Hack Attacks Testing: How to Conduct Your Own Security Audit [With CDROM]

John Chirillo routinely stuffs his books with a wide variety of hard to find technical gems. This book is no exception as he has created an exceptional manual on security auditing. His compilation of tools is excellent and the book descriptions and how-to's, even better. For those that are inclined, he outlines the building of a Tiger Box (testing system) which takes full advantage of the tools contained on the CDROM. The head to head comparisons of the popular security tools help you in selecting the security tool that is right for you. If you are playing catch up in the mad-cap world of Internet security, this book can help you level the playing field. The CDROM also contains the highly functional Tiger Tools Suite which takes the difficult job of security testing to the level of simple mouse clicks. This is a good book to break in a beginner and is full of information to satisfy the security veteran.

I enjoyed the detail in this book and the configurations are technically sound. The author covered the best known software with clear instructions on getting up and running and then performing an audit with each package. The book closes with an interesting evaluation ranking chart and compares each package based on number of issues detected. The text is easy to follow and formatted well. This is a good beginner guide to vulnerability assessments (veterans need not apply).