Hacking the Windows Operating System

Up until now, in our journey, we have spent time mostly on ideas and theory at a 10,000-foot view of security and exploitation. Here, we begin to dive into the details and operations of compromising and defending the Windows operating system (OS). Before we begin, it is important to reiterate that this chapter assumes the groundwork discussed in the earlier chapters is complete, including footprinting, scanning, and enumeration.

Attacking Windows systems involves four key aspects: the Windows OS, Windows Networking, Windows Services and Applications, and Windows Authentication. Once one of these areas has been compromised and access has been gained, the second part of exploitation begins; this includes privilege escalation, establishing persistence, and lateral movement. Meanwhile, the defenders are trying to detect, isolate, and mitigate such activity on the network. For defenders, we can take what we learn about attackers and apply those lessons...