VerSprite Cybersecurity Consulting Services
Risk-based security testing, threat modeling, and managed defense, built on PASTA, the threat modeling methodology our CEO co-created.
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What Are Cybersecurity Consulting Services?
Cybersecurity consulting services help organizations find, prioritize, and reduce security risk with outside expertise. At VerSprite, that covers three areas: building security into software and cloud environments (Builders), testing what attackers can actually exploit (Breakers), and detecting and responding to threats on an ongoing basis (Defenders). Every engagement is scoped by business impact using PASTA, the risk-centric threat modeling methodology co-created by VerSprite CEO Tony UcedaVélez.
SERVICES BY TEAM
Builders, Breakers, and Defenders
Three specialized teams, one risk-based methodology.
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What Cybersecurity Consulting Services Actually Cover
“Cybersecurity consulting” describes everything from a single penetration test to a multi-year risk program, which makes it hard to know what you’re buying. At VerSprite, every engagement starts from one premise: security work should be prioritized by the business impact of a credible threat, not by a generic checklist of controls. That’s the thinking behind PASTA (Process for Attack Simulation and Threat Analysis), and it shapes how we scope everything from a focused application assessment to an enterprise-wide security program.
Where Consulting Fits Across the Security Lifecycle
Most organizations don’t need one service. They need the right sequence of services at the right time. Our three teams map to that lifecycle:
- Before code ships or infrastructure goes live: Builders integrate threat modeling, cloud security, and CI/CD security into development, so vulnerabilities are caught before they’re expensive to fix.
- Once systems are live: Breakers validate what’s actually exploitable through penetration testing, red teaming, and adversary emulation, testing assumptions rather than just scanning for known issues.
- On an ongoing basis: Defenders provide the monitoring, detection, and threat intelligence layer that catches what prevention missed, with digital forensics and incident response when needed.
Engagements can start anywhere in that sequence. A company shipping features weekly has different priorities than one managing a decade of legacy infrastructure.
Who Consulting Engagements Are Built For
Our consulting work concentrates in industries where a security failure has direct financial, safety, or regulatory consequences — financial services, healthcare, SaaS, retail, and manufacturing among them. That concentration matters: a threat model for a payment platform looks nothing like one for a hospital network or an industrial control system, and 16 years of engagements across those sectors informs how we scope new ones. Whether the immediate need is a single assessment or a long-term program, the starting point is the same conversation: what’s the credible threat, and what’s the actual business impact if it materializes.
Assessment, Advisory, and Managed Engagement Models
| Model | What it answers | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Assessment | What is our exposure right now? | Penetration testing, red teaming, risk assessments, compromise assessments |
| Advisory | How do we build and run the program? | Virtual CISO, regulatory compliance, vendor risk programs |
| Managed | Who handles day-to-day security operations? | MDR, threat vulnerability management, security automation |
Many clients combine all three: an assessment identifies priorities, advisory work builds the program to address them, and managed services sustain it. Every engagement traces back to a defined threat model, not an abstract compliance framework.
Who Consulting Engagements Are Built For
Our work concentrates in industries where a security failure has direct financial, safety, or regulatory consequences. A threat model for a payment platform looks nothing like one for a hospital network or an industrial control system, and 19+ years of engagements across these sectors inform how we scope new ones. Whether the need is a single assessment or a long-term program, the starting conversation is the same: what’s the credible threat, and what’s the business impact if it materializes?
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Cybersecurity Services by Industry
VerSprite delivers security services across industries where security failures translate directly to financial loss, safety risk, or regulatory exposure.
Financial Services & FinTech
- Simulate fraud, account takeover, and adversary campaigns targeting banking and payment ecosystems
- Protect cloud, API, and transaction environments through offensive testing and continuous monitoring
- Align security programs with GLBA, PCI DSS, FFIEC, and evolving financial regulations
- Give executives clear risk visibility across financial, operational, and regulatory exposure
Healthcare & Life Sciences
- Protect ePHI, clinical systems, and research environments through offensive, defensive, and advisory services
- Detect and respond to ransomware and targeted threats that affect patient care
- Align security and privacy programs with HIPAA, HITECH, and healthcare regulatory requirements
- Strengthen operational resilience to protect patient safety and continuity of care
SaaS & Technology Providers
- Secure cloud-native, multi-tenant, and DevSecOps environments across the software lifecycle
- Run red teaming, penetration testing, and AI security assessments to protect product integrity
- Support SOC 2, ISO 27001, and enterprise customer security requirements
- Build security programs that scale with growth and earn customer trust
Retail & E-Commerce
- Protect payment systems, customer data, and digital commerce platforms
- Detect and prevent fraud, credential abuse, and supply chain compromise
- Align privacy and compliance programs with PCI DSS, GDPR, and consumer protection laws
- Reduce downtime, revenue loss, and reputational risk through continuous defense
Manufacturing & Critical Infrastructure
- Secure IT/OT convergence and operational technology environments
- Simulate targeted attacks on production systems and supply chains
- Monitor nation-state and advanced threat activity affecting industrial sectors
- Strengthen governance and resilience to protect uptime and safety
Also serving: Government · Gaming · Education · View all industries
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PASTA Threat Modeling: 7 Stages for Simulating Real Attacks
PASTA is a seven-stage, risk-centric threat modeling methodology co-created by VerSprite CEO Tony UcedaVélez and documented in Risk-Centric Threat Modeling (Wiley, 2015). It lets our penetration testers, red teamers, and analysts focus on the vulnerabilities that carry real business impact, not just the ones with the highest technical score.
