Package: nmap Version: 6.40-0.2 Severity: minor In the "PORT SCANNING BASICS" "The six port states recognized by Nmap" section of the Nmap manual page, the actual state names are missing.
This is what it says: An application is actively accepting TCP connections, UDP datagrams or SCTP associations on this port. Finding these is often the primary goal of port scanning. Security-minded people know that each open port is an avenue for attack. Attackers and pen-testers want to exploit the open ports, while administrators try to close or protect them with firewalls without thwarting legitimate users. Open ports are also interesting for non-security scans because they show services available for use on the network. A closed port is accessible (it receives and responds to Nmap probe packets), but there is no application listening on it. They can be helpful in showing that a host is up on an IP address (host discovery, or ping scanning), and as part of OS detection. Because closed ports are reachable, it may be worth scanning later in case some open up. Administrators may want to consider blocking such ports with a firewall. Then they would appear in the filtered state, discussed next. [..] But if you check http://nmap.org/book/man-port-scanning-basics.html, you'll see that it says: open An application is actively accepting TCP connections, UDP datagrams or SCTP associations on this port. Finding these is often the primary goal of port scanning. Security-minded people know that each open port is an avenue for attack. Attackers and pen-testers want to exploit the open ports, while administrators try to close or protect them with firewalls without thwarting legitimate users. Open ports are also interesting for non-security scans because they show services available for use on the network. closed A closed port is accessible (it receives and responds to Nmap probe packets), but there is no application listening on it. They can be helpful in showing that a host is up on an IP address (host discovery, or ping scanning), and as part of OS detection. Because closed ports are reachable, it may be worth scanning later in case some open up. Administrators may want to consider blocking such ports with a firewall. Then they would appear in the filtered state, discussed next. [..] Regards, Oskar -- System Information: Debian Release: jessie/sid APT prefers testing APT policy: (990, 'testing'), (500, 'testing-updates'), (500, 'unstable') Architecture: amd64 (x86_64) Foreign Architectures: i386 Kernel: Linux 3.13-1-amd64 (SMP w/8 CPU cores) Locale: LANG=POSIX, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8) Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash Versions of packages nmap depends on: ii libc6 2.18-4 ii libgcc1 1:4.8.2-16 ii liblinear1 1.8+dfsg-1 ii liblua5.2-0 5.2.3-1 ii libpcap0.8 1.5.3-2 ii libpcre3 1:8.31-2 ii libssl1.0.0 1.0.1g-2 ii libstdc++6 4.8.2-16 pn python:any <none> nmap recommends no packages. nmap suggests no packages. -- no debconf information -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-dist-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
