Consulting Services
Tabletop Exercise
Gain clear insight into how your organization responds under pressure with scenario-based tabletop exercises that strengthen coordination, decision-making, and resilience.
Incident and Crisis Readiness Validation
OnDefend tabletop exercises test how your teams, processes, and partners actually perform when faced with realistic cyber crisis scenarios. Through guided, scenario-driven discussions and optional live attack simulation, we help organizations identify procedural gaps, clarify roles and responsibilities, and strengthen coordination across technical, executive, legal, and communications teams.
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Exercise Options
Traditional Tabletop Exercise
A facilitated, scenario-based discussion in which participants assume a simulated cyber attack is actively occurring, guiding teams through response decisions, communications, and coordination as the scenario unfolds, validating incident response and disaster recovery plans without executing any live technical or attack activity. This format is well suited for executive and leadership readiness, compliance and audit preparation, and first-time or recurring response validation.
Tabletop Exercise with Real-World Attack Simulation
This exercise follows the same facilitated, scenario-based structure as a traditional tabletop but augments the discussion with a simulated real-world attack executed through the OnDefend proprietary BlindSPOT breach and attack simulation platform. By introducing live technical activity alongside guided decision-making, this approach provides deeper validation of how effectively internal SOC teams and third-party response providers detect, escalate, coordinate, and respond to threats under realistic conditions without introducing risk to production environments.
What Our Tabletop Exercises Evaluate
OnDefend evaluates both the technical and non-technical aspects of cyber incident response to ensure your organization is prepared to respond effectively when it matters most.
Incident Response Plan Effectiveness
Incident Response Plan Effectiveness
Validation of response workflows, escalation paths, decision authority, and coordination across teams.
Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity
Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity
Assessment of recovery objectives, dependencies, and operational impacts during disruptive events.
Executive and Crisis Decision-Making
Executive and Crisis Decision-Making
Evaluation of leadership engagement, risk acceptance, communications, and strategic response choices.
Cross-Team Coordination
Cross-Team Coordination
Testing how security, IT, legal, compliance, communications, and business leaders work together under pressure.
Third-Party and Vendor Response
Third-Party and Vendor Response
Review of coordination with MSSPs, IR firms, legal counsel, cyber insurance, and other external responders.
Giving You The Competitive Advantage
OnDefend tabletop exercises are designed to deliver realistic, execution-focused validation by combining experienced facilitation, relevant threat scenarios, and actionable outcomes that improve real-world incident readiness.
Our Team
Partners with Yours
OnDefend works closely with your security leaders, executives, and response partners to ensure exercises reflect real organizational structure, constraints, and risk tolerance. Our goal is not to “pass or fail” teams but to improve readiness, confidence, and coordination before a real incident occurs.
Resources
Explore our comprehensive resource collection to enhance your organization’s security posture and stay ahead of potential threats.
TikTok Partnership
HaystackID and OnDefend are furthering security of the TikTok U.S. platform & app.
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Tabletop Exercise FAQs
What is a cybersecurity tabletop exercise?
A tabletop exercise is a facilitated, scenario-based evaluation of how an organization would respond to a cyber incident, focusing on decision-making, coordination, and execution.
How is this different from an incident response plan review?
A plan review evaluates documentation. A tabletop exercise tests how teams actually apply those plans under realistic conditions.
What does the BlindSPOT simulation add?
BlindSPOT adds live technical activity, allowing organizations to validate detection, response, and coordination in real time.
How long does a tabletop exercise take?
Most exercises range from half-day to full-day sessions, depending on scope and whether live simulation is included.
How often should tabletop exercises be performed?
Most organizations conduct tabletop exercises annually or after major changes to infrastructure, personnel, or threat exposure.
What does the live attack simulation add to a tabletop exercise?
The live attack simulation option augments a traditional tabletop exercise with simulated, real-world attacker activity powered by the OnDefend proprietary BlindSPOT platform. This allows organizations to evaluate how effectively internal SOC teams and third-party response providers detect, escalate, coordinate, and respond to threats in real time while still operating in a controlled, non-disruptive environment.
What is BlindSPOT?
BlindSPOT is OnDefend’s proprietary breach and attack simulation platform designed to safely emulate real-world adversary behavior. It enables organizations to test detection, response, and coordination capabilities under realistic conditions without impacting production systems, providing measurable insight into security operations and incident readiness.
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