Penetration Testing and Vulnerability Assessments

Risk

Penetration Testing and Vulnerability Assessments

What is Penetration Testing?

Penetration Testing (Pen Testing) is a simulated cyberattack performed by certified security professionals to identify exploitable vulnerabilities across your networks, systems, web applications, APIs, and cloud infrastructure. Unlike automated scans, pen testing applies human intelligence, manual testing, and real-world attack techniques to provide a true picture of your risk. 

At AARC-360, we go beyond checklist testing. Our methodology is rooted in NIST 800-115, OWASP, OSSTMM, and decades of hands-on experience. Our pen testers use multiple tools and develop exploits and scripts to attack from all ends. The result: deeper findings, clearer remediation guidance, and measurable improvement to your security posture. 

Why Penetration Testing Matters:

Cyber threats continue to grow more advanced. Many businesses don’t realize how exposed they are until an attacker takes advantage. Many cybersecurity experts say that it is not a matter of “if” it happens, but “when.”


Common industry challenges include:

  • Reliance on automated scans that miss critical vulnerabilities
  • Outdated or “forgotten” assets still connected to the internet
  • Weak authentication or misconfigurations in cloud applications
  • Poor visibility into internal lateral movement
  • Increased compliance requirements (SOC 2, ISO 27001, PCI DSS, HIPAA, etc.)
  • Expanding attack surface from remote work and third-party tools

AARC-360 helps you uncover security weaknesses before cyber criminals do.

How Our Penetration Testing Works

We follow a rigorous, standardized, and repeatable process designed for accuracy, transparency, and actionable results.

Intelligence Gathering & Enumeration:​

We go beyond the provided scope to identify:

  • “Forgotten” IPs, URLs, cloud assets, and exposed services
  • Corporate data leaks on GitHub, Pastebin, and social media
  • Credentials or passwords exposed publicly
  • System behaviors, misconfigurations, and attack vectors. This stage gives us contextual awareness of how an attacker sees your environment.

Vulnerability Analysis & Exploitation:

Using a combination of commercial tools, open-source utilities, proprietary scripts, and manual testing, our engineers validate and safely exploit vulnerabilities such as:

  • SQL injection and other injection flaws
  • Broken authentication and session management
  • Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
  • Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
  • Improper access controls & privilege escalation
  • Insecure communications & cryptographic storage
  • Directory traversal & insecure direct object references
  • Role breakout attempts and lateral movement

We never perform Denial of Service attacks and we never damage systems—testing is controlled and safe.

AARC-360 Provides the following Assessments:

  • Web Application Penetration Tests – comprehensively evaluate your critical web applications using multiple levels of testing through a combination of manual and automated processes to identify security vulnerabilities.
  • External Network Penetration Tests – assess the security of your outer perimeter for internet facing hosts and services.
  • Internal Network Penetration Tests – assess the security of internal private networks and hosts to assess what a malicious insider could compromise from within your environment.
  • Cloud Penetration Tests – assess the security posture of your cloud environment whether it is on AWS, Azure, or another cloud hosting platform.
  • Remote Social Engineering – is an assessment performed to validate the effectiveness of your user security awareness and incident response processes. This is done through various methods including phishing attacks.
  • Onsite Social Engineering – is performed to assess the effectiveness of your physical security controls, employee awareness and response to suspicious behavior, and validate that network security controls cannot be compromised via an onsite presence.

Why Choose AARC-360 for Pen Testing?

Free 30-Day Remediation Retest Included

Once you’ve addressed your findings, we perform one complimentary retest within 30 days to validate that vulnerabilities have been properly remediated. This ensures your environment is truly secure and supports audit readiness for SOC 2, ISO 27001, PCI DSS, and other compliance frameworks.

Exceptional Client Support

All the findings are delivered in a report with actionable steps for remediations. You will also have direct access to your tester, post-engagement calls, and remediation guidance make the entire process collaborative and clear

Deep Expertise — No Junior Testers

All tests are led by experienced engineers with real-world offensive security experience.  We use NIST, OWASP, OSSTMM—but we also apply thousands of hours of practical experience.

AARC-360 will provide a report that contains detailed information on what vulnerabilities and attempted exploits were found on the applications / infrastructure within the scope of the testing.  The report will also include samples of how they were found, what it means from a risk perspective, and most importantly, recommendations on how to remediate the issues.

 

Frequently Asked Questions

Most engagements take 2–4 weeks for the testing phase alone, depending on scope and complexity. (This timeframe does not include remediation or the retest window.)

Yes. AARC-360 provides one free remediation retest within 30 days of report delivery.

During this retest, we validate that all addressed vulnerabilities have been fully resolved and verify no new issues were introduced. Retest results are documented in the report.

No. We discuss limitations on our initial call to test safely and avoid actions that could disrupt systems. You will have access to your tester’s Source IP.

No. Scans are automated; pen tests involve manual exploitation by experts. We do provide Vulnerability Assesments as an add on.

Yes, most frameworks require or strongly recommend penetration testing as part of annual security validation.

Absolutely. Your penetration tester will be communicating with you from end to end. Remediation consultation is included.

Ready to Improve Your Security?

Protect your organization with expert penetration testing designed for accuracy, transparency, and long-term resilience. Contact AARC-360 to set up a call with our team.