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Red Team Engagement Goal Planning

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Creating and deciding Red Team engagement goals can be difficult. This is especially true for organizations new to Red Teaming. Whether you are on the delivery or receiving end of a Red Team engagement, the solid goals must be decided to have successful Red Team engagement. This document provides a list of common goals that work well in most Red Team engagements. They can be used as a starting point for planning. Modify and customize as needed. Each goal has a list of questions that can be answered as a narrative from the observations and measurements during a Red Team engagement.

Common Goals: Measure and observe ...

A threat’s ability to access to common and restricted areas (physical)

  • What ability does a threat have to access common areas?
  • What ability does a threat have to access restricted areas?
  • Can a threat use access gained to enable cyber capabilities?
  • What impacts can a threat have through gained access?

A threat’s ability to access key/critical systems

  • Can a threat access key/critical systems?
  • What impacts can a threat have on key/critical systems?

A threat’s ability to move freely throughout a network

  • What ability does a threat have to freely move throughout a network?

A threat’s ability to gain domain wide and local administrative access?

  • What ability does a threat have to gain local administrative access?
  • What ability does a threat have to gain domain administrative access?
  • What ability does a threat have to gain elevated access?

A threat’s ability to access or identify sensitive information

  • What ability does a threat have to access sensitive information?
  • What ability does a threat have to identify sensitive information?

A threat’s ability to exfiltrate data outside an organization

  • What ability does a threat have to exfiltrate data outside an organization?
  • How much data must be exfiltrated to impact an organization?

A threat’s ability to act undetected for a given time frame

  • How long can a threat go undetected?
  • Can a threat achieve its goals undetected?
  • What must a threat do to stimulate a reaction from an organization?

A threat’s ability to perform operational impacts

  • What impacts can a threat perform against an organization?
  • How can a threat affect X?