Advanced Security Programs
Security Control Validation
Prove your security controls will prevent, detect, and respond to real-world attacks before they can be exploited.
Security Control Assurance
Organizations invest heavily in security tools and response teams but rarely are able to validate whether those controls actually work together under real-world attack conditions.
OnDefend validates your organization’s ability to prevent, detect, and respond to real-world cyber attacks. Through controlled emulation of modern threat actor tactics, we expose weaknesses across your security stack, measure the effectiveness of your defenses, and empower your teams with where to start.
TALK TO AN ONDEFENDER
Security Controls Validated for Real-World Risk
Threat Prevention Controls
OnDefend validates controls such as secure email gateways (SEG), secure web gateways (SWG), web application firewalls (WAF), data loss prevention (DLP), endpoint protection platforms, and identity-based prevention mechanisms. This testing confirms that prevention technologies are properly configured, resilient to evasion techniques, and capable of stopping modern attack methods such as phishing, malware delivery, and data exfiltration.
Threat Detection Controls
OnDefend assesses endpoint detection and response (EDR), extended detection and response (XDR), security information and event management (SIEM), network detection and response (NDR), and cloud-native detection services. Testing focuses on detection accuracy, alert fidelity, coverage gaps, and the ability to detect attacker activity early enough to reduce risk and mean time to detect (MTTD).
Threat Response Capabilities
OnDefend evaluates security operations center (SOC) operations, managed detection and response (MDR) providers, incident response workflows, escalation procedures, and containment capabilities. By activating real response processes during controlled attack simulations, this validation demonstrates whether teams can identify, contain, and remediate threats within defined service levels and reduce mean time to respond (MTTR).
Integrated Security Control Ecosystems
OnDefend validates how prevention, detection, and response controls operate together across integrated security ecosystems. This includes testing telemetry flow, alert correlation, handoffs between tools and teams, and the effectiveness of layered defenses when facing multi-stage, cross-domain attack scenarios.
Giving You The Competitive Advantage
Security Control Validation from OnDefend is designed to deliver realistic testing, meaningful insight, and actionable outcomes.
Our Team
Partners with Yours
We work closely with your security, IT, and response teams to ensure validation exercises align with your environment, risk profile, and operational realities – delivering insight that drives real improvement, not shelfware reports.
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.
Read Article
Security Control Validation FAQs
What is security control validation?
Security control validation is the process of proving that an organization’s prevention, detection, and response security controls work effectively against real-world cyber attack techniques. Rather than relying on static configuration reviews or theoretical coverage, security control validation uses controlled adversary emulation to confirm whether security tools and security teams actually prevent attacks, detect malicious behavior, and respond effectively under realistic conditions.
How is security control validation different from penetration testing?
Penetration testing focuses on exploiting vulnerabilities to demonstrate technical impact. Security control validation focuses on whether security controls, monitoring tools, and response teams detect, block, and respond to attacker behavior. While penetration testing answers “Can this vulnerability be exploited?”, security control validation answers “Would our defenses see it, stop it, and respond in time?”
How is security control validation different from pen testing as a service (PTaaS) or attack surface management (ASM)?
PTaaS and ASM primarily focus on identifying vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and exposed assets across an organization’s attack surface. Security control validation focuses on whether deployed security controls and response teams can effectively detect, prevent, and respond to attacks once they occur. While PTaaS and ASM answer “What is exposed?”, security control validation answers “Do our defenses actually work during real attacks?”
Is security control validation a product or a service?
Security control validation is a managed security service delivered by OnDefend. The service is powered by BlindSPOT, our proprietary breach and attack simulation platform, and executed by elite purple team operators who design, run, and analyze adversary emulation exercises. This combination of automation and expert-led validation ensures realistic testing, actionable outcomes, and continuous improvement rather than standalone tool output.
What security controls are tested during security control validation?
OnDefend validates controls across your entire defensive stack to ensure layered security is functioning as intended across prevention, detection, and response. Security control validation assesses not only individual tools, but how controls, teams, and processes operate together during real-world attack scenarios.
Threat Prevention Controls
Validation ensures malicious activity is blocked before it impacts users or systems, including secure email gateways (SEG), secure web gateways (SWG), web application firewalls (WAF), data loss prevention (DLP), endpoint protection platforms, and identity and access controls.
Threat Detection Controls
Testing confirms whether attacker behavior is accurately detected and alerted on across ndpoint detection and response (EDR), extended detection and response (XDR), security information and event management (SIEM), network detection and response (NDR), and cloud-native detection services.
Threat Response Capabilities
Validation measures how effectively incidents are handled by internal SOC teams, managed detection and response (MDR) providers, incident response teams, NDR and threat hunting services, and supporting operational elements such as playbooks, escalation paths, and response SLAs.
Is security control validation safe in production environments?
Yes. OnDefend uses controlled, non-destructive adversary emulation designed for production-safe execution. Testing is carefully scoped to avoid business disruption while still exercising real security controls, detection telemetry, alerting pipelines, and response workflows in live environments.
Can security control validation be performed continuously?
Yes. Security control validation is most effective when performed continuously. Continuous validation ensures that prevention, detection, and response controls do not silently degrade due to configuration drift, tool updates, environmental changes, or evolving attacker techniques. OnDefend enables continuous security control validation through expert-led purple teaming combined with automation powered by BlindSPOT, making ongoing validation scalable and cost-effective.
How often should security controls be validated?
Organizations may validate security controls quarterly or after major incidents, tool changes, or architectural updates. However, continuous security control validation provides the highest level of assurance by identifying control failures as soon as they are introduced rather than months later.
Does security control validation support compliance requirements?
Yes. Security control validation supports frameworks such as SOC 2, ISO 27001, NIST, HIPAA, and PCI DSS by demonstrating that security controls are not only present but effective in real-world attack scenarios. Validation provides defensible evidence that controls operate as intended beyond checklist compliance.
Assess Your Risk
Understand your real exposure with guidance from security experts.
