You want to connect to your friend's computer and run a Trojan on it. Which of the following tools will you use to accomplish the task?

PsExec is a command-line tool from the Microsoft Sysinternals suite designed to execute processes on remote systems. It is a legitimate administration utility that functions as a lightweight telnet replacement. An attacker with appropriate credentials for a target machine can use PsExec to connect to it over the network (via the SMB protocol) and remotely launch any executable, such as a Trojan. This capability makes it a common tool for lateral movement and remote code execution during penetration tests without requiring prior installation of client software on the target.

A. Remoxec: While it is a remote execution tool, PsExec is the industry-standard and Microsoft-provided utility for this task, making it the most appropriate answer in a professional context.

B. Hk.exe: This executable is historically associated with the L0phtCrack password auditing tool for dumping password hashes; it is not used for remote execution of programs.

D. GetAdmin.exe: This is a local privilege escalation tool used to gain administrator-level rights on the machine it is run on, not to execute commands on a remote system.

1. Microsoft Corporation. (2023). PsExec v2.43. Microsoft Learn. Retrieved from https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/psexec. The official documentation states

"PsExec is a light-weight telnet-replacement that lets you execute processes on other systems... without having to manually install client software."

2. Al-Shaer

E.

& Wei

J. (2014). Network Security Analytics and Automation. In Cyber-Physical Systems: A Computational Perspective (pp. 455-485). CRC Press. In Chapter 15

Section 15.3.2

tools like PsExec are discussed as common methods for remote command execution in attack scenarios.

3. Botezatu

M.

Pătrașcu

A.

& Simion

E. (2021). A Survey on Windows Lateral Movement Techniques in Enterprise Networks. IEEE Access

9

21536-21561. https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2021.3057807. In Section III-A

"Remote Services

" the paper explicitly identifies PsExec as a "legitimate administration tool... that can be used to execute commands on a remote host

" and notes its frequent use by attackers for lateral movement.