OS only discovery

Hello everybody,
I would like to set up a scan that only provides the OS and possible updates as a result. Can someone help me how to set this up in openVAS?

many Greetings
Alexander Pietsch

OS detection: yes. Use the scan config Host Discovery
Possible updates: no. Greenbone / OpenVAS is not an update manager. Missing Updates are often detected when the OS version is EoL and therefore a security risk. But as long as the Version is still supported there is not comparison that indicates if there are more recent versions available or not.

Hallo Tino, danke fĂĽr deine Antwort. Das hatte ich auch schon so versucht. Nur leider erhalte ich dann in einem Bericht folgendes:


Ich hätte da ein paar Einträge erwartet. Hast du eine Idee warum da nichts erkannt wird?

Viele GrĂĽĂźe

Host Discovery on generates results with the severity level “log”. Results of this severity level are filtered out by default.
Try adjusting the filter by entering “levels=g” in the filter bar. This should show you all entries in your tabs.

Hin Tino,
unfortunately negative. I completely deleted the task and created it again. “Levels = g” is then specified in the report filter.


What am I doing wrong?

The results are now shown, the Operating Systems couldn’t be determined however.
Try to get a more accurate OS detection by using the config System Detection", and/or adding credentials to the task if this is possible.
If this doesn’t help check the results.
Some results should be of the VT “Unknown OS and Service Banner Reporting”. The details of this test collect everything the task was able to collect about the host’s OS. Send me what info was found and what the actual OS of this host was. We might find a way to enhance the OS detection.

1 Like

I’ve come a little further. Under Assets / Operating Systems I see a lot.
So the OS can already be queried, right?

Some OS have successfully been found in some tasks, yes. That enables them to be shown in this asset view.

1 Like