Understanding What is Purple Team in Cyber Security

Purple teaming is a collaborative approach to cybersecurity that brings together red and blue teams to test and improve an organization’s security posture. Unlike traditional red team/blue teams, the purple team works closely together, sharing information and insights to address weaknesses and improve overall security.

Purple teams simulate malicious attacks and conduct penetration testing to identify vulnerabilities and recommend remediation strategies. This collaborative approach combines offensive (red) and defensive (blue) team members, working in unison to test and defend the organization’s infrastructure.

The benefits of purple teaming are numerous. It helps identify misconfigurations and coverage gaps, strengthens network security, fosters cooperation among teams, raises awareness of human vulnerabilities, and builds the skills and maturity of security capabilities.

Purple team activities include social engineering attacks, launching cyber malware and bug attacks, exploiting vulnerabilities, conducting penetration testing and security audits, developing and implementing security plans, and performing regular vulnerability scans.

Purple teaming enhances security knowledge, boosts performance without increasing the budget, streamlines security improvements, provides critical insights, improves communication and collaboration, and saves time on establishing communication channels.

Purple team exercises involve open engagement where red and blue teams discuss attack techniques and defense expectations in real-time to improve people, processes, and technology.

Purple teaming assessments help evaluate and mitigate threats, refine attack responses, and test capabilities using industry-standard frameworks.

Building a successful purple team requires developing a comprehensive plan, leveraging automation tools, and continuously testing and evaluating security measures.

Key Takeaways:

• Purple teaming is a collaborative approach to cybersecurity, bringing together red and blue teams.
• Purple teams simulate malicious attacks and conduct penetration testing to identify vulnerabilities.
• Purple teaming strengthens network security and fosters cooperation among teams.
• Purple team exercises involve open engagement to improve people, processes, and technology.
• Building a successful purple team requires a comprehensive plan and continuous testing.

Definition of Purple Team

A purple team is a hybrid security assessment approach that combines the offensive capabilities of red teams with the defensive expertise of blue teams. Unlike traditional red and blue teams, which operate independently, the purple team works collaboratively to test and enhance an organization’s security defenses. This collaborative approach allows for a comprehensive evaluation of the organization’s security posture by simulating real-world attacks and sharing knowledge and insights between teams.

The purple team conducts a series of coordinated exercises, including penetration testing, vulnerability assessments, and threat simulations, to identify weaknesses in the organization’s infrastructure and recommend strategies for improvement. The objective is not only to detect vulnerabilities but also to improve the organization’s overall security capabilities, response readiness, and incident handling procedures. By integrating offensive and defensive perspectives, the purple team provides a more holistic view of the organization’s security posture.

The purple team approach fosters open communication and collaboration between the red and blue teams. It facilitates knowledge sharing, enabling the blue team to understand attack techniques used by the red team, and the red team to gain insights into defensive strategies employed by the blue team. This collaboration helps to bridge the gap between offensive and defensive teams and allows for more effective identification and mitigation of threats.

In summary, a purple team is a collaborative approach to cybersecurity that combines the offensive capabilities of red teams with the defensive expertise of blue teams. It aims to improve an organization’s security defenses by conducting coordinated exercises, sharing insights, and fostering open communication between teams. By combining offensive and defensive strategies, the purple team approach enhances the organization’s overall security posture and readiness to combat cyber threats.

Purpose of Purple Teaming

The primary purpose of purple teaming is to identify vulnerabilities, enhance security measures, and improve overall defenses against cyber threats. By bringing together red and blue teams in a collaborative effort, purple teaming allows organizations to gain valuable insights into their security posture. Through simulated attacks and penetration testing, purple teams uncover weaknesses and provide recommendations for remediation.

Purple teaming goes beyond traditional red team/blue team exercises by fostering close collaboration between offensive and defensive teams. This collaborative approach enables a deeper understanding of potential vulnerabilities and a more effective response to threats. By working in unison, red and blue team members can jointly test and defend an organization’s infrastructure, ultimately strengthening its security.

One of the key benefits of purple teaming is the identification of misconfigurations and coverage gaps. By engaging in active attack simulations, purple teams can uncover vulnerabilities that may have been overlooked. In addition, the cooperative nature of purple teaming encourages teams to share knowledge and expertise, enhancing communication and improving overall teamwork. This not only raises awareness of human vulnerabilities but also fosters cooperation among teams.

