Are they coming out with a new model or something ? <| sep |> I ' m assuming programs like these are very loud . Not for those trying to be stealthy . Is this accurate ? That is accurate . When I ' m performing a pentest , I will never use Nessus , or just throw Nmap wildly around a network . With modern detection tools , it ' s trivial for defenders to see that kind of traffic . Is it standard procedure , so to speak , to use tools like this ? Or is it more realistic that one would do some in depth scanning , with tools such as nmap , on their own and do their own assessment to see what is exploitable ? Nmap is still pretty common , but few pentesters that I know will use things like Sparta or Nessus to do real penetration testing . Stealthy scanning is definitely the way to go . Look at things like nbtscan for easy , quick , and stealthy enumeration on Windows networks . Of these types of tools available , what are the most widely used programs in the industry and where would be a good resource to begin learning them ? I would say that among network scanning tools , nmap is one of the most popular . Nessus is useful for vulnerability assessment , but I don ' t consider it a penetration testing tool . The best way to learn about these tools is to use them in a lab or on your own network , to see how they respond to different devices . Is this how vulnerability assessment of a host is normally done ? If not , what is ? This is the usual tactic for doing vulnerability assessment of a host , but you should keep in mind that penetration testing and vulnerability assessment are quite different .