Penetration Testing Built Around Real Attack Paths
We deliver hands-on penetration testing that goes beyond automated scanning. By emulating real-world attack techniques and validating exploitable paths, our practitioner-led assessments uncover vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and security control weaknesses that automated tools alone can miss — helping you understand your real-world risk and prioritize remediation.
Service Offerings
Focused offensive security assessments designed to identify exploitable weaknesses, validate real-world attack paths, and help organizations understand where their greatest risks actually exist.
Network Penetration Testing
Evaluate external and internal environments through hands-on testing designed to uncover exploitable vulnerabilities, configuration weaknesses, segmentation issues, privilege-escalation opportunities, and attack paths that automated scanning alone may miss.
Web Application Penetration Testing
Assess web applications, APIs, authentication flows, business logic, and supporting services for vulnerabilities that could expose sensitive information, compromise accounts, or enable unauthorized access to critical functionality.
Active Directory & Password Assessments
Evaluate Active Directory environments and credential security for weaknesses that could enable unauthorized access, privilege escalation, lateral movement, or compromise of critical systems. Assess password exposure, account controls, permissions, and identity-based attack paths.
Social Engineering Assessments
Test the human side of your security program through controlled phishing, vishing, and other authorized social engineering scenarios designed to measure susceptibility, identify process weaknesses, and evaluate how personnel respond to realistic attack techniques.
Wireless Security Assessments
Evaluate authorized wireless environments for weaknesses in authentication, encryption, configuration, network segmentation, rogue access protections, and other conditions that could enable unauthorized network access.
Physical Security Assessments
Assess physical security controls through controlled, pre-authorized scenarios designed to evaluate facility access, employee verification procedures, restricted areas, security processes, and opportunities for unauthorized entry.
AI-ASSISTED. PRACTITIONER-LED.
Enhanced by Northstar Compass
Our penetration-testing methodology is supported by Northstar Compass, our AI-assisted offensive-security platform designed to help practitioners correlate evidence, analyze attack paths, maintain scope awareness, and turn complex testing data into actionable security insights.
AI enhances our analysis. Experienced penetration testers remain in control of every testing decision.
Our Engagement Approach
Northstar follows a structured, practitioner-led engagement lifecycle designed to identify real-world attack paths, translate technical findings into meaningful risk, and support effective remediation and retesting.
01
Scoping & Rules of Engagement
Define scope, objectives, constraints, testing windows, points of contact, and rules of engagement to ensure safe and authorized testing.
04
Attack Path Validation
Validate how identified weaknesses could be chained together to demonstrate realistic attack paths and business risk.
02
Reconnaissance & Attack Surface Analysis
Review the in-scope environment to understand exposed assets, key technologies, trust relationships, and likely attack paths.
05
Reporting & Remediation Guidance
Deliver a detailed report with prioritized findings, supporting evidence, risk context, and practical remediation guidance.
03
Technical Testing
Perform hands-on security testing to identify vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, security control weaknesses, and exploitable conditions across the target environment.
06
Retest & Validation
After remediation, retest previously identified issues to confirm that vulnerabilities have been addressed and attack paths have been closed.
EXPERTISE & EXPERIENCE
Experienced Practitioners. Real-World Perspective.
Northstar’s cybersecurity practice is led by experienced offensive-security professionals with hands-on expertise across the penetration-testing lifecycle — from scoping and rules of engagement through technical testing, attack-path validation, reporting, and remediation validation.
Our experience spans complex enterprise environments across financial services, healthcare, government, education, manufacturing, retail, transportation, and technology.
01 — Hands-On Offensive Security
Practical experience conducting network, web application, Active Directory, password, wireless, social engineering, and physical security assessments in real-world environments.
02 — Enterprise Security Experience
Experience assessing complex infrastructure, sensitive systems, distributed networks, and environments where technical findings must be translated into clear business risk.
03 — Industry-Recognized Credentials
CISSP • GPEN • GWAPT • CEH • OSCP+
Northstar engagements can be supported by practitioners holding recognized offensive-security and information-security certifications based on engagement requirements.
04 — Full-Lifecycle Engagement Experience
Experience across the complete assessment lifecycle — including scoping, rules of engagement, technical testing, evidence collection, attack-path analysis, reporting, remediation guidance, and retesting.
200+ Penetration Testing Deliverables
Across our practitioners’ professional experience
Experience Across Diverse Industries
Financial Services • Healthcare • Government • Education • Manufacturing • Retail • Transportation • Technology