Furthermore, purple teaming enhances the skills and maturity of an organization’s security capabilities. By regularly conducting purple team exercises, organizations can continuously improve their security measures, staying one step ahead of evolving cyber threats. The insights gained from purple teaming also serve as a valuable resource for refining attack response strategies and testing capabilities using industry-standard frameworks.

Benefits of Purple Teaming
Identifying misconfigurations and coverage gaps
Strengthening network security
Fostering cooperation among teams
Raising awareness of human vulnerabilities
Building the skills and maturity of security capabilities

Benefits of Purple Team Exercises

Purple team exercises offer several benefits, including uncovering misconfigurations and coverage gaps, strengthening network security, and fostering collaboration between red and blue teams. By combining offensive and defensive strategies, purple teams simulate real-world attacks and penetration testing, enabling organizations to identify vulnerabilities and develop effective remediation strategies.

One of the key advantages of purple teaming is its ability to uncover misconfigurations and coverage gaps within an organization’s security infrastructure. By simulating attacks and utilizing the expertise of both red and blue teams, purple teams can identify weaknesses that may have been overlooked in traditional red or blue team assessments. This comprehensive approach helps organizations strengthen their security posture and enhance their overall resilience.

Purple team exercises also play a crucial role in fostering collaboration between red and blue teams. Unlike the traditional adversarial relationship between red and blue teams, purple teams work closely together, sharing information and insights. This collaborative approach not only improves communication and coordination but also enhances the effectiveness of response strategies. By combining the strengths of both teams, organizations can ensure a more robust and proactive defense against potential threats.

In addition to uncovering vulnerabilities and fostering collaboration, purple team exercises provide organizations with critical insights into their security capabilities. By engaging in real-world simulations and assessments, organizations gain a deeper understanding of their vulnerabilities, strengths, and areas for improvement. This knowledge allows them to make informed decisions regarding security investments, prioritize remediation efforts, and continuously enhance their security posture.

Table: Benefits of Purple Team Exercises

Benefits	Description
Uncovering Misconfigurations and Coverage Gaps	Identifying weaknesses that may have been overlooked in traditional assessments, strengthening security measures and overall resilience.
Fostering Collaboration	Improving communication and coordination between red and blue teams, enhancing the effectiveness of response strategies.
Providing Critical Insights	Gaining a deeper understanding of vulnerabilities, strengths, and areas for improvement, enabling informed decision-making and continuous enhancement of security posture.

Overall, purple team exercises offer organizations a comprehensive and proactive approach to cybersecurity. By combining offensive and defensive strategies, fostering collaboration between red and blue teams, and providing critical insights, organizations can effectively identify and address vulnerabilities, strengthen their security measures, and enhance their overall resilience.

Purple Team Approach

The purple team approach combines the skills and expertise of both red and blue teams, working together to simulate malicious attacks and improve an organization’s security posture. Unlike traditional red and blue teams that operate independently, the purple team fosters a collaborative environment where offensive and defensive strategies are shared and tested in real-time. By leveraging the strengths of both teams, the purple team aims to identify vulnerabilities, address weaknesses, and enhance overall security.

With the purple team approach, red team members take on the role of attackers, attempting to exploit vulnerabilities in the organization’s systems and infrastructure. Meanwhile, blue team members act as the defenders, working to detect and prevent these attacks. While the red team looks for potential entry points, the blue team actively monitors and defends against these threats, learning from each attack iteration.

The purple team approach goes beyond simply testing security measures. It provides an opportunity for the red team and blue team to collaborate, share insights, and work together towards a common goal – improving the organization’s security stance. By combining offensive and defensive tactics, purple teaming helps to identify misconfigurations, coverage gaps, and vulnerabilities that may otherwise go unnoticed.

Through continuous engagement and open communication, the purple team approach enables organizations to build stronger security capabilities, foster cooperation among teams, and raise awareness of human vulnerabilities. This approach also helps to streamline security improvements and save time by establishing effective communication channels and identifying critical insights. By leveraging the skills and expertise of both red and blue teams, the purple team approach strengthens network security and enhances an organization’s overall cyber resilience.

