Penetration testing services UAE find your vulnerabilitiesbefore attackers do.
CREST-aligned penetration testing services UAE, VAPT, vulnerability assessment, and red team exercises — delivered across Dubai, Abu Dhabi and the wider GCC by OSCP-certified operators who've spent years on both sides of the keyboard. If your defences haven't been tested, they haven't been proven.
Firewall, EDR, email gateway. All green.
One SQL injection.
A retail client had ticked every box - firewall refresh, endpoint detection, email security, a SOC contract. They felt confident enough to tell the board they were "in a strong position."
On day one of the engagement, a single parameter in their customer-facing login form surfaced a blind SQL injection. It exposed 2.3 million customer records. It had been there for over two years.
No internal scan had flagged it. No SOC rule had fired. The defensive stack was doing its job - just not the job anyone had actually tested.
"You can have the best defensive tools in the world - if you're not actively testing them, you're flying blind."
- Lead engagement engineer · Artiflex
Records at risk · live extract estimate
Reproduced from an authorised engagement · client anonymised
Penetration testing in the UAE — VAPT, compliance & credentials
Penetration testing Dubai and across the UAE now sits on the board agenda every quarter — next to NESA, CBUAE, SAMA, PCI-DSS and ISO 27001. This is the context, the terminology, and the team behind every engagement we run.
VAPT methodology explained — scan + exploit, in one engagement
VAPT — Vulnerability Assessment & Penetration Testing — is the combined approach most UAE buyers ask for by name. A VAPT engagement runs automated vulnerability assessment for breadth, then layers manual penetration testing on top so every finding is validated, chained and prioritised by business impact — not a CVSS printout.
Automated scans find every known CVE, misconfiguration and stale patch in scope.
Humans exploit what's exploitable, chain it, and prove the real business impact.
Artiflex IT delivers VAPT services UAE buyers can hand directly to their auditor — formatted for NESA, CBUAE, SAMA, PCI-DSS and ISO 27001 evidence cycles.
Penetration testing in UAE: compliance & standards
Regulators across the UAE and the wider GCC now expect independent penetration testing evidence, not just internal attestations. Artiflex IT aligns every engagement methodology — scoping, execution, reporting and retest — with the frameworks your auditor will actually open:
- NESA IASNESA penetration testing requirements for UAE federal and critical-sector entities — aligned to the UAE Information Assurance Standards and mapped to your control baseline.
- CBUAECentral Bank of UAE expectations for banks, exchange houses and licensed payment providers — including annual testing windows and evidence of retest.
- SAMASAMA penetration testing Saudi Arabia guidance for regulated financial institutions — we support UAE-headquartered groups with Saudi subsidiaries and cross-border scope.
- PCI-DSSPCI DSS penetration testing UAE for retailers and payment processors — segmentation testing, external + internal ASV coverage, and ROC-ready evidence packs.
- ISO 27001ISO 27001 penetration testing as part of your ISMS — findings fed straight into Annex A controls, risk treatment plan and management review.
Need the framework context itself, not just the test? Our cybersecurity implementation roadmap shows where a security audit, compliance uplift and retest fit into a phased programme — and where threat intelligence and incident response pick up once the pen test has surfaced what matters.
Red team exercise — full adversary simulation
Red teaming is an objective-based adversary simulation — phishing, physical intrusion, custom tradecraft, C2 infrastructure and detection evasion, run against a defined flag rather than a checklist. It is genuinely powerful, but it is not where most organisations start.
We only recommend a red team once your baseline vulnerability assessment and targeted pen tests are clean, your SOC is in place, and your incident response playbooks have been exercised at least once. Running a red team against an immature programme simply confirms what everyone already knew — and burns the budget that should have funded the fundamentals.
See where red teaming fits in the full programme inside our phased implementation roadmap.
Vulnerability scanning and penetration testing are not the same thing
Both matter. Both live in a mature security programme. But they answer different questions - and collapsing them into one is how organisations convince themselves they're covered when they're not.
Vulnerability scan
Asks: "What known issues do we have, right now?"
A scanner crawls your estate, fingerprints software versions, and cross-references public vulnerability databases. Fast, cheap, and repeatable - the right baseline for continuous monitoring.
What it misses: chained attacks, business-logic flaws, anything an author didn't write a signature for, and the realistic question of whether any of it is actually exploitable in your environment.
Penetration test
Asks: "If an attacker came in today, how far could they get?"
A qualified operator - OSCP, OSCE, CREST - manually probes your environment, exploits what's exploitable, and chains findings together until they reach your crown-jewel data. Depth, not breadth. Proof, not score.
