Footprinting is the first phase of ethical hacking and information gathering. It involves collecting as much information as possible about a target system or organization from public sources (such as websites, social media, WHOIS databases, job postings, etc.) before launching an attack or vulnerability scan.
# Reference - CEH v13 Official Study Guide, Module 1: Introduction to Ethical Hacking
"Footprinting is the process of gathering information about a target system to find ways to intrude into the system."
# Incorrect options:
A). Scanning is the next phase, involving probing the network.
C). Enumeration extracts detailed information from services like SNMP, NetBIOS, etc.
D). System Hacking is the actual exploitation phase.