The Cyber Threat Perspective

Replay of Episode 178, originally published April 22, 2026.

We are re-running this one because it is the question we get asked most
on internal pen test debriefs: of everything on the list, what actually
slows an attacker down? Spencer and Tyler answer it from the attacker
side, using what has and has not stopped them on real engagements.

What's covered:

- Application control done right, including where ThreatLocker and WDAC
  actually block a payload and where they get bypassed
- MFA, the Protected Users group, and least privilege as attacker-facing
  controls rather than compliance checkboxes
- Why mismanaged admin privileges and service accounts remain the fastest
  route from foothold to domain admin
- Network segmentation and zero trust, and what separates a real
  implementation from a diagram
- Deception techniques and EDR baselining for catching activity that
  looks legitimate

If you are deciding where the next dollar of your security budget goes,
this is the episode that tells you what attackers hope you skip.
Blog: https://offsec.blog/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@cyberthreatpov
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Spencer's Links: https://spenceralessi.com
Work with Us: https://securit360.com | Find vulnerabilities that matter, learn about how we do internal pentesting here.

Interested in a pen test? Visit securit360.com.
Every organization has a Joe. He is the long tenured engineer or admin who built half the environment, maintains the other half, and keeps most of it in his head. Everybody depends on him and nobody wants to challenge him.
Spencer and Tyler break down key man risk in IT, drawing on hundreds of internal pen tests across law firms, banks, credit unions, manufacturing, municipalities, and SaaS organizations.
In this episode:
Why tribal knowledge is a security risk, not just an operations problem
How word of mouth process handoffs turn into a game of telephone
The reason remediations stall for an extra 30 days
Shadow IT that originates inside the IT team
Privilege creep and the single account that owns the environment
When Joe's resistance to change is the correct call
Cross training that does not add more work to Joe's plate
Incentives, clear ownership, and update deadlines that actually stick
Separating fact gathering from decision making so seniority does not win by default
This is not a knock on senior admins. It is a look at the risk that accumulates when one person carries everything, and what IT leaders can do about it.
All of our content can be found at Offsec.blog. Interested in a pen test? Visit securit360.com.
Blog: https://offsec.blog/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@cyberthreatpov
Twitter: https://x.com/cyberthreatpov
Follow Spencer on social ⬇
Spencer's Links: https://spenceralessi.com
Work with Us: https://securit360.com | Find vulnerabilities that matter, learn about how we do internal pentesting here.

Service accounts are one of the easiest paths to domain admin on an internal
pen test, and one of the most neglected accounts in Active Directory.

In this episode, Spencer and Tyler break down why service accounts keep
falling: Kerberoasting every service account (not just the privileged ones),
cracking the hashes offline, and spraying what cracks across the environment.
Tyler shares a recent engagement where a non-administrative service account
shared its password with a domain admin. Same password, one "SVC_" prefix
apart. That spray handed over the domain. He's also seen the built-in RID 500
administrator account used as a service account on three separate engagements
this year.

They also get into where these credentials actually live: web.config files on
open file shares, plaintext password files (present on roughly 90% of their
pen tests), and one .eml attachment with the credentials sitting inside a
screenshot.

Then the fix list, in the order they'd actually do it:

- Inventory the accounts and document where each one is used, before you touch a password
- Delete the service accounts that don't need to exist
- Strip privileges and restrict interactive logon rights
- Get a password vault or PAM solution, and make every password long and unique
- Alert on service accounts logging on interactively
- Move to group managed service accounts (gMSA) where you can
- Enforce 20-25 character minimums in the meantime. They've cracked 20+ character passphrases with a gaming rig, a 180 GB wordlist, and mutation rules producing roughly four quadrillion permutations

Plus the three cleanup mistakes that cause the most damage, including the story
of a $70 billion enterprise where one undocumented password reset turned into a
10-hour troubleshooting call.
Blog: https://offsec.blog/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@cyberthreatpov
Twitter: https://x.com/cyberthreatpov
Follow Spencer on social ⬇
Spencer's Links: https://spenceralessi.com
Work with Us: https://securit360.com | Find vulnerabilities that matter, learn about how we do internal pentesting here.

In July 2026, Microsoft alone released 622 CVEs. In the 2010s, the monthly average was about a dozen. Nobody handed IT teams more time, budget, or headcount to match, and that gap is what burnout is actually made of.
Somewhere in the last five to ten years, "keeping the lights on" became "and also prevent cyberattacks." Spencer Alessi and Brad Causey talk through how security landed on IT's plate, why capable admins end up feeling like they're failing, and what to do about it when hiring a dedicated security person isn't on the table.
The core of the episode is a four-question framework for prioritizing when you can't do everything:
- Harm: what would cause the greatest damage to the business?
- Likelihood: what is most likely to actually be attacked?
- Improve: what can you realistically fix with the people and tools you have today?
- Accept: what risk must leadership explicitly own because your team can't address it?
Brad's addition: don't start from the scan report, start from the crown jewels. Client matters if you're a law firm, financial data if you're a bank. From there, draw lines outward to whatever touches them. And executives need to get comfortable accepting risk, because zero risk tolerance isn't a strategy, it's a phrase.
We also get into the language that works with leadership. "You gave me four things and I have time for two" is adversarial and doesn't give anyone enough to decide with. "I recommend A and C, here's why, and here's when B and D land if nothing else gets added" is managing up. Same for new projects: price the work honestly, including cost, timeline, and tradeoffs, then hand the decision back to the people with full business context.
We close with the four things IT teams need to succeed: authority, budget, team, and support, including a trusted outside partner for the specialized work you shouldn't be doing yourself.
Planning your next penetration test? Book a call with us at https://securit360.com
If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with your network. See you next week.
Blog: https://offsec.blog/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@cyberthreatpov
Twitter: https://x.com/cyberthreatpov
Follow Spencer on social ⬇
Spencer's Links: https://spenceralessi.com
Work with Us: https://securit360.com | Find vulnerabilities that matter, learn about how we do internal pentesting here.

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The OWASP Subtractive Security Top 10 Project --> https://github.com/OWASP/OWASP-Subtractive-Hardening-Top-10
The OWASP Subtractive Security Top 10 Project is an initiative to identify, document, and promote the highest-impact opportunities for reducing cyber risk through the elimination of attack paths.
Blog: https://offsec.blog/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@cyberthreatpov
Twitter: https://x.com/cyberthreatpov
Follow Spencer on social ⬇
Spencer's Links: https://spenceralessi.com
Work with Us: https://securit360.com | Find vulnerabilities that matter, learn about how we do internal pentesting here.