1. Identifying weak encryption protocols
2. Capturing authentication handshakes
3. Cracking Pre-Shared Keys (PSK) to allow remote access
4. Identifying rouge access points that may have been planted inside the organisation’s building(s)
5. Authentication attacks against wireless devices and the organisation’s Access Points (APs)
6. Identifying information disclosure when wireless clients connect to your network
7. Certificate spoofing attacks

During the assessment, our consultancy team can deploy rogue wireless access points throughout your organisation, which will be used to try and coerce employees into connecting to them. These may be configured with SSIDs such as “Free Wireless Hotspot” in an attempt to get users to connect to these instead of the corporate network. In the event of a user connecting to one of these rogue access points, we can attempt to further the attack on the workstation and then potentially onto the corporate domain.

For wireless networks that use WPA-Enterprise authentication, a configuration review will be performed on a sample wireless client (such as a laptop), as weaknesses in WPA-Enterprise authentication are not always apparent from passive information gathering.

Prerequisites

1. List of wireless SSIDs to be tested.
2. An office location which is in range of the wireless networks to be tested.
3. If a WPA-Enterprise network is in scope of testing, we will need a corporate laptop or device that we can access with administrative rights in order to check the configuration.
4. If a wireless controller is in scope of testing, we will need the IP address of the controller and credentials that we can access it with. This can be a read-only account providing the account will allow us to inspect all areas of the controller.
5. If network segregation testing is to be performed, we will need the IP address ranges that you would like us to ensure are segregated from the wireless network.
6. A signed and completed testing consent form
7. An up-to-date network diagram showing both the wireless and wired networks

Deliverables

Engaging with SecureTeam for your Wireless Network Penetration Test will provide you with the following:

In-flight Support

Prior to your test commencing, our consultant(s) will discuss the scope of work with you, so that a full understanding is obtained of what your wireless network is used for, and any services it connects to. This not only allows the test to run more efficiently, but also allows the discovered vulnerabilities to be rated more accurately in terms of risk.

During the testing phase, our consultant(s) will engage directly with you – notifying you of any critical vulnerabilities that may be present within your infrastructure and any evidence in our results that indicates a security breach may have already taken place.

Reporting

Once the project has been completed, you will be provided with the following:

Comprehensive Technical Report

Our clear & concise reporting format contains an Executive Summary that can be understood by all members of your organisation – including individuals who may be in management or non-technical roles. All vulnerabilities are explained to a sufficient level of technical detail, so that your development team and systems administrators can quickly pinpoint the root cause of the vulnerability and apply the recommended course of action.

Technical References

Where applicable, we provide additional reference URLs for each vulnerability, so that further information and mitigation advice can be obtained from reputable sources of technical information.

Risk-Based Approach with CVSS Scoring

A risk-based approach is used throughout the report and all vulnerabilities are scored in line with CVSS (Common Vulnerability Scoring System). This allows the contents of the report to be fed into your own internal risk assessments and allows a plan to be developed to address the vulnerabilities which present the highest risk to your organisation.

Secure & Encrypted Report Delivery

Due to the sensitive content which may be contained in our test reports, all test reports are delivered to our customers through a secure file delivery mechanism. All test reports are encrypted using AES-256 encryption and are secured with a strong, randomly-generated password which is delivered ‘out-of-band’ to you via SMS. The encrypted file is then delivered to you through an encrypted & expiring URL link – allowing you to download the test report securely to your workstation.

After Care

Once our consultancy engagement is complete and our final report has been delivered to you, our consultancy team remain available to you indefinitely for any questions you may have surrounding the report’s findings or our consultancy engagement with you.

We pride ourselves in partnering with our customers to provide adhoc security advice and to ensure that our engagement with you doesn’t simply end once the final report has been delivered.

We are committed to ensuring that you receive the utmost value out of our consultancy services and look forward to developing a long-lasting business relationship with you.

Conference Call

Once you have received our final report, you have the option of attending a conference call between the consultant(s) involved in delivering your project and individuals within your organisation who you feel would benefit from a more in-depth discussion of the report’s findings.

A conference call is suitable for both management and technical staff. It provides you with the perfect opportunity to ensure that all vulnerabilities and their recommended course of action are fully understood by stakeholders the technical staff who will be tasked with applying the recommended course of action.