Nmap, short for Network Mapper, is a free, open-source tool for vulnerability scanning and network discovery. Network administrators use Nmap to identify what devices are running on their systems, discovering hosts that are available and the services they offer, finding open ports and detecting security risks.
On modern operating systems, ports are numbered addresses for network traffic. Different kinds of services use different ports by default.
For example, normal web traffic uses Port 80, while POP3 email uses Port 110. One of the ways that a firewall works is by allowing or restricting traffic over a particular port.
Because the ports into your computer can cause a security risk, it’s critical to know which ports are open and which are blocked.
There is a wide range of free network monitoring utilities and vulnerability scanners available to network administrators and security auditors. While the basis of Nmap's functionality is port scanning, it allows for a variety of related capabilities including:
- Network mapping: Nmap can identify the devices on a network (also called host discovery), including servers, routers and switches, and how they're physically connected.
- OS detection: Nmap can detect the operating systems running on network devices (also called OS fingerprinting), providing the vendor name, the underlying operating system, the version of the software and even an estimate of devices' uptime.
- Service discovery: Nmap can not only identify hosts on the network, but whether they're acting as mail, web or name servers, and the particular applications and versions of the related software they're running.
- Security auditing: Figuring out what versions of operating systems and applications are running on network hosts lets network managers determine their vulnerability to specific flaws. If a network admin receives an alert about a vulnerability in a particular version of an application, for example, she can scan her network to identify whether that software version is running on the network and take steps to patch or update the relevant hosts. Scripts can also automate tasks such as detecting specific vulnerabilities.
