CompTIA Network+ N10-008 Practice Question

A penetration test simulates an attack on a system to exploit potential vulnerabilities, including those that might be publicly disclosed, in a controlled environment. It is the most proactive and direct method of assessing the practical risk of known issues in a network's defenses from the perspective of a potential attacker. Vulnerability assessment, although helpful for identifying vulnerabilities, doesn't reveal the ease with which an attacker could exploit them. Documentation review and user rights review are important assessments but do not directly address the exploitation of known software vulnerabilities.