Today’s malicious cyber attacks use a combination of phishing, social engineering, and advanced malware to gain unauthorized access to organizational data. These threats are evolving and proliferating at a concerning scale. Not only did cyber crime losses increase by 22% from 2022 to 2023, but there was also a 30% increase in overall cyberattacks in 2024 compared to 2023. 

The cost of breaches and the incidence of attacks are increasing. Traditional moat-and-castle approaches to cybersecurity simply can’t keep up with attackers’ increasingly advanced malicious attacks. Organizations must embrace a new way of proactively assessing their systems and preparing for threats long before an actual attack. 

This is where red teaming enters the picture. Red teaming goes beyond traditional security assessments by evaluating not just technical defenses but also human factors, physical security, and strategic processes. This comprehensive approach uncovers blind spots and prepares organizations for real-world adversaries. 

In this guide, we explain how red teaming works and who is involved in the process. We also share the benefits of starting a red teaming program and best practices for optimizing red teaming in your organization. 

What Is Red Teaming?

Red teaming is a proactive approach to cybersecurity where a group of ethical hackers (the red team) uses the latest adversarial exploits to gain unauthorized access to an organization’s systems or data. 

The goal of red teaming is to identify vulnerabilities by simulating real-world threats. Effective red teaming allows organizations to improve their defenses before adversaries notice and exploit these weaknesses. 

Red teaming requires a group of ethical hackers who can think like adversaries. Unlike penetration testing, which tests the defenses of a single system at a specific point in time, red teaming takes a more holistic and creative approach, just like a real hacker would. This outside-the-box approach uncovers more blind spots that organizations might miss during routine scans or reviews. 

Red teaming is applicable to multiple industries, including:

• Technology: Red teams identify vulnerabilities in software and systems. For example, the proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) models requires organizations to conduct red teaming for large language models (LLMs). 
• Finance: Cybersecurity is a must for banks and investment firms. They conduct red teaming to test defenses against attacks that attempt to gain access to high-value accounts and sensitive information. 
• Healthcare: Hospitals simulate data breaches with red teaming to uncover vulnerabilities in their electronic health record (EHR) systems.
• Government: All levels of government use red teaming to test critical infrastructure and cyber defenses against espionage or terrorism. 
• Energy: Mission-critical infrastructure is a prime target for hackers—in fact, it experiences three times more incidents than other verticals. For example, energy grid operators use red teaming to simulate cyber attacks on their control systems to determine the effectiveness of their disaster response plans. 

Types of Red Teaming

Red teaming comes in many forms across industries, including:

• Cybersecurity: This is one of the most common types of red teaming. Cybersecurity red teams simulate cyber attacks to identify gaps in an organization’s defenses. 
• Physical: Cybersecurity assessments can also include physical red teaming, but it’s popular in many industries where physical security is a must. With this type of red teaming, the test assesses a facility’s physical defenses. The team attempts to gain unauthorized access to buildings, testing locks and surveillance systems in the process.
• Operational: How effective are your organization’s disaster plans? Operational red teaming stress tests crisis management plans to see how well your organization can operate during a disruption.
• Defense: The military uses red teams to assess attack strategies in combat simulations. 
• Ethics: LLMs benefit from ethical red teaming, which monitors how much a policy or product adheres to ethical standards and regulations. 
  

Ultimately, organizations are free to structure their red teams however they see fit. What matters most is that the red teaming exercises remove blind spots and help organizations become more secure. 

The Red Teaming Process

Red teams mimic the actions taken by an adversary to gain unauthorized access. The exact process varies by organization, but red teaming usually follows these steps:

• Planning and preparation: First, articulate what the red team needs to achieve. Determine specific goals, such as testing vulnerabilities, improving incident response, or evaluating decision-making. Create success criteria to help you determine whether the test is successful. At this stage, it’s also important to establish rules of engagement to prevent the red team from disrupting actual operations. 
• Reconnaissance: Once the project scope is established, the red team researches its target system or process. It identifies potential entry points and gaps to exploit during the next stage of the process. 
• Attack simulation: The red team tests for vulnerabilities in realistic adversarial situations. In cybersecurity, this includes phishing attacks and social engineering. 
• Reporting: The team logs everything it does and reports its findings to organizational leaders. This report may also include evidence and a map of specific vulnerabilities and failures. Some will even quantify and rank risks based on their potential impact. Leaders use these reports to prioritize remediation and improve the organization’s overall security posture. 
• Remediation and follow-up: In the final step, companies implement the recommended remediation measures to strengthen their security posture. Follow-up helps to ensure that companies adopt a continuous improvement mindset. This can include training sessions, enhancing monitoring capabilities, or subsequent red team engagements to evaluate the effectiveness of remediation efforts. 
  

