Offensive Security
Offensive security is the practice of finding weaknesses by attacking your own systems — through penetration testing, red teaming and attack simulation — before someone else does.
What is Offensive Security?
Definition
Offensive Security is the practice of finding weaknesses by attacking your own systems first: penetration testing, red teaming, attack simulation and adversary emulation, all carried out under an agreed scope. Its value is evidential rather than theoretical — a defensive control either withstood a real technique or it did not, and that answer is worth more than an architecture diagram claiming it should have. In cybersecurity it works only when paired with the defensive side, because a finding nobody remediates is an expensive way of documenting a problem.
Role in cybersecurity
Offensive Security plays an important role in building organizational resilience against cyber threats. Implementing appropriate mechanisms in this area is required by regulations such as NIS2, DORA and ISO 27001.