Who are ethical hackers

Who are ethical hackers? 
Successful ethical hackers possess a variety of skills. They must be trustworthy. While testing security of a client systems, the ethical hacker may discover info. about the client that should not be disclosed. In many cases, this information if publicized, could lead into real intruders breaking to the systems, possibly leading to financial and informational losses. During evaluation, the ethical hacker holds the keys to the company and therefore must be trusted to exercise tight control over any information about a target that could be misused. The sensitivity of information gathered during an evaluation requires that strong measures to be taken to ensure the security of the systems being employed by ethical hackers themselves. 
Ethical hacking can also be called as penetration testing, intrusion testing and red teaming. An ethical hacker is also called as white hat.

What do ethical hackers do? 

An ethical hackers evaluation of a systems security seeks answers to three basic questions

1) What can an intruder see on the target systems? 
2) What can an intruder do with that information? 
3) Does anyone at the target notice the intruder's attempts or successes? 
While the first and second of these are utterly important, the third is even more important: If the owners of the target systems do not notice when someone is trying to break in the intruders can spend weeks or months trying and will eventually succeed. 

 
The idea of testing the security of a system by trying to break into it is not new. Whether an automobile company is crash-testing cars, or an individual is testing his or her skill at martial arts by sparring with a partner, evaluation by testing under attack from a real adversary is widely accepted as prudent. It is, however, not sufficient by itself. Regular auditing, vigilant intrusion detection, good system administration practice, and computer security awareness are all essential parts of an organization's security efforts. A single failure in any of these areas could very well expose an organization to cyber-vandalism, embarrassment, loss of revenue or mind share, or worse. Any new technology has its benefits and its risks. While ethical hackers can help clients better understand their security needs, it is up to the clients to keep their guards in place.