Cybersecurity red teaming uses several attack vectors to access an organization’s systems. This isn’t an exhaustive list, but red teams often use these strategies to break through an organization’s defenses. 

Who Is Involved in Red Teaming?

Red teaming can be a complex process. The most successful tests include various team members with diverse backgrounds, which allows organizations to conduct thorough tests. 

Red teams should include:

• Red team members: The red team acts as adversaries that test your systems. These professionals not only need to have up-to-date knowledge of adversarial attacks, but they also need to think outside the box. This can be a difficult position to fill—the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics found that information security analyst roles are in high demand, with a projected 35% growth rate. 
• Blue team members: While not necessary for all red teaming exercises, having a blue team is helpful. These employees defend your systems from the red team’s simulated attacks. Having a blue team helps organizations conduct more realistic tests that include a real-time breach response team. 
• Ethicists: Red teaming for LLMs, in particular, can raise issues with bias and fairness. It’s best to have an ethicist on the team to navigate these tricky tests. 
• Management: Organizational leaders define the scope of the red teaming exercise and ensure the organization implements the required fixes.
  

Red teams can’t operate in a vacuum. Effective red teaming requires seamless collaboration between these groups, with clear communication and shared goals. Each participant plays a vital role in identifying vulnerabilities, improving defenses, and ensuring the organization can address real-world challenges.

Benefits of Red Teaming

Email scanning, firewalls, and access management policies still matter. However, these defenses aren’t perfect. Instead of assuming your existing defenses are adequate, invest in red teaming to validate your approach to cybersecurity. Red teaming offers a host of benefits, from improved security to a reduced incidence of attacks. 

Improved Security

Red teaming helps organizations identify and address vulnerabilities in systems, processes, and defenses. In fact, according to Cybersecurity Insiders, 81% of organizations say their security posture improved after conducting red team exercises. 

In an era of near-constant cyber threats, red teaming is a valuable process that helps organizations stay one step ahead of malicious actors. 

Fewer Breaches and Lower Costs

Data breaches in 2021 cost companies over $4 million—the highest amount ever recorded. While businesses can’t avoid all breaches, identifying vulnerabilities proactively can prevent these costly attacks from happening in the first place. That benefits not only an organization’s reputation but also its finances.

Faster Incident Response

If you have a blue team, red teaming can help you evaluate your organization’s defenses. Understanding where your blue team falls short allows you to improve their tools, processes, and training, enabling faster detection and response times. 

Speed matters in cybersecurity, and the insights gained by red teaming can significantly reduce damages by optimizing your incident response frameworks. 

Better Employee Awareness

Human error is responsible for 95% of breaches. Pentesting identifies gaps in software patches, but red teaming is capable of more advanced social engineering simulations that pinpoint weaknesses in your employees’ cybersecurity knowledge. These advanced simulations train employees to recognize and respond to suspicious activity. 

Red Teaming for Generative AI Platforms

Generative AI platforms, particularly LLMs, introduce new security challenges that traditional cybersecurity measures often fail to address. These AI-driven systems can be exploited through adversarial attacks such as data poisoning, model manipulation, evasion attacks, and prompt injection attacks, making them prime targets for cybercriminals. Red teaming plays a crucial role in identifying and mitigating these threats before they can be exploited in real-world scenarios. 

Generative AI platforms are unique in that they continuously evolve, learning from vast datasets and user interactions. However, this adaptability also introduces vulnerabilities, including: 

• Prompt injection attacks: Attackers can manipulate AI-generated responses by injecting harmful prompts, potentially leading to misinformation, biased outputs, or security breaches.
• Data poisoning: Malicious actors can corrupt training data to alter model behavior, introducing biases or security loopholes.
• Model manipulation: Attackers can reverse-engineer or manipulate AI models to extract sensitive information, including proprietary data or personally identifiable information (PII).
• Hallucinations and bias exploitation: Generative AI models can unintentionally generate false or misleading information, which can be weaponized in misinformation campaigns.

