Vignesh Mani

Penetration Tester · Cybersecurity Engineer

Vignesh is a Computer Security Master's student at EPITA in Paris, with hands-on experience in web, network and infrastructure penetration testing gained through internships and independent project work. He works primarily with Burp Suite, Nmap and Python, following OWASP testing methodology.

Vignesh Mani
Paris, France
EPITA, Computer Security
Offensive security focus
Cloud & infrastructure background
About

Background

Vignesh's background spans cloud engineering, site reliability engineering and cybersecurity. During two internships at the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing in India, he worked on OpenStack infrastructure and on log-based threat detection, which gave him practical exposure to production systems and monitoring before he moved into offensive security.

His current focus is penetration testing across web applications, networks and Active Directory environments, following OWASP methodology with Burp Suite as his main testing tool. Alongside coursework, he also builds small security tools in Python, including a port scanner, a subdomain enumerator and a directory brute-forcer, to understand the mechanics behind common reconnaissance techniques rather than relying only on existing frameworks.

Current focus
Web and network penetration testing
Location
Paris, France
Education
M.S. Computer Security, EPITA
Primary tools
Burp Suite, Nmap, Python
Security Focus

Areas of hands-on experience

Penetration Testing
Web, internal and infrastructure testing following OWASP Top 10 and Testing Guide methodology. Tools: Burp Suite, SQLmap.
Network Security
Reconnaissance and enumeration across TCP/IP, DNS and firewall boundaries. Tools: Nmap, Wireshark, Hydra, Gobuster.
Active Directory
Attack paths across Windows domains, worked from a Kali Linux environment. Environment: Kali Linux, Windows.
Cloud & Infrastructure
Provisioning and securing cloud platforms, including IAM and RBAC design. Platforms: OpenStack, Docker, VMware.
Security Automation
Scripts that remove a manual step from testing or provisioning workflows. Languages: Python, Bash, PowerShell.
Monitoring & Detection
Log correlation and alert tuning, from the reliability side of two internships. Platforms: ELK Stack, Grafana, Splunk.
Projects

Independent security tools

Built outside of coursework and internships. Source for all of them is on GitHub.

target thread thread thread open / closed map
Network Tooling

TCP Port Scanner

A multi-threaded TCP port scanner. It splits a target port range across a thread pool instead of testing ports one at a time, so a full-range scan finishes in seconds rather than minutes.

Python, socket, threading
GitHub
  • ICMPSends a standard ping sweep across the target range.
  • TCPIn parallel, attempts a TCP connection on common ports.
  • MERGEA host is marked live if either probe gets a response.
Network Tooling

Live Host Discovery

A host discovery tool combining ICMP and TCP probing. A pure ICMP sweep misses hosts on networks that filter ping, so this checks both and treats a response to either as evidence the host is live.

Python, ICMP, TCP
GitHub
  • 1Resolve a random, non-existent subdomain to fingerprint wildcard DNS on the target.
  • 2Brute-force the real wordlist across multiple threads.
  • 3Discard any result matching the wildcard fingerprint.
DNS Tooling

Subdomain Enumeration Tool

A threaded DNS brute-forcer. Wildcard DNS makes naive brute-forcing unreliable, since almost any guess resolves to something, so this fingerprints wildcard behaviour first and filters matching results out.

Python, DNS resolution, threading
GitHub
$ python dirbrute.py https://target.tld --ext bak,old,config --threads 50
Web Tooling

Directory Brute-Forcer

A multi-threaded HTTP path discovery tool with extension fuzzing and status-code filtering, used to find backup files and admin routes that don't show up in a normal crawl.

Python, HTTP, threading
GitHub
Professional Experience

Internships

Feb 2024, Jul 2024
Cloud Engineering Intern
Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, India

Worked on an OpenStack-based cloud provisioning platform used across 13 branches, automating over 100 VM deployments. Carried out REST API security assessments that identified authentication and privilege escalation flaws, then implemented fixes using RBAC and token-based authentication, along with least-privilege IAM policies. Automated provisioning workflows with Python and Bash, cutting manual provisioning time by approximately 40%.

OpenStack, RBAC, IAM, Python, Bash
Jul 2023, Sep 2023
Site Reliability Engineering Intern
Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, India

Deployed an OpenTelemetry stack for infrastructure monitoring and log aggregation. Analyzed logs to identify abnormal traffic patterns and potential DDoS activity, and tuned alerting thresholds through load simulation, reducing false positives by approximately 30%.

OpenTelemetry, log analysis, alerting
Skills

Technical reference

Offensive Security

OWASP Top 10, OWASP Testing Guide, Burp Suite, SQLmap

Networking

Nmap, Wireshark, Netcat, Hydra, Gobuster, TCP/IP, DNS, DHCP, VPNs

Operating Systems

Linux (Kali), Windows, Active Directory

Cloud & Infrastructure

OpenStack, Docker, VMware, IAM, RBAC

Programming & Scripting

Python, Bash, PowerShell

Monitoring & Detection

ELK Stack, Grafana, Splunk, OpenTelemetry
Education & Certifications

Formal background

Master of Computer Science, Computer Security
EPITA, Le-Kremlin Bicêtre, France
Expected March 2027
Bachelor of Engineering, Computer Science
Sriram Engineering College, Chennai, India
2020 to 2024, CGPA 8/10
eLearnSecurity Junior Penetration Tester (eJPT)In progress
Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA)In progress
French Language, A2 LevelJul 2026
Contact

Interested in discussing a cybersecurity opportunity or project? Get in touch.

Based in Paris, France. Currently available for full-time roles.