SOC 2 Penetration Testing

DarkPoint Security provides SOC 2 penetration testing services designed to help organizations demonstrate the effectiveness of their security controls to auditors and stakeholders. Our security assessments map directly to the AICPA Trust Service Criteria, giving your auditor the evidence needed to evaluate your control environment during Type I and Type II examinations.

  • Penetration testing aligned to SOC 2 Trust Service Criteria (CC6.1, CC7.1, CC7.2)
  • External, internal, web application, cloud, and API security assessments
  • Reports structured for SOC 2 Type I and Type II audit readiness
  • Vulnerability identification mapped to Security, Availability, and Confidentiality criteria
  • Remediation validation testing to confirm control effectiveness

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What is SOC 2?

SOC 2 (System and Organization Controls 2) is an auditing framework developed by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) that evaluates how organizations manage and protect customer data. The framework is built around five Trust Service Criteria: Security, Availability, Processing Integrity, Confidentiality, and Privacy. Of these, Security is the only mandatory criterion and forms the foundation of every SOC 2 examination. Organizations select additional criteria based on the nature of their services, customer expectations, and contractual obligations.

SOC 2 reports come in two types. A Type I report evaluates whether an organization's controls are suitably designed at a specific point in time. A Type II report goes further by assessing both the design and operating effectiveness of those controls over an observation period, typically six to twelve months. Type II reports are considered significantly more rigorous and are the standard expectation for enterprise customers conducting vendor due diligence. Most organizations pursuing SOC 2 compliance ultimately aim for a Type II report, as it provides the strongest assurance that security controls are functioning consistently.

SOC 2 compliance is particularly relevant for SaaS providers, cloud service providers, managed service providers, data centres, and any technology organization that stores, processes, or transmits customer data. In Canada, where organizations must also consider obligations under PIPEDA (Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act), SOC 2 provides a recognized framework for demonstrating that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect personal information. For Canadian businesses serving clients in the United States or handling cross-border data, a SOC 2 report has become a baseline expectation in procurement and vendor risk management processes.

SOC 2 Penetration Testing Requirements

While the AICPA Trust Service Criteria do not explicitly require penetration testing by name, several criteria establish control objectives that penetration testing directly supports. Most SOC 2 auditors consider penetration testing an essential component of a mature security program and expect to see it as evidence of control effectiveness, particularly for the Security criterion.

  • CC6.1 — Logical and Physical Access Controls — Organizations must implement logical access security measures to protect information assets against unauthorized access. Penetration testing validates that access controls, authentication mechanisms, and authorization policies are functioning as intended by attempting to bypass them under controlled conditions. This includes testing for privilege escalation, broken access controls, and authentication weaknesses across your environment.
  • CC7.1 — Detection and Monitoring — Organizations must use detection and monitoring procedures to identify anomalies that could indicate security events, including configuration changes that introduce new vulnerabilities. Penetration testing evaluates whether your monitoring tools and security operations processes can detect simulated attack activity, providing direct evidence that your detection capabilities are operational.
  • CC7.2 — Incident Identification and Vulnerability Management — Organizations must monitor system components for anomalies and evaluate detected events to determine whether they represent security incidents. Penetration testing identifies exploitable vulnerabilities before attackers do and provides a controlled mechanism for testing your incident identification and response processes.
  • CC3.2 — Risk Assessment — Organizations must identify and assess risks that could affect the achievement of their objectives. Penetration testing is a practical risk assessment activity that identifies real-world threats to your environment, going beyond theoretical risk registers to demonstrate how vulnerabilities could be exploited in practice and what the actual business impact would be.

For SOC 2 Type II engagements, penetration testing results conducted within the observation period provide your auditor with direct evidence that security controls were tested and validated during the reporting window. Timing your SOC 2 penetration testing to fall within this period is critical for maximizing the value of the assessment.

How DarkPoint Helps You Achieve SOC 2 Compliance

DarkPoint Security aligns our penetration testing services to the SOC 2 Trust Service Criteria, ensuring that every engagement produces findings and documentation that map directly to the control objectives your auditor will evaluate. Our SOC 2 security assessment methodology covers the full scope of your technology environment.