Red teaming for generative AI security helps organizations uncover these vulnerabilities by simulating adversarial attacks and stress-testing AI defenses under real-world conditions. The process typically includes: 

• Threat modeling: Understanding how adversaries could exploit AI vulnerabilities, including adversarial prompt engineering, fine-tuning exploits, or dataset manipulation.
• Adversarial testing: Simulating sophisticated cyber threats, such as malicious inputs, automated bot-driven attacks, and unauthorized model extraction attempts.
• Bias and ethical red teaming: Assessing AI outputs for fairness, unintended biases, and ethical considerations to ensure compliance with regulations and prevent harmful outcomes.
• Robustness validation: Stress-testing AI models under various adversarial conditions to evaluate their resilience against prompt engineering and data manipulation attacks.
• Continuous modeling and adaptation: Implementing ongoing red teaming exercises to keep pace with emerging threats and ensure AI security measures remain effective over time.

As AI continues to be integrated into critical systems—including cybersecurity, finance, healthcare, and defense—its security implications cannot be ignored. Red teaming provides a proactive defense mechanism that helps organizations strengthen AI model security against adversarial attacks, identify and mitigate ethical and bias-related risks, improve the transparency and reliability of AI-generated outputs, and ensure compliance with evolving AI security and governance standards. 

Red Teaming Best Practices

Red teaming is an incredibly valuable security exercise. However, it can potentially cause disruptions and requires a lot of manual effort. Follow these best practices to optimize red teaming in your organization. 

Leverage Red Teaming Tools

Red teams need the proper tools to execute advanced attacks. For example, Mindgard is the go-to tool for executing AI red teaming attacks, helping you understand LLM vulnerabilities. The Burp Suite tests web applications, while Cobalt Strike simulates advanced persistent threats (APTs). 

Automation is a must-have for any tool. While some organizations conduct red teaming annually, many need to perform these tests continuously. 

Instead of asking your red team to conduct these processes manually, opt for a solution like Mindgard that automatically conducts red teaming on your behalf. Skip over the hassle of constant testing and quickly generate reports on what you need to improve—boosting your security posture for less hands-on effort. 

Train and Certify Your Team

The right tools make a big difference, but knowledgeable employees are also necessary for red teaming. Organizations need to hire experienced, creative red team members who understand the current threat landscape. 

If you haven’t already, consider enrolling your red and blue teams in professional development to ensure they stay on the cutting edge of cybersecurity. 

Create Realistic Threat Models

Red teaming exercises are only helpful if they help your organization improve its defenses against real threats. Simulating an improbable situation or an outdated attack method won’t yield helpful results. 

Threats evolve, and red teaming exercises have to stay relevant. Incorporate the latest adversarial tactics, techniques, and procedures into your threat models and scenarios. 

Retest

Red teaming doesn’t truly end. After all, some teams claim to have fixed security gaps, but whether those fixes are effective remains to be seen. Effective red teaming includes planning for retesting after mitigation, which ensures that the process actually improves your defenses. 

Turn Threats into Opportunities with Mindgard

The best time to address a cyber attack is before it happens. The incidence and cost of breaches continue to increase, requiring organizations to embrace out-of-the-box solutions. 

With red teaming, organizations can think like adversaries and address exploitable vulnerabilities before malicious actors can use them to cause harm. 

Now’s the time to stay one step ahead of your adversaries. Mindgard’s AI security platform empowers your organization with automatic AI red teaming. Schedule a demo now to see how Mindgard bolsters organizational resilience. 

Frequently Asked Questions

Can small businesses implement red teaming, or is it only for large organizations?

Small businesses can absolutely benefit from red teaming, although with scaled-down scope and complexity. Even a small-scale red teaming exercise can uncover critical vulnerabilities. Partnering with external consultants or using cost-effective tools like Mindgard can help small businesses implement red teaming without straining their budgets.

What role does artificial intelligence (AI) play in red teaming?

AI simulates sophisticated attacks, automates reconnaissance, and analyzes vulnerabilities at scale. For example, AI can identify patterns in network traffic to uncover weaknesses or predict the effectiveness of phishing campaigns.

What is the difference between a red team and a blue team?

A red team simulates adversarial attacks to uncover vulnerabilities, while a blue team defends against these attacks and works to protect the organization’s assets. The red team tests the effectiveness of the blue team's security measures, and together, they help improve the overall security posture.