


Nessus features several practical uses for cybersecurity professionals. To download Nessus Home, obtain an activation code by subscribing with your name and e-mail address and then download the latest version of Nessus Home for your operating system. With Nessus Home, users can scan up to 16 IP addresses at high speeds with in-depth assessments. Obviously, the commercial version comes with more features, but this does not in any way degrade the effectiveness of Nessus Home. It is free to home users for personal use (Nessus Home), but requires a license for commercial use (Nessus Professional). Figure A shows the Nessus Windows client.Nessus is a proprietary vulnerability scanner created by Tenable, Inc. You’ll need time and experimentation to really discover what you can do with this tool. It’s impossible to cover all variations and options in the short span of this article however, I’ll give you an overview that will help you get started. Nessus is highly configurable, as you will see. When you are ready to scan production systems, run the scans during nonworking hours (or at least, during less hectic times) and have fellow administrators ready to restart systems or applications if necessary. I strongly suggest that you start scanning in a lab environment before trying this on a live production network. Scanning can freeze host systems and is visible to IDS devices and sniffers. Anyone running scans without prior notice and permission will be seen as a hacker-no matter how good your intentions are. Now, I’m going to show you the specifics of how to use it.īefore you start scanning your hosts or network, you need to get permission. In my previous article, I introduced Nessus and explained how it can be a valuable asset. Nessus is a powerful tool for scanning your network and pinpointing security issues such as missing patches and flaws that could targeted by attackers. Here's a detailed look at how to use the Nessus security scanner. IT departments can easily spend thousands of dollars on software that helps pinpoint network security soft spots. Learn how to scan for security flaws with Nessus
