# Network Pentest

> Internal network and Active Directory penetration testing skill for corporate environments. Use when performing authorized internal network assessments, AD attack path analysis, lateral movement, privilege escalation, and post-exploitation across Windows/Linux estates. Covers BloodHound, Impacket, NetExec/CrackMapExec, Responder, Rubeus, mimikatz, certipy. Triggers on requests to pentest internal networks, attack AD, perform lateral movement, Kerberoast, DCSync, or escalate privileges.

- Skill: `hardw00t/network-pentest` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 18 files)
- Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add hardw00t/network-pentest`
- Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/hardw00t/network-pentest/raw
- Safety review: pending
- Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex
- Category: Coding & Dev Tools
- Author: hardw00t (https://skillmd.com/u/hardw00t)
- Updated: 2026-09-10
- Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/hardw00t/network-pentest

---


# Network Penetration Testing

## STOP — Authorization check (read before any execution)

This skill executes **offensive techniques** against live infrastructure. Before any action:

1. Confirm a **written engagement letter / SOW** is in scope and in-date.
2. Confirm **Rules of Engagement (ROE)** covering: target CIDRs, excluded hosts, allowed techniques (coercion? DCSync? password spray?), permitted hours, source-IP allowlist, and customer emergency contact.
3. Confirm the **authorization** explicitly names the domain(s) and tenant(s) you are about to test.
4. If ANY of the above is unclear, ambiguous, or missing — **STOP and request clarification**. Do not proceed on the basis of verbal approval, chat-channel approval, or inferred scope.

Destructive/high-blast-radius actions (DCSync against production DCs, Zerologon, Skeleton Key, GPO edits, krbtgt reset, cert forgery) require a **second, specific written approval** in addition to the base engagement letter. Every such action must be logged with timestamp, operator, and justification for the customer's IR reconciliation.

Prefer read-only enumeration and dry-run modes first. Escalate only when the previous step establishes the precondition. Never chain offensive actions speculatively.

---

This skill enables comprehensive internal network and Active Directory penetration testing: reconnaissance, credential attacks, lateral movement, privilege escalation, and domain dominance. It is a thin router — heavy content lives in `workflows/`, `references/`, and `payloads/`. Load only the file you need.

## When to Use

- Authorized internal network penetration test
- Authorized Active Directory security assessment
- Lateral movement / privilege escalation validation
- Credential-attack testing (spray, Kerberoast, AS-REP)
- Post-exploitation path verification from a simulated phished user
- Network segmentation bypass validation
- Purple-team exercises where offensive action is agreed with the blue team

## Trigger Phrases

- "pentest the internal network"
- "attack Active Directory" / "AD assessment"
- "perform lateral movement"
- "escalate privileges on the domain"
- "extract NTDS / DCSync"
- "kerberoast" / "AS-REP roast" / "password spray"
- "test network segmentation"

## When NOT to Use This Skill

- **Cloud IAM assessment (AWS IAM, Azure Entra ID, GCP IAM)** — use `cloud-security`. This skill is for on-prem AD, not cloud-native identity. (Azure Hybrid / AD-Connect scenarios may touch both.)
- **External web application / external surface testing** — use `dast-automation` for unauthenticated web surface, Burp-based testing, and API security.
- **Container image CVE scanning or runtime k8s hardening** — use `container-security`.
- **Source-code/IaC misconfiguration review** — use `iac-security` / `sast-review`.
- **Mobile app testing** — use `mobile-security`.
- **Social-engineering / phishing campaigns** — out of scope; use the dedicated phishing skill if present.

If the engagement has a cloud + on-prem hybrid target (e.g., Entra Connect, AAD joined workstations), start here for the on-prem side and hand off specific cloud identity paths to `cloud-security`.

## Decision Tree

```
Are you authorized (see STOP section)?
├── No  -> stop, request written scope + ROE
└── Yes
    │
    ├── No creds yet, no foothold
    │     -> workflows/recon.md
    │     -> workflows/credential_attacks.md  (Responder, spray)
    │
    ├── Low-priv domain cred in hand
    │     -> workflows/ad_enumeration.md  (BloodHound + LDAP)
    │     -> workflows/credential_attacks.md  (Kerberoast, AS-REP)
    │
    ├── Local admin on one host, need to spread
    │     -> workflows/lateral_movement.md
    │
    ├── Need to elevate (local or domain)
    │     -> workflows/privilege_escalation.md
    │
    └── Domain Admin / replication rights in hand
          -> workflows/domain_dominance.md   (DCSync, golden ticket, rollback)
```

## Parallelism Hints

Independent — run concurrently (one sub-agent each):
- Host discovery across different /24s (subnet-level fan-out)
- Nmap service fingerprinting across disjoint host batches
- BloodHound collection methods: `Default`, `ACL`, `LocalGroup`, `Session` (independent LDAP/SMB streams)
- LDAP queries by object class (users, computers, groups, SPN, ASREP)
- Per-host LSASS/SAM/LSA extraction across a pwned-hosts list
- Kerberoast vs AS-REP roast vs Responder (different primitives)
- Hashcat sessions on separate hashlists / GPUs

Must be sequential (shared state / lockout / replication):
- **Password spraying against the same domain** — bad-pwd counters are shared; fanning out causes lockouts. Enforce a per-account cadence of `attempts < LOCKOUT_THRESHOLD - 1` per observation window, with delays between passes.
- Repeated LSASS dumps on the same host — EDR stacking triggers
- Full `secretsdump -just-dc` runs against the same DC (replication contention)
- krbtgt password resets and their twin (required >= ticket-lifetime apart)

## Sub-Agent Delegation

- **Recon**: one sub-agent per subnet (/24) for discovery + fingerprinting. Aggregator sub-agent consolidates services.csv.
- **AD enumeration**: one sub-agent per BloodHound collection method.
- **Lateral movement**: when BloodHound surfaces N distinct attack paths of similar length, dispatch one sub-agent per path; each owns its credential cache. Collate into a single `engagement-notes.md`.
- **Hash cracking**: dedicate a sub-agent per hash list to avoid GPU contention on a single hashcat process.

