Penetration testing—allowing trusted sources to simulate cyberattacks to assess computer network and system security—is proving to be a vital practice that helps agencies identify risks before bad actors can exploit them, federal security officials said Thursday.
“Really critically and importantly, what [penetration testing] has done is given us a much better sense of what are the things we need to focus on and where are the control areas that we really have weaknesses,” Adrian Monza, cyber defense branch chief of the Homeland Security Department’s U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services said at a GovernmentCIO cyber forum in Arlington, Va.
Monza explained that he has a number of penetration testers on his team, who he fondly looks to as his internal hackers.
