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# Privilege Escalation

**Privilege Escalation** is the process of exploiting vulnerabilities or misconfigurations in a system to gain higher-level access, such as administrative or root privileges. It is a crucial part of the attack lifecycle and often determines the success of a penetration test. Once a foothold is established on a system, elevating privileges allows the attacker to perform tasks that require admin-level permissions. Mastering privilege escalation is essential for becoming an effective penetration tester.