Architecture based on open source project

Metasploit is built on a symbiotic architecture of the open source base and commercial software additions that bring a graphical user interface, workflows, and advanced attack capabilities.

Rapid7 is uniquely positioned to cost-effectively offer a best-in-class product by leveraging a large community security professionals and researchers. And, the commercial editions of Metasploit fuel the ongoing development and quality assurance of the free, open source framework - a great symbiosis.

The Metasploit Framework, with its many modules, is written entirely in Ruby and offers a command line interface only. The commercial editions of Metasploit, such as Metasploit Express and Metasploit Pro, add a graphical Web-based interface based on Apache Web server. Users can connect to the server locally or over the network. Metasploit Pro supports the connection of several users simultaneously to enable concerted penetration testing efforts. In such team situations, team members can route traffic through a central instance of Metasploit and further through compromised targets.

The commercial editions of Metasploit support the simultaneous execution of tasks, such as discovery, brute forcing, and exploitation, which accelerates penetration testing efforts.

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