How Does Purple Teaming Work

Purple teaming involves close collaboration between red and blue teams, with information sharing and joint efforts to test and defend an organization’s infrastructure. This collaborative approach combines offensive and defensive strategies to identify vulnerabilities, assess existing security measures, and improve overall security posture.

During purple team engagements, the red team, acting as the adversary, launches simulated attacks and exploits vulnerabilities in the organization’s systems. The blue team, on the other hand, takes on the role of defenders, using their expertise in detection and mitigation to identify and respond to the red team’s tactics.

The purple team’s primary goal is to enhance the organization’s defenses by uncovering weaknesses and applying appropriate countermeasures. This is achieved through a continuous feedback loop, where both teams closely collaborate, sharing insights and knowledge gained from their respective activities.

The Purple Teaming Process

The purple teaming process involves several key steps:

1. Preparation: The red and blue teams align their objectives and establish rules of engagement. They define the scope of the assessment, including the systems and technologies to be tested.
2. Planning: The teams develop a detailed plan of attack and defense, outlining the specific tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) to be employed during the engagement.
3. Execution: The red team carries out the simulated attacks, employing a variety of methods such as social engineering, malware exploitation, and network penetration testing.
4. Monitoring and Analysis: The blue team closely monitors the red team’s activities, analyzing their tactics and identifying vulnerabilities or weaknesses in the organization’s defenses.
5. Feedback and Improvement: The teams meet regularly to discuss findings, share insights, and develop strategies for improving security measures. This iterative process helps to strengthen the organization’s security posture over time.

By combining the strengths of both the red and blue teams, purple teaming enables organizations to proactively identify and mitigate potential security risks. It fosters a collaborative culture that emphasizes continuous improvement, leading to more robust and resilient cybersecurity practices.

Purple Teaming Benefits
Identifying misconfigurations and coverage gaps
Strengthening network security
Fostering cooperation among teams
Raising awareness of human vulnerabilities
Building the skills and maturity of security capabilities

Source: Research study on the benefits of purple teaming

Purple Teaming Activities

Purple teaming in cybersecurity involves a range of activities, including launching simulated attacks, exploiting vulnerabilities, and developing security plans. The goal of these activities is to test and improve an organization’s security posture by identifying weaknesses and implementing appropriate remediation strategies.

One of the key activities performed by purple teams is conducting social engineering attacks. This involves attempting to deceive employees or users to gain unauthorized access to sensitive information or systems. By simulating these attacks, purple teams can identify human vulnerabilities and educate employees about potential risks.

“Purple teams simulate malicious attacks and penetration testing to identify vulnerabilities and recommend remediation strategies.”

Exploiting vulnerabilities is another important activity carried out by purple teams. They leverage their offensive capabilities to find weaknesses in an organization’s network or software systems. By exploiting these vulnerabilities, purple teams can demonstrate the potential impact of a real-world cyber attack and help organizations prioritize their security efforts.

Additionally, purple teams develop and implement security plans based on the findings from their assessments and tests. They work closely with the organization’s blue team to design and deploy effective defensive measures. This collaboration ensures that any vulnerabilities identified during purple team exercises are properly addressed, leading to a more robust and resilient security infrastructure.

Purple Teaming Activities
Launching social engineering attacks
Exploiting vulnerabilities
Developing and implementing security plans
Performing penetration testing and security audits
Conducting regular vulnerability scans

Benefits of Purple Teaming

Purple teaming activities provide critical insights, raise awareness of human vulnerabilities, and help build the skills and maturity of security capabilities. By bringing together red and blue teams in a collaborative approach, purple teaming offers several key benefits for organizations.

Firstly, purple teaming allows for the identification of misconfigurations and coverage gaps in an organization’s security measures. Through simulated attacks and penetration testing, purple teams can identify vulnerabilities and recommend remediation strategies, ensuring comprehensive security coverage.

Secondly, purple teaming strengthens network security by enabling red and blue teams to work together in a unified manner. The synergy between offensive and defensive tactics helps organizations proactively defend against potential threats and improve incident response capabilities.

Key Benefits of Purple Teaming

• Identify misconfigurations and coverage gaps
• Strengthen network security
• Foster cooperation among teams
• Raise awareness of human vulnerabilities
• Build skills and maturity of security capabilities

Furthermore, purple teaming fosters cooperation and collaboration among different teams within an organization. By working together, red and blue teams gain a deeper understanding of each other’s perspectives and can develop more effective security strategies.

