Named in Gartner's 2025 Adversarial Exposure Validation (AEV) category
Adversarial Exposure Validation that proves exploitability, not theory
Autonomous AI agents discover your surface, run real attacks safely, and validate every exposure with a working proof of concept. Free pen test. No agents. Results in minutes.
Recon: Credentials found in exposed .git repo
Attempt: Direct DB access, blocked
Pivot: Credential reuse to SSH root access
Escalate: Internal pivot to database exfiltration
Why severity scores leave you exposed
Theoretical risk ranks vulnerabilities by score. Attackers rank them by what actually works. Three structural gaps keep the two apart, and attackers exploit all three at once.
Scope gap
- Only a subset of assets is tested deeply
- Crown-jewel apps get attention, peripheral assets do not
- 20% of breaches begin through a peripheral asset
Depth gap
- Findings reported in isolation, attackers chain them
- 22% of breaches start with credential abuse
- Business logic flaws stay invisible to scanners
Speed gap
- Most teams still validate on a yearly cadence
- Modern teams deploy weekly, daily, or on demand
- The window between change and validation keeps widening
AEV closes the gap by validating exposure from the attacker's side. It does not guess what is risky. It proves what is exploitable.
Adversarial Exposure Validation on an agentic platform
FireCompass runs the full validation loop across web apps, APIs, and infrastructure, continuously, and proves every finding before it reaches you.
Discover
- Shadow apps and forgotten subdomains
- Leaked credentials on the dark web
- API endpoints from JS files and docs
- Peripheral assets attackers target first
Validate
- OWASP Top 10 plus business logic abuse
- Authenticated and unauthenticated paths
- Proof of exploit for every finding
- No exploit, no alert
Chain & red team
- Credential reuse across services
- App-to-app and app-to-network pivots
- MITRE ATT&CK kill chain automation
- End-to-end red team emulation
Continuously
- Triggered by deployment, CVE, or new asset
- Matches CI/CD release cadence
- Day-1 CVE validation
- One-click revalidation of fixes
From exposed .git to full database compromise, fully autonomous
No human steering. No predefined playbook. The agent chained validated findings across four steps.
Recon
Agent found an exposed .git directory, rebuilt the repo, and extracted database credentials from config files.
Attempt
Agent tried the database directly. The port was not externally exposed. A scanner would stop here.
Pivot
Agent hypothesized credential reuse, tested the same creds against SSH, and gained root access.
Escalate
Agent found private keys, pivoted to the internal network, reached the database, and exfiltrated data.
UAT to production pivot
WAF bypass via origin discovery
Infrastructure lateral movement
100% score across every penetration testing benchmark
Fully autonomous, no manual steering and no human hints. Verified against industry-standard environments.
Easy, medium and hard
PoC-validated
All three difficulty levels
FireCompass AEV vs other validation approaches
| Capability | FireCompass AEV | BAS / control validation | Manual red teaming |
|---|---|---|---|
| Validates with a real exploit PoC | ✓ Live execution | Simulated technique only | ✓ Manual, slow |
| Business logic testing | ✓ AI-driven | Not supported | ✓ Manual only |
| Multi-stage attack chaining | ✓ Web to API to infra | Limited | ✓ Expert-dependent |
| Continuous, trigger-driven cadence | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | Annual |
| False positive rate | Under 2% | Not applicable, no exploitation | Low but variable |
| Cost per app / test | Under $1,000 | Tooling plus tuning time | $2,400 to $10,000 |
$5,000 to under $1,000 per app. Two weeks to one day.
Replaced a large consulting firm's manual program with continuous, evidence-backed validation across 2,000+ web applications.
Before: manual pen testing consulting
- About $5,000 per app per test, two consultant-days
- Two or more weeks of lead time to schedule and complete
- Tested 200 of 2,000+ apps annually
- Reported isolated findings, missed attack chains
- Scans produced a 70% false positive rate
After: FireCompass AEV
- Under $1,000 per app, an 11x cost reduction
- On-demand testing, zero lead time
- Full coverage across 2,000+ apps continuously
- Found chained attack paths the consultants scoped out
- Under 2% false positives, every finding PoC-validated
Start with AEV. Expand to full red teaming and CTEM.
One platform covering pen testing, automated red teaming, attack surface management, and continuous threat exposure management.
Adversarial Exposure Validation
Web and API attacks, executed and validated with proof of concept.
Infrastructure pen testing
Networks, servers, and cloud, continuously validated.
Continuous Automated Red Teaming
MITRE ATT&CK-aligned attack trees, lateral movement, and privilege escalation.
PTaaS, pen testing as a service
Expert in the loop for business logic and compliance.
CTEM and attack surface management
Continuous exposure monitoring and risk prioritization.
Deployment
- SaaS for external asset discovery and validation
- Internal appliance for internal assets
- Internal deployment in under one hour
- SaaS deployment in minutes
Trusted by Fortune 500. Recognized by Gartner, Forrester and more.
Adversarial Exposure Validation, answered
Everything CISOs, security engineers, and red team leads ask before starting with FireCompass.
What is Adversarial Exposure Validation (AEV)?
AEV is technology that delivers continuous, automated evidence of whether an attack is feasible in your environment. It runs real attack techniques against live assets and controls and proves which exposures an attacker could exploit, rather than scoring them by severity.
How is AEV different from breach and attack simulation (BAS)?
BAS simulates known techniques and measures whether a control detects them. AEV goes further and executes the attack, confirming exploitability with a working proof of concept. Gartner positions AEV as the successor to BAS, automated pen testing, and red teaming.
Does AEV replace penetration testing?
AEV replaces the calendar-based model. Instead of one annual test that covers about 20% of your surface, AEV validates exposure continuously and on triggers such as a deployment or a new CVE, with evidence behind every finding.
How does FireCompass keep false positives under 2%?
Every finding is executed safely against the live target and confirmed before it reaches your dashboard. That validation gate holds the false positive rate under 2%, against the 40 to 70% typical of scanners.
Is continuous offensive testing safe to run against production?
Yes, when the platform enforces governance. FireCompass applies scope allowlists, rate limiting, an instant kill switch, safe payload enforcement, credential scope guards, RBAC, and append-only audit logs with cryptographic timestamps.
How does AEV support CTEM and compliance?
AEV is the validation layer of a CTEM program. The audit trail maps to PCI DSS 4.0, SOC 2 Type II, DORA, and ISO 27001 evidence requirements, so you can prove what was tested and how.
Does AEV cover APIs and infrastructure, not just web apps?
Yes. FireCompass validates exposure across web apps, APIs, and infrastructure, and chains findings across them to show the real path an attacker would take.
Is there a free way to try AEV?
Yes. FireCompass Explorer gives teams a free, evidence-backed pen test against a business-critical web app, with results in minutes and no agents to install.
Go deeper
Reference guide
The offensive security guide: BAS, CTEM, CART, pen testing, VA, AEV, and COST
Read the guide →Analyst note
Gartner named FireCompass in the new COST market. Here is what most vendors will miss.
Read the breakdown →Use case
Agentic web application and API penetration testing
See how it works →Prove what an attacker can actually reach
Run a free, evidence-backed pen test against a business-critical web app. See validated exploits, not a list of maybes.
Launch FireCompass Explorer →