Do NOT fan out credential spraying — it is a single-threaded, lockout-aware operation.

## Reasoning Budget

Extended thinking pays off for:
- **Attack-path planning from BloodHound graph data** — trade off chain length, noise, blast radius, reversibility
- **Kill-chain sequencing** from heterogeneous loot (e.g., a cracked svc account + a readable LAPS attribute + a vulnerable cert template — which chain is shortest to DA?)
- **Cleanup ordering** in domain dominance (remove artefacts in the correct order to avoid locking yourself out mid-rollback)
- **Privilege-vector selection** (which of 4 ACL write primitives to use, which delegation path to exploit)

Minimal reasoning — execute without deep thought:
- Nmap command construction from a port list
- Parsing `linpeas` / `winpeas` / `nxc` output for known signatures
- Single-purpose tool invocations with documented flags

## Multimodal Hooks

- Capture screenshots of authoritative commands under DA context (e.g., `Get-ADDomain`, `whoami /all`) — link via `schemas/finding.json#evidence.screenshot`.
- BloodHound path screenshots for executive summary.
- Wireshark / tcpdump pcap snippets for relay/coercion evidence — link via `schemas/finding.json#evidence.pcap`.

## Structured Output

All findings conform to `schemas/finding.json`. Skill-specific fields: `target_host`, `ip`, `port`, `protocol`, `service_version`, `domain`, `compromised_account` (object w/ sam/upn/credential_type), `privilege_level`, `attack_chain` (ordered step objects with MITRE technique IDs), `mitre_attack`, `kill_chain_phase`, `blast_radius`, `authorized` (must be `true`).

## Workflow Index

| Workflow | Use when | File |
|----------|----------|------|
| Reconnaissance | Start of engagement, inventory the scope | `workflows/recon.md` |
| AD enumeration | Have a domain cred, need the graph | `workflows/ad_enumeration.md` |
| Credential attacks | Need (more) creds: spray / roast / coerce | `workflows/credential_attacks.md` |
| Lateral movement | Have creds + one host, need to spread | `workflows/lateral_movement.md` |
| Privilege escalation | Local or domain elevation | `workflows/privilege_escalation.md` |
| Domain dominance | DA reached — evidence + rollback | `workflows/domain_dominance.md` |

## Payloads Index

| File | Purpose |
|------|---------|
| `payloads/responder_config.md` | Three Responder.conf profiles (capture / relay / WPAD) |
| `payloads/cme_modules.md` | Curated NetExec/CME module list by phase |
| `payloads/gpo_abuse_templates.md` | SharpGPOAbuse / pyGPOAbuse templates + rollback |

## References Index

| File | Content |
|------|---------|
| `references/nmap_cheatsheet.md` | Host discovery, port/service scans, masscan handoff |
| `references/bloodhound_queries.md` | Cypher queries for paths, ACLs, delegation, sessions |
| `references/impacket_toolkit.md` | GetUserSPNs, GetNPUsers, secretsdump, psexec, wmiexec, ticketer, ntlmrelayx, addcomputer |
| `references/crackmapexec.md` | NetExec/CME protocols, spraying cadence, module list |
| `references/ad_attack_matrix.md` | Kerberoast, AS-REP, DCSync, delegation, ACL, GPO, ADCS mapping with MITRE IDs |
| `references/lateral_movement.md` | PtH, PtT, overpass, DCOM, WMI, WinRM, SSH pivot, ligolo |
| `references/bounty_patterns_2024_2026.md` | Post-2023 bounty TTPs as network-recon primitives (HTTP/2 CONNECT scan, TE.0 smuggling recon, K8s SA-token theft pivot) |

## Tools

| Tool | Purpose | Install |
|------|---------|---------|
| nmap | Network/service scan | `apt install nmap` / `brew install nmap` |
| masscan | Fast large-scope discovery | `apt install masscan` |
| NetExec (nxc) | Multi-proto post-auth | `pipx install netexec` |
| Impacket | SMB/Kerberos/MSRPC suite | `pipx install impacket` |
| BloodHound CE + SharpHound / bloodhound-python | AD graph | `pipx install bloodhound` + CE docker |
| certipy-ad | ADCS attack toolkit | `pipx install certipy-ad` |
| Rubeus | Windows Kerberos toolkit | Binary from GitHub |
| mimikatz / pypykatz | Credential extraction | Binary / `pipx install pypykatz` |
| Responder | LLMNR/NBT-NS/mDNS poisoner | `git clone` + run from repo |
| evil-winrm | WinRM client | `gem install evil-winrm` |
| kerbrute | Kerberos user enum + spray | Binary from GitHub |
| hashcat | Hash cracking | `apt install hashcat` |
| ligolo-ng / chisel | Modern pivoting / tunneling | Binaries |

## Last Validated

- **2026-04**
- Tested against: impacket 0.12, NetExec 1.3, certipy-ad 4.8, BloodHound CE 5.11, bloodhound-python 1.7.2, nmap 7.94, Rubeus 2.3, ligolo-ng 0.7.