In addition to technical aspects, purple teaming raises awareness of human vulnerabilities. It helps organizations recognize the role of human error and social engineering in cyberattacks, allowing for the development of targeted training and awareness programs.

Overall, purple teaming is a valuable practice in modern cybersecurity. It not only enhances security knowledge but also boosts performance without increasing the budget. By streamlining security improvements and providing critical insights, organizations can effectively defend against evolving threats and ensure the integrity of their digital assets.

Benefits of Purple Teaming
Identify misconfigurations and coverage gaps
Strengthen network security
Foster cooperation among teams
Raise awareness of human vulnerabilities
Build skills and maturity of security capabilities

Enhancing Security Knowledge

Implementing purple teaming exercises improves security knowledge and awareness, helping organizations stay ahead of evolving cyber threats. By combining the offensive strategies of red teams with the defensive strategies of blue teams, purple teaming provides a unique opportunity for organizations to gain a comprehensive understanding of their security strengths and weaknesses.

One of the key benefits of purple teaming is its ability to foster cross-team communication and collaboration. Through open engagement and real-time discussions, red and blue teams work together to share insights, attack techniques, and defense expectations. This collaborative approach not only enhances security knowledge within the organization but also strengthens the overall security posture.

Purple team exercises involve a range of activities, including social engineering attacks, penetration testing, security audits, and vulnerability scans. These activities enable organizations to proactively identify and address vulnerabilities in their infrastructure. By simulating real-world attacks, purple teams can uncover potential misconfigurations, coverage gaps, and weaknesses that may otherwise go unnoticed.

Benefits of Purple Teaming:

• Identifying misconfigurations and coverage gaps
• Strengthening network security
• Fostering cooperation among teams
• Raising awareness of human vulnerabilities
• Building the skills and maturity of security capabilities

Purple Team Activities	Benefits
Social engineering attacks	Identifies human vulnerabilities
Penetration testing and security audits	Uncovers infrastructure weaknesses
Vulnerability scans	Identifies potential misconfigurations and coverage gaps

In addition to these benefits, purple teaming assessments help organizations evaluate and mitigate threats, refine attack responses, and test their security capabilities using industry-standard frameworks. This allows organizations to measure the effectiveness of their security measures and make improvements where necessary.

Building a successful purple team requires developing a comprehensive plan, leveraging automation tools, and continuously testing and evaluating security measures. By investing in purple teaming exercises, organizations can enhance their security posture, stay ahead of emerging threats, and ensure the ongoing protection of their critical assets.

Boosting Performance and Efficiency

Purple teaming helps organizations optimize their cybersecurity efforts, leading to improved performance and efficiency while keeping costs in check. By bringing together red and blue teams in a collaborative approach, purple teaming enables organizations to identify vulnerabilities and weaknesses in their security posture more effectively. This proactive approach allows for the timely implementation of remediation strategies, reducing the likelihood of successful cyber attacks.

One of the key benefits of purple teaming is its ability to streamline security improvements without increasing the budget. By combining offensive and defensive strategies, purple teams can identify misconfigurations and coverage gaps, ensuring that the organization’s network security is robust and resilient. This collaborative approach fosters open communication and cooperation between teams, breaking down silos and enhancing overall cybersecurity maturity.

Furthermore, purple teaming exercises provide critical insights into the organization’s security measures. By simulating real-world attack scenarios and conducting penetration testing, purple teams can identify vulnerabilities and recommend improvements to the organization’s people, processes, and technology. This continuous evaluation and testing of security measures help organizations stay ahead of emerging threats, ensuring that their cybersecurity efforts are always up to date.

Purple Teaming Benefits	Description
Strengthened Network Security	Purple teaming identifies vulnerabilities and recommends remediation strategies to fortify the organization’s network security.
Enhanced Collaboration	Purple teaming fosters open communication and cooperation between red and blue teams, breaking down silos and enhancing overall cybersecurity maturity.
Raised Awareness of Human Vulnerabilities	Purple teaming helps raise awareness of human vulnerabilities by simulating social engineering attacks and other malicious activities.
Improved Skill Set	Purple teaming exercises provide opportunities for team members to build their skills and enhance their understanding of cybersecurity best practices.