- Define Objectives: Establish the business objectives, compliance requirements, and impact tolerance the application supports, so every later stage is tied to what the business stands to lose.
- Define Technical Scope: Enumerate the technology stack, infrastructure, and dependencies that support those objectives. You can’t protect what you don’t know exists.
- Application Decomposition: Map data flows, trust boundaries, and interactions among application components and services.
- Threat Analysis: Review threat intelligence and environment-specific data relevant to the application’s services, data, and deployment model.
- Vulnerability & Weakness Analysis: Identify weaknesses in design and code and correlate them with the threats identified in Stage 4.
- Attack Modeling: Simulate the attack paths that could exploit those weaknesses to determine which threats are actually viable.
- Risk & Impact Analysis: Weigh business impact, likelihood, and countermeasure cost to produce a prioritized remediation plan, including where risk acceptance is appropriate.
What Is PASTA Threat Modeling? · PASTA Threat Modeling Service
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Results From Our Engagement
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Accreditations and Team Certifications
VerSprite holds CREST accreditation for web and mobile application security testing. Our consultants hold industry certifications, including CISSP, CISM, CISA, GIAC, and GSEC.
Frequently Asked Questions
VerSprite provides cybersecurity consulting across three areas: secure development and risk management (Builders), offensive security (Breakers), and managed detection and threat intelligence (Defenders). Services include penetration testing, red teaming, application and organizational threat modeling, MDR, vulnerability management, virtual CISO, and risk and compliance support.
VerSprite organizes its services into three teams. Builders integrate security into development and cloud environments through threat modeling, automation, and CI/CD security. Breakers emulate real-world attacks through penetration testing, red teaming, and adversary emulation. Defenders detect and respond to threats using managed detection and response, threat intelligence, and open-source intelligence.
PASTA (Process for Attack Simulation and Threat Analysis) is a risk-centric, seven-stage threat modeling methodology co-created by VerSprite CEO Tony UcedaVélez. It prioritizes threats by the business impact they could cause rather than technical severity alone. Learn more about PASTA.
The seven stages are Define Objectives, Define Technical Scope, Application Decomposition, Threat Analysis, Vulnerability & Weakness Analysis, Attack Modeling, and Risk & Impact Analysis.
VerSprite takes a risk-based rather than compliance-driven approach, examining credible threats to measure potential business impact instead of only assessing security controls. As the creators of the PASTA methodology, with 19+ years of experience, VerSprite tailors each engagement to a client’s environment, assets, and business priorities.
VerSprite focuses on industries where security failures translate directly to financial loss, safety risk, or regulatory exposure, including financial services and FinTech, healthcare and life sciences, SaaS and technology, retail and e-commerce, and manufacturing and critical infrastructure.
Yes. VerSprite holds CREST accreditation for web and mobile application security testing, and its team holds certifications including CISSP, CISA, CISM, and GIAC.
Pricing depends on scope: the number and complexity of applications or environments, the engagement model (assessment, advisory, or managed), and the depth of testing required. VerSprite scopes each engagement around the threats and assets that matter most to the business, so you aren’t paying for coverage you don’t need. Contact us for a scoped estimate.
It depends on the size and complexity of the target. In VerSprite’s hybrid penetration testing case study, a standard manual test of a medium-sized web application took about 80 hours, while the hybrid approach combining Knife with consultant testing took about 40 hours and found more issues.
Penetration testing looks for as many exploitable vulnerabilities as possible within a defined scope, such as an application or network. Red teaming emulates a specific adversary pursuing a specific objective, testing how well detection and response hold up against a realistic attack. Many organizations start with penetration testing and add red teaming as their security program matures.
Most organizations start with a risk assessment or threat model to identify what matters most and where the biggest gaps are, then use a virtual CISO to build the program around those priorities. Testing and managed services follow once the foundation is in place.