Precision and pressure
Don't stop at pen testing
Our red team specialists simulate the full weight of a targeted attack, so you know exactly how your defences hold up when it matters, not just whether weaknesses exist.
Why red teaming?
Red team testing is a fundamentally different discipline from penetration testing. Rather than enumerating vulnerabilities across a defined target, a red team engagement tasks phew's specialists with emulating a realistic threat actor, pursuing specific objectives within your environment using the same techniques, tactics, and procedures that sophisticated attackers use in practice.
Red team engagements are covert by design, and that is not incidental. Your security operations, IT, and incident response teams are not informed that an exercise is underway and therefore they respond as they would to a genuine incident. This is what makes the assessment authentic.
The measure of success is not a findings list, it is whether a capable, motivated adversary could achieve a meaningful outcome, and whether your organisation would detect and stop them. Learnings from these exercises are invaluable and help your team to improve existing practices and tighten controls
Two types
of engagement
Red team engagements can target different attack surfaces depending on your organisation's exposure and what you most need to validate.
The two approaches are not mutually exclusive, and phew can scope engagements that span both where that reflects your threat model.
RED TEAMING
Networks & endpoints
A full-scope engagement targeting your internal infrastructure, starting from zero and working through initial access, privilege escalation, lateral movement, and objective completion. This is the most comprehensive test of your organisation's end-to-end defensive posture, from perimeter to crown jewels.
Where the goal is to focus on deeper network defences rather than the initial breach, an assumed breach starting point can be agreed during scoping, allowing the team to concentrate effort on what happens after a foothold is established.
- Unscripted, realistic detection and response pressure
- Honest measure of actual defensive posture
BEYOND PEN TESTING
Web Applications
& APIs
A goal-oriented engagement targeting your public-facing web assets, treating them not as a vulnerability enumeration exercise but as an entry point towards a defined objective. This is a natural and powerful progression from web application and API penetration testing, shifting the question from what weaknesses exist to what a motivated attacker could actually achieve by exploiting them.
Organisations with mature web application pen testing programmes will find this engagement adds a layer of assurance that structured testing alone cannot provide.
- Adversarial pressure applied beyond the application boundary
- Validate whether application-level controls hold under real attack conditions
How we work
Every red team engagement is built around a clear methodology: from threat modelling and scoping through to tradecraft, rules of engagement, and reporting. Here is what that looks like in practice
Tailored exercise
Scoping and threat modelling
Rather than defaulting to a generic adversary profile, phew works with you to identify the threat scenarios most relevant to your organisation, your sector, and your data. This helps define the objectives the simulated adversary will pursue.
From those objectives, we can establish any constraints on approach and any out-of-bounds systems. This ensures that the engagement remains purposeful and that findings provide meaningful improvements to your defensive posture, rather than a generic set of recommendations.
Tradecraft
Full-spectrum adversary
The phew team works across the full engagement lifecycle, with techniques mapped to MITRE ATT&CK throughout. Phishing and social engineering exercises, where in scope, are conducted with discipline to generate actionable data rather than unnecessary disruption.
- Initial access through external services, phishing, or physical means where in scope
- Privilege escalation, credential access, and lateral movement
- Persistence and objective completion without triggering detection
- Continuous mapping to MITRE ATT&CK tactics and techniques
Clear boundaries
Rules of engagement
Red team engagements can require more structured rules of engagement than conventional penetration testing. All parameters are agreed upfront, with emergency stop procedures defined before any activity begins.
- Authorised scope, techniques, and out-of-bounds conditions
- Escalation triggers and communication protocols
- Handling of critical findings discovered during the engagement
- Data handling, NDA, and evidence destruction commitments
Reporting and debrief
A narrative, not a findings list
The output is a narrative account of the engagement, tracing the attack path and mapping each phase to specific defensive gaps.
A technical debrief with the relevant internal teams is standard, and for collaborative engagements this can include a structured review of detection rules and response planning
Is red teaming right for you?
Red teaming delivers the most value when foundational security is already in place.
You are likely ready for red teaming if:
- You have a SOC, MDR, or other established detection in place
- You've completed pen testing across your critical assets
- You need to validate detection and response in a realistic adversarial scenario
- You're subject to regulatory expectations around resilience testing (such as financial services or critical infrastructure)
- Your board or stakeholders have asked how you would withstand a targeted attack
If you are earlier in your security journey, pen testing or purple teaming is usually a better starting point.
In a purple team engagement, phew works alongside your team in real time, fine tuning your detection ability and building response capability in a more controlled way. Notwithstanding the collaborative setting, we maintain genuine adversarial rigour throughout, so the overall picture of your defences remains realistic.
Whilst red and purple teaming involve different approaches and provide different information for your team, they are often used together as part of a continuous security validation programme.
Frequently Asked Questions
Red team testing raises harder questions than most.
Here's a clear breakdown of what matters, so you can engage with confidence and get the most from the exercise.
How is red teaming different from penetration testing?
Penetration testing is designed to find and evidence vulnerabilities within a defined scope. Red teaming is designed to simulate a targeted attack against your organisation, test whether your defences detect and respond to it, and measure how far a capable adversary could progress toward a meaningful objective.
The two disciplines are complementary, but they answer different questions.
We are not sure we are ready for red teaming. Where should we start?
Red teaming delivers the most value where foundational security controls and an established detection capability are already in place. If that describes your organisation, you are likely in the right place.
If you have the foundations but want to build and validate your response capability before committing to a full red team exercise, our purple team service is the natural next step. If significant known vulnerabilities remain unaddressed across your critical assets, penetration testing is where to start.
Who in our organisation needs to know the exercise is happening?
At minimum, a small number of authorised stakeholders must be aware and must provide written authorisation before any activity begins.
In a blind engagement, awareness is deliberately limited beyond that group. In a collaborative engagement, nominated internal counterparts work alongside phew’s team throughout. phew will help you determine the right structure for your organisation.
Can we combine network and web red teaming in a single engagement?
Yes. Many organisations have meaningful exposure across both attack surfaces, and phew can scope engagements that span internal infrastructure and external-facing web assets where that reflects your threat model.
The two are not mutually exclusive, and combining them often produces a more complete picture of how far a motivated adversary could progress from any starting point.
How long does a red team engagement take?
Red team engagements are typically longer than conventional penetration tests, given the breadth of activity and the objective-driven nature of the work. Duration depends on the complexity of your environment, the objectives defined.
phew scopes and right-sizes every engagement upfront so there are no surprises on timing or cost.
Red teaming
Get clear insights into your current defences, what to improve, and how to minimise effects of a compromise
Talk to us about what a red team engagement could teach you that penetration testing might not