In conclusion, purple teaming plays a crucial role in optimizing an organization’s cybersecurity efforts. By combining offensive and defensive strategies, purple teams can identify vulnerabilities, recommend remediation strategies, and enhance network security. Furthermore, purple teaming promotes collaboration and open communication between teams, raising awareness of human vulnerabilities and building the skills and maturity of the organization’s security capabilities. With its ability to provide critical insights and streamline security improvements, purple teaming is an essential component of modern cybersecurity practices.

Improving Communication and Collaboration

Purple teaming exercises facilitate effective communication, collaboration, and knowledge sharing between red and blue teams, leading to improved coordination and response to threats. By working together, the purple team can bridge the gap between offensive and defensive strategies, allowing for a holistic approach to cybersecurity. This collaboration allows the teams to identify vulnerabilities and weaknesses more efficiently, as they can leverage each other’s expertise and perspectives.

The open engagement between the red and blue teams in purple team exercises fosters valuable communication channels. They can discuss attack techniques, defense expectations, and threat intelligence in real-time, ensuring that the organization’s security measures are continuously tested and refined. This cooperative environment encourages information sharing and problem-solving, leading to more efficient and effective responses to cyber threats.

In addition to communication, purple teaming also promotes collaboration among teams. By working together, the red and blue teams can align their efforts and strategies, creating a unified approach to securing the organization’s infrastructure. This alignment enhances the coordination and response to threats, as both teams have a better understanding of each other’s capabilities and limitations. It also breaks down silos and fosters a culture of teamwork, where information and insights are shared freely.

Purple Teaming Benefits
Identifies misconfigurations and coverage gaps
Strengthens network security
Fosters cooperation among teams
Raises awareness of human vulnerabilities
Builds skills and maturity of security capabilities

Through effective communication and collaboration, purple team exercises not only enhance an organization’s security posture but also promote a culture of continuous improvement. By working together, red and blue teams can address vulnerabilities, strengthen network security, and build a more resilient cybersecurity framework.

Purple Teaming Assessments

Purple teaming assessments provide organizations with the opportunity to assess their security measures, identify vulnerabilities, and enhance their overall cyber defenses. By combining the offensive tactics of the red team with the defensive strategies of the blue team, these assessments allow for a comprehensive evaluation of an organization’s security posture.

During a purple teaming assessment, the red team, consisting of ethical hackers, launches simulated attacks and attempts to breach the organization’s defenses. The blue team, composed of defenders and security analysts, actively monitors and defends against these attacks. This collaborative approach enables the organization to gain valuable insights into their security strengths and weaknesses.

Through a series of carefully crafted scenarios and simulations, purple teaming assessments replicate real-world threats and attack techniques. This allows organizations to understand their vulnerabilities and develop effective mitigation strategies. The red team’s actions are closely observed by the blue team, who can then provide real-time feedback, analysis, and recommendations. This iterative process ensures that vulnerabilities are identified, and remediation efforts are prioritized.

Purple Teaming Assessment Process	Benefits
1. Planning and scoping: Define the scope, objectives, and scenarios for the assessment.	– Identification of vulnerabilities and weaknesses
2. Execution: Conduct the planned assessment activities, including attack simulations and defensive measures.	– Enhanced understanding of security strengths and weaknesses
3. Analysis and feedback: Analyze the results of the assessment and provide actionable recommendations.	– Improved incident response capabilities
4. Remediation: Implement the recommended changes to enhance the organization’s security defenses.	– Strengthened defense against cyber threats

By utilizing a purple teaming approach, organizations can proactively identify vulnerabilities and weaknesses in their security measures. Through continuous assessment and improvement, they can strengthen their cyber defenses and enhance their overall security posture.

Building a Successful Purple Team

Building a successful purple team requires a comprehensive plan, leveraging automation tools, and continuous testing and evaluation of security measures. By following these essential steps, organizations can optimize their cybersecurity strategies and enhance their overall security posture.

Developing a Comprehensive Plan

The first step in building a successful purple team is to develop a comprehensive plan that outlines the goals, objectives, and scope of the team’s activities. This plan should include clear guidelines on the roles and responsibilities of team members, as well as the tools and technologies that will be utilized. By establishing a well-defined plan, organizations can ensure that the purple team operates efficiently and effectively.

