{"id":4158,"date":"2025-10-15T09:22:23","date_gmt":"2025-10-15T07:22:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/enthec.com\/?p=4158"},"modified":"2025-10-15T09:22:23","modified_gmt":"2025-10-15T07:22:23","slug":"red-team-in-cybersecurity-how-it-works","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/enthec.com\/en\/red-team-in-cybersecurity-how-it-works\/","title":{"rendered":"Red team in cybersecurity: how it works"},"content":{"rendered":"
The term <\/span>red team<\/b> is sparking interest in the world of computer security: what exactly does it mean, how does it work, and why is it useful? In this article, we’ll clearly and comprehensively explain what it is, its advantages, its limitations, and how it fits into a modern defense strategy like the one we offer at Enthec with our Kartos solution.<\/span><\/p>\n Before diving in, it’s a good idea to learn a little about Kartos: it’s a cyber surveillance solution designed for businesses that seeks to offer Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM). In other words, Kartos helps you permanently identify weak points in your infrastructure, prioritize the most dangerous ones, and ensure that vulnerabilities don’t reappear. <\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n A red team is a specialized team that simulates the role of a real attacker to test an organization’s security. Rather than just performing spot tests, their approach seeks to replicate advanced techniques, combining technical, human, and sometimes physical methods to determine <\/span>if an adversary could compromise critical assets without being detected<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n In the cybersecurity sector, \u201cred teaming\u201d means turning those simulations into<\/span> intentional and structured exercises,<\/b> with defined objectives, clear rules, and mechanisms to learn from the results.<\/span><\/p>\n Unlike a routine vulnerability audit or scan, a red team seeks to emulate how a real attacker, with the resources, skills, and patience, would attempt to infiltrate, hide, move laterally, and achieve a goal (e.g., exfiltrate data).<\/p>\n A red team executes an adversary emulation exercise on a network, system, or IT environment to identify critical flaws and gaps that are difficult to detect using other methods.<\/span><\/p>\n It is common to confuse red team with<\/span> pentesting<\/a>,<\/span> but there are key differences:<\/span><\/p>\n A red team exercise can last weeks, involve multiple vectors (email, remote access, phishing, deception, social engineering), and conclude with a report detailing the progress made, the detections, and the defensive flaws that need to be addressed.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n To better understand this, I’ll break down the typical phases of a red team exercise:<\/span><\/p>\n Before attacking, the intended targets are agreed upon (e.g., accessing sensitive data, gaining administrator access, leaking information), and systems are evaluated as either within or outside the perimeter (what is excluded). Rules of engagement are also established to prevent unwanted damage. <\/span><\/p>\n The team gathers public, internal, or compromised information about the organization: domains, employees, networks, exposed services… This allows for the construction of realistic attack scenarios. <\/span><\/p>\n Here, the red team uses vulnerabilities<\/a>, phishing<\/a>, weak credentials, or social engineering<\/a> to gain a foothold within the target network. This involves gaining initial access without being detected. <\/span><\/p>\n Once inside, the simulated attacker escalates privileges, moves laterally, explores the network, searches for other vulnerable systems, and moves toward the defined target.<\/p>\n The red team, if successful, carries out the planned scenario: data extraction, maintaining a hidden presence, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n The team delivers a report with findings, attack routes used, points where attacks were stopped or detected, and recommendations for correcting weaknesses.<\/span><\/p>\n Recommendations are reviewed, issues are corrected or mitigated, and in some cases, a subsequent verification (light re-red teaming) is performed to confirm that the improvements have been practical.<\/p>\n These stages allow us to understand not only where there are vulnerabilities, but also<\/span> how an intelligent attacker would exploit them in a real-life environment.<\/b><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Incorporating red teaming as part of a CTEM strategy brings benefits that go beyond simple fault finding:<\/span><\/p>\n When integrated with a platform like<\/span> Kartos,<\/b> red teaming becomes part of the CTEM cycle, as it is not a one-off exercise but rather an ongoing process of monitoring exposure to threats.<\/p>\n Furthermore, by being part of a CTEM framework, the red team’s results are automatically fed back: new findings are integrated into the platform, prioritized based on their impact and risk, and periodic measurements are taken to verify that exposure is being reduced. This is the core of the<\/span> Continuous Threat Exposure Management approach.<\/strong><\/p>\n Although the red team is very valuable, it’s not a perfect or magic solution. It’s essential to understand its limitations: <\/span><\/p>\n For all these reasons, a good approach is to use red teaming in combination with other forms of assessment (continuous analysis, automated scans, more frequent simulations) within a CTEM framework.<\/span><\/p>\n Here is Enthec with its Kartos tool, a CTEM platform that allows:<\/span><\/p>\n For a red team exercise to truly deliver value, it’s recommended to follow these practices:<\/span><\/p>\n With these practices, red teaming ceases to be an isolated event and becomes a powerful lever for ongoing improvement and strengthening.<\/p>\n Red teaming is an advanced and powerful technique for simulating real attacks, assessing an organization’s defenses, and discovering attack paths that other methods would miss. Red teaming within a CTEM framework, for example, by integrating it with the solution Kartos by <\/span> If your company is already using monitoring or scanning tools, adding red teaming (in a well-balanced way) can significantly increase the level of security. Ideally, these results shouldn’t be isolated but rather<\/span> integrated into a CTEM strategy to ensure improvements are maintained over time.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The term red team is sparking interest in the world of computer security: what exactly does it mean, how does […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":4156,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[24,32,38,78],"class_list":["post-4158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cybersecurity-en","tag-cybersecurity","tag-kartos-en","tag-organizations","tag-prevention"],"yoast_head":"\nWhat is a red team?<\/b><\/h2>\n
Red teaming vs. penetration testing (pentesting)<\/b><\/h3>\n
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How a red team works: typical stages<\/b><\/h2>\n
1. Definition of objectives and scope<\/b><\/h3>\n
2. Reconnaissance\/intelligence<\/b><\/h3>\n
3. Initial exploitation\/entry point<\/b><\/h3>\n
4. Persistent access and lateral movement<\/b><\/h3>\n
5. Goal achievement \/ final scenario<\/b><\/h3>\n
6. Report and recommendations<\/b><\/h3>\n
7. Correction and validation phase<\/b><\/h3>\n
Advantages of the red team within a CTEM strategy<\/b><\/h2>\n
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Limits and risks of the red team<\/b><\/h2>\n
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How Kartos fits into this equation
<\/b><\/h2>\n\n
Good practices for successfully using Red Team<\/b><\/h2>\n
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\n Enthec, <\/span>
\n<\/a>multiplies its value: it is not a one-off exercise, but<\/span> part of a continuous mechanism for evaluating and improving the security posture.<\/b><\/p>\n