Security Testing (English)

中文版: See skill security-testing.

Prompt: this directory's prompts/security-testing_EN.md.

When to Use

• User mentions security testing, security-testing
• Need to execute this testing type or produce deliverables per Standard-version
• Trigger examples: "Generate/design/write security test plan for the following"

Output Format Options

Markdown by default. For Excel / CSV / JSON, add at the end of your request; see output-formats.md.

How to Use

1. Open the relevant file in this directory's prompts/ and copy the content below the dashed line.
2. Append your requirements and context (business flow, environment, constraints, acceptance criteria).
3. If you need non-Markdown output, append the request sentence from output-formats.md at the end.

Code Examples

1. OWASP ZAP Security Scanning

Complete OWASP ZAP security testing example including baseline scan, full scan, and API scan.

Location: ../security-testing/examples/owasp-zap-scan/

Includes:

• Baseline scan script (quick scan)
• Full scan script (deep scan)
• API scan script
• Automated run scripts
• Detailed README documentation

Quick Start:

cd examples/owasp-zap-scan
./run-scan.sh baseline https://example.com

Test Coverage:

• SQL injection detection
• XSS vulnerability detection
• CSRF vulnerability detection
• Security configuration check
• API security testing

See: examples/owasp-zap-scan/README.md

Best Practices

Security Testing Principles

1. OWASP Top 10

   • Injection attacks
   • Broken authentication
   • Sensitive data exposure
   • XML External Entities (XXE)
   • Broken access control
   • Security misconfiguration
   • Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
   • Insecure deserialization
   • Using components with known vulnerabilities
   • Insufficient logging and monitoring

2. Testing Phases

   • Development: Static code analysis
   • Testing: Dynamic security testing
   • Pre-release: Penetration testing
   • Production: Continuous monitoring

3. Testing Methods

   • Black box: No knowledge of internal implementation
   • White box: Full knowledge of internal implementation
   • Gray box: Partial knowledge of internal implementation

Tool Selection Guide

Tool	Use Case	Advantages
OWASP ZAP	Web application security	Open source, easy to use, automated
Burp Suite	Penetration testing	Powerful, professional
Nmap	Network scanning	Port scanning, service identification
SQLMap	SQL injection	Automated injection testing
Nikto	Web server	Quick vulnerability scanning

Common Pitfalls

• ❌ Running tools without threat context → ✅ Map tests to assets, attack surfaces, and risk priorities
• ❌ Treating scan output as final truth → ✅ Triage findings, verify exploitability, and reduce false positives
• ❌ Missing authz/authn abuse scenarios → ✅ Add broken access control and session abuse cases
• ❌ One-time testing before release only → ✅ Integrate recurring security checks in CI and release gates

Troubleshooting

Detailed troubleshooting steps were moved to references/troubleshooting.md. Load it on demand to keep the main skill concise.

Reference Files

• prompts/security-testing_EN.md — Security testing Standard-version prompt
• output-formats.md — Markdown / Excel / CSV / JSON request instructions
• examples/owasp-zap-scan/ — Complete OWASP ZAP example
• quick-start.md — 5-minute quick start guide

Related skills: api-testing-en, automation-testing-en, test-strategy-en, test-reporting-en.

Target Audience

• QA engineers and developers executing this testing domain in real projects
• Team leads who need structured, reproducible testing outputs
• AI users who need fast, format-ready deliverables for execution and reporting

Not Recommended For

• Pure production incident response without test scope/context
• Decisions requiring legal/compliance sign-off without expert review
• Requests lacking minimum inputs (scope, environment, expected behavior)

Critical Success Factors

• Provide clear scope, environment, and acceptance criteria before generation
• Validate generated outputs against real system constraints before execution
• Keep artifacts traceable (requirements -> test points -> defects -> decisions)

Output Templates and Parsing Scripts

• Template directory: output-templates/
  • template-word.md (Word-friendly structure)
  • template-excel.tsv (Excel paste-ready)
  • template-xmind.md (XMind-friendly outline)
  • template-json.json
  • template-csv.csv
  • template-markdown.md
• Parser scripts directory: scripts/
  • Parse (generic): parse_output_formats.py
  • Parse (per-format): parse_word.py, parse_excel.py, parse_xmind.py, parse_json.py, parse_csv.py, parse_markdown.py
  • Convert (generic): convert_output_formats.py
  • Convert (per-format): convert_to_word.py, convert_to_excel.py, convert_to_xmind.py, convert_to_json.py, convert_to_csv.py, convert_to_markdown.py
  • Batch convert: batch_convert_templates.py (outputs into artifacts/)

Examples:

python3 scripts/parse_json.py output-templates/template-json.json
python3 scripts/parse_markdown.py output-templates/template-markdown.md
python3 scripts/convert_to_json.py output-templates/template-markdown.md
python3 scripts/convert_output_formats.py output-templates/template-json.json --to csv
python3 scripts/batch_convert_templates.py --skip-same