How do I know if a target is being marked as unresponsive?
There are a few ways you can verify the target status.
Firstly, head to the Targets page and filter by 'Unresponsive'. You'll notice that they have a grey dot next to them:
Second, head to the target's detail page, where you'll see the target status in the top left (just below the target name):
Third, head to the scan's detail page and filter the status by 'Unresponsive':
Why would a target be marked unresponsive?
Whenever you kick off a scan with Intruder, we run a discovery scan (using Smart Recon) so you'll know within seconds if the target responds to ping and/or if any of the 4000 most common ports are open.
If they're not, the scan finishes there – with nothing exposed, there's nothing for us to scan for vulnerabilities – and the target is marked as unresponsive.
What should I do if this isn't what I expected?
...if it's the first scan on this target
You'll need to work your way through this list, eliminating as you go:
Check if the scanner being blocked by your firewall, IPS or WAF; if it is, you'll need to add our source scanner IPs to your allowlist(s).
Check if your firewall has geo-fencing enabled. If it does, you'll need to make allowances for these two IPs:
UK/London:203.12.218.0/24US/Iowa:
64.52.19.0/24Confirm that the target is exposing ports or services to the internet and/or that it responds to ping.
Verify that you've added the correct target (sounds obvious, but www.example.com is different from example.com).
...if it's become unresponsive since the last scan
This means something changed since the target was last scanned and so you'll want to check if:
Firewall configuration, or IPS/IDS/WAF settings have changed.
The target is experiencing internet connectivity or stability issues which is preventing traffic from reaching the target. To fix this, we'd suggest reviewing the settings on the device, network and system environment.
If you don't think any of the above scenarios apply to you, please contact us via the chat bubble to let us know which targets you expect to be responsive and the ports/services you expect to be exposed and responding to discovery probes. As well as the list of potential scenarios you have eliminated thus far.