  • External Network Penetration Testing — Validates your perimeter security controls against CC6.1 by testing internet-facing infrastructure for misconfigurations, unpatched vulnerabilities, and weak access controls that could allow unauthorized access to your systems and customer data
  • Internal Network Penetration Testing — Assesses lateral movement risks and internal access controls supporting CC6.1 and CC7.2, simulating an insider threat or compromised endpoint to evaluate how effectively your environment contains unauthorized activity and protects sensitive data
  • Web Application Penetration Testing — Tests customer-facing applications and SaaS platforms for vulnerabilities such as injection flaws, broken authentication, insecure direct object references, and sensitive data exposure, supporting CC6.1 access controls and CC7.1 detection capabilities
  • Cloud Penetration Testing — Evaluates the security of your cloud infrastructure, including IAM policies, storage configurations, network security groups, and serverless functions across AWS, Azure, and GCP, mapped to CC6.1 and CC7.2 criteria
  • API Penetration Testing — Assesses the security of REST and GraphQL APIs that handle customer data, testing authentication, authorization, input validation, and rate limiting controls to validate that programmatic access points meet SOC 2 security requirements

Our reports are written with SOC 2 auditors in mind. Each finding includes a mapping to the relevant Trust Service Criteria, severity classification based on exploitability and business impact, exploitation evidence, and actionable remediation guidance. For Canadian organizations subject to PIPEDA, our assessments also consider whether identified vulnerabilities could result in unauthorized access to personal information, helping you address both SOC 2 and Canadian privacy obligations simultaneously.

Our SOC 2 Testing Process

DarkPoint Security follows a structured methodology designed to produce thorough results that support your SOC 2 compliance objectives and provide maximum value to your audit process:

  • Scoping and Criteria Mapping — We work with your team to identify the systems, applications, and infrastructure components that fall within your SOC 2 audit boundary. We review your system description, Trust Service Criteria selections, and existing control documentation to define a testing scope that aligns with your auditor's expectations. Proper scoping ensures that all in-scope components are tested and that results can be directly referenced during the examination.
  • Penetration Testing Execution — Our security consultants perform comprehensive testing against all in-scope assets using a combination of automated tooling and manual techniques. Testing covers network-layer exploitation, application-layer vulnerabilities, cloud configuration weaknesses, API security issues, and access control bypass attempts. Each test is mapped to the relevant SOC 2 criteria to ensure traceability in the final report.
  • Reporting for SOC 2 Auditors — We deliver a detailed report that maps each finding to specific Trust Service Criteria, assigns severity ratings based on exploitability and business impact, provides evidence of testing activities, and includes prioritized remediation recommendations. The report includes an executive summary suitable for management, board, and stakeholder review, along with technical detail sufficient for your engineering team to remediate each finding.
  • Remediation Validation — After your team addresses the identified vulnerabilities, we perform targeted retesting to confirm that fixes are effective and that controls are operating as intended. This validation step provides additional evidence of control effectiveness for your SOC 2 auditor and is included as part of every engagement.

Relevant Services

DarkPoint Security offers the full range of penetration testing services needed to support SOC 2 compliance:

Frequently Asked Questions

While the AICPA Trust Service Criteria do not explicitly mandate penetration testing by name, criteria such as CC6.1, CC7.1, and CC7.2 require organizations to demonstrate that they identify vulnerabilities, detect anomalies, and evaluate the effectiveness of security controls. Penetration testing is one of the most widely accepted methods for satisfying these criteria, and most SOC 2 auditors expect to see penetration testing as part of a mature security program. For organizations pursuing SOC 2 Type II certification, penetration testing conducted within the observation period provides strong evidence of ongoing control effectiveness.

A SOC 2 Type I report evaluates the design of an organization's controls at a specific point in time. A SOC 2 Type II report evaluates both the design and operating effectiveness of those controls over a period of time, typically six to twelve months. Type II reports carry more weight with customers and prospects because they demonstrate that controls are not only in place but are functioning consistently. Penetration testing supports both report types by providing evidence that security controls are effective against real-world attack scenarios.

Most organizations perform penetration testing at least annually to align with their SOC 2 audit cycle. For Type II reports, testing should be conducted within the audit observation period so that results are included in the auditor's evaluation of control effectiveness. Organizations with higher risk profiles, frequent infrastructure changes, or customer contractual requirements may benefit from more frequent testing, such as semi-annual or quarterly assessments. We recommend coordinating the testing schedule with your auditor to ensure results are available when needed.

Our SOC 2 penetration testing report includes a detailed scope definition aligned to your Trust Service Criteria, an executive summary of findings, technical details of each vulnerability with severity ratings, evidence of exploitation attempts, and prioritized remediation recommendations. The report maps findings to relevant SOC 2 criteria such as CC6.1, CC7.1, and CC7.2, and is structured to provide your auditor with the evidence needed to evaluate control effectiveness. We also include an attestation letter confirming the scope, methodology, and timeframe of the assessment.