Leveraging Automation Tools

To streamline purple team exercises and maximize efficiency, organizations should leverage automation tools. These tools can help facilitate the testing and evaluation of security measures, identify vulnerabilities, and generate automated reports. By automating certain tasks, such as vulnerability scanning and threat detection, organizations can save time and resources while maintaining a rigorous security testing regimen.

Continuous Testing and Evaluation of Security Measures

A successful purple team is one that continuously tests and evaluates security measures to stay ahead of emerging threats and vulnerabilities. Regular penetration testing, security audits, and vulnerability scans are essential to identify weaknesses in the organization’s infrastructure and ensure that appropriate remediation strategies are in place. By maintaining a proactive approach to security testing and evaluation, organizations can minimize the risk of cyberattacks and strengthen their overall security posture.

Building a successful purple team requires careful planning, the use of automation tools, and ongoing testing and evaluation of security measures. By embracing this collaborative approach, organizations can enhance their cybersecurity capabilities and stay one step ahead of cyber threats.

Key Steps	Description
Develop a Comprehensive Plan	Outline goals, objectives, and scope of the team’s activities.
Leverage Automation Tools	Utilize automation tools to streamline processes and maximize efficiency.
Continuous Testing and Evaluation	Regularly test and evaluate security measures to identify weaknesses and implement remediation strategies.

Critical Insights and Time Savings

Purple teaming exercises provide valuable insights and save time by establishing efficient communication channels and streamlining security enhancements. By combining the expertise of both offensive (red) and defensive (blue) teams, purple teaming enables organizations to identify vulnerabilities and weaknesses in their cybersecurity defenses, ensuring a more robust and resilient security posture.

Through the collaborative efforts of red and blue teams, purple team exercises simulate real-world cyber attacks, allowing organizations to proactively detect and address potential threats. By conducting simulated attacks, the purple team can identify misconfigurations, coverage gaps, and vulnerabilities that may otherwise go unnoticed.

One of the key advantages of purple teaming is the enhancement of communication and collaboration within an organization. Unlike traditional red team/blue team exercises, where teams often work independently, purple teaming fosters a cooperative environment where both teams work together towards a common goal. This open engagement allows for real-time discussions on attack techniques and defense expectations, leading to improved coordination and a better understanding of the organization’s security strengths and weaknesses.

Additionally, purple teaming exercises help to build the skills and maturity of an organization’s security capabilities. By conducting regular assessments and testing, the purple team can identify areas for improvement and implement necessary changes. This iterative process not only strengthens an organization’s security posture but also enhances the overall performance and efficiency of its cybersecurity defenses.

Benefits of Purple Teaming
Identifies misconfigurations and coverage gaps
Strengthens network security
Fosters cooperation among teams
Raises awareness of human vulnerabilities
Builds skills and maturity of security capabilities

In conclusion, purple teaming exercises play a crucial role in modern cybersecurity practices by providing critical insights and saving time. Through effective communication channels, streamlined security enhancements, and cooperative collaboration, organizations can enhance their overall security posture and better defend against potential cyber threats.

Conclusion

Purple teaming is a powerful approach that combines the strengths of red and blue teams, fostering collaboration and improving an organization’s overall security posture. Unlike traditional red and blue team exercises, purple teaming promotes close cooperation and knowledge sharing between offensive and defensive cybersecurity professionals. By working together, purple teams simulate real-world attacks, identify vulnerabilities, and recommend remediation strategies to enhance an organization’s security defenses.

The benefits of purple teaming in cybersecurity are numerous. It helps identify misconfigurations and coverage gaps, strengthening network security and mitigating potential threats. By fostering cooperation among teams, purple teaming ensures that there is a synergy between offensive and defensive strategies, leading to more effective security measures.

Purple teaming also raises awareness of human vulnerabilities, allowing organizations to address weaknesses in training and education. By combining the skills of red and blue team members, purple team exercises build the expertise and maturity of an organization’s security capabilities. This collaborative approach enables organizations to strengthen their defenses, streamline security improvements, and save valuable time by establishing effective communication channels.

As part of purple teaming, assessments are conducted to evaluate and mitigate threats, refine attack responses, and test capabilities using industry-standard frameworks. Building a successful purple team requires a comprehensive plan, leveraging automation tools, and continuous testing and evaluation of security measures. This ongoing effort ensures that an organization stays ahead of emerging threats and maintains a robust security posture.