Client Success Story

Red Teaming and Penetration Testing for the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts had to coordinate security across 22 interconnected subsystems holding sensitive legal data while maintaining continuous authorization. InterSec ran red team and penetration testing with policy review and user education to keep the judiciary's systems assessment-ready.

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Penetration Testing Federal Completed

Subsystems kept continuously authorized

Red team and penetration testing that kept the federal judiciary assessment-ready.

DOJ and FISMA requirements fully met

Red team exercises surfaced what scans miss

Staff trained to resist social engineering

Client

Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts

Sector

Federal

Environment

22 interconnected subsystems

Mandates

DOJ security & FISMA

The Challenge

The office faced the difficulty of coordinating security across many subsystems while keeping judicial functions running without interruption. Any lapse could undermine the integrity of legal data or breach federal guidelines, and three factors made it hard.

Complex architecture

The subsystem architecture made a unified security stance difficult to coordinate.

Extreme data sensitivity

Legal documents and judicial records allow no compromise.

Always-on authorization

DOJ mandates and FISMA required maintaining authorization to operate at all times.

The Approach

InterSec deployed a systematic red team strategy, paired with policy reviews and user-awareness training, so each subsystem was tested against both external attackers and insider threats. The work combined three elements.

Run red team simulations

Replicate sophisticated attacker tactics rather than running surface scans.

Reinforce the human layer

Use policy and user education to address the data-handling and phishing risks technical controls cannot reach.

Keep risk assessments iterative

Maintain authorization readiness as the environment changes rather than drifting between point-in-time reviews.

The Solution in Practice

InterSec used advanced penetration testing tools and documented each finding, delivering targeted remediation steps rather than a raw vulnerability list. The team also helped the office simplify the work of maintaining and renewing authorization to operate, while staff training equipped personnel to recognize and resist social engineering.

The red team exercises probed the subsystems the way a real adversary would, surfacing issues that conventional testing tends to miss.

Results & Impact

Thorough identification of technical gaps, combined with sharper user vigilance, produced a more secure environment that upheld the strict standards of the federal judiciary.

Issues exposed by the red team exercises were patched promptly.

Continuous authorization was maintained across all 22 subsystems.

DOJ and FISMA security and privacy requirements were fully met.

Key Takeaways

Red teaming finds what scans miss

Replicating real attacker tactics surfaces the chained weaknesses a checklist-based test passes over.

The human layer is part of the attack surface

Phishing and data-handling training close the gap that technical controls cannot.

Authorization is maintained, not achieved once

Iterative risk assessments keep a complex multi-subsystem environment continuously ready.

Findings need remediation steps, not just ratings

Targeted, documented fixes are what turn a test into an improvement.

Capabilities Demonstrated

Red TeamingAdvanced Penetration TestingPolicy Review & User EducationFISMA & DOJ ComplianceATO Maintenance

Working With InterSec

Protecting sensitive systems takes testing that thinks like an attacker.

And reporting that drives real fixes. InterSec runs red team and penetration testing programs for federal organizations that have to stay authorized. Let's scope an engagement.

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