Attack chain · typical narrative
- 01PhishSpear-phish an accountant
- 02FootholdMacro → loader → C2
- 03HarvestExtract cached creds
- 04PivotLateral to DB server
- 05ExfilStage + quiet egress
What it delivers: proof your scanner findings are or aren't exploitable, the attack narrative that connects five individual medium-risk items into one critical business exposure, and the detection gaps your SOC never saw fire.
Five perspectives - five engagements
Each surface rewards a different testing method and toolkit. Most organisations need two or three on a rolling cycle; a few need all five. Here's what each one actually looks like.
Web Application Penetration Testing
Our most-requested engagement. Automated scanners miss the chained logic flaws - authenticated users escalating through a discount endpoint, or an API that trusts a client-supplied user ID. Manual testing finds them.
What we look for
- SQL injection, XSS, SSRF, deserialisation
- Authentication, session and access-control flaws
- Business-logic and workflow abuse
- Client-side template and prototype pollution
Scope depends on your environment - we quote after a 30-minute scoping call.
Request a scoped quote →Pick the right instrument for the job
A quick reference we give every client during scoping. Most mature programmes run the top three on a rolling calendar, and commission the bottom three on cycle.
| Engagement | Scope | Typical Duration | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vulnerability Scan | Automated, breadth-first scanning | 1 – 2 days | Continuous monitoring baseline |
| Network Pen Test | External + internal network | 5 – 10 days | Annual compliance requirement |
| Web App Pen Test | Customer-facing applications | 5 – 15 days | Pre-launch / annual review |
| API Pen Test | REST · GraphQL · gRPC | 3 – 7 days | API-heavy architectures |
| Cloud Security Assessment | AWS · Azure · GCP posture | 5 – 10 days | Cloud migration or annual review |
| Red Team Exercise | Full adversary simulation | 2 – 4 weeks | Mature security programmes |
Sample · redacted · PDF
See what a professional pen test report actually looks like
A fully redacted sample from a recent engagement - executive summary, technical findings with proof, remediation guidance, and a retest plan. Use it to benchmark anything you're being handed today.
The deliverable matters as much as the testing
A bad pen test report is a scanner printout with a new cover page. A good one is the artefact that actually drives remediation, audit evidence, and the next board conversation.
What's inside
Five sections - non-negotiable
Executive summary
Risk rating, business impact, and the three things leadership needs to decide on. Written for a board - not a SOC.
Technical findings with proof
Each vulnerability with reproducible steps, exploit payloads, screenshots, and a CVSSv3.1 vector - not a scanner printout.
Remediation guidance
Concrete fixes your engineers can ship - code patches, configuration snippets, compensating controls if a fix isn't immediate.
Attack-chain narrative
How individual issues chain into real impact. This is the difference between 'a medium finding' and '2.3M records at risk'.
Retest and verification
Evidence that each finding was actually fixed - not merely ticketed as closed. Auditors and boards expect this now.
Red flags
If you see any of these in a quote - walk away
- Report is a Nessus / Qualys PDF with a new cover page
- No business-impact analysis - just CVSS numbers
- No proof-of-concept, no exploit steps, no screenshots
- Remediation advice is 'update to latest version'
- No retest included - you pay again to verify the fix
Our promise: every finding ships with exploit proof, a business-impact narrative, and a remediation your engineers can ship that week.
Where vulnerability management sits in the stack
Testing is one part of a coherent programme. These are the neighbours - the places most of our clients loop back to once the first engagement is closed.
Cybersecurity overview
Pillars, framework, and where vulnerability assessment sits in the stack.
Read moreSIEM, SOAR & MDR
Threat intelligence, detection and incident response - 24/7 blue-team cover.
Read moreEndpoint security
EDR/XDR as the sensor grid pen tests validate against.
Read moreCyber for business
The non-technical playbook - seven pillars explained for the board.
Read moreImplementation roadmap
Where security audit, compliance and retest fit in a phased programme.
Read moreFrequently Asked Questions
A vulnerability scan is automated and broad - it finds known CVEs and misconfigurations across your estate. A penetration test is manual and deep - humans exploit the findings, chain them together, and demonstrate real impact. You need both: the scan tells you what's there, the pen test tells you what it actually costs you.
At minimum annually, and after any significant architectural change - a new application, a cloud migration, a merger. Regulated industries (PCI-DSS, CBUAE, NESA) often require more. The best-run teams run a rolling programme: quarterly scans, annual pen tests, and a red team every 18–24 months.
Professional testing uses controlled techniques that minimise disruption risk. We passively reconnoitre first, escalate intensity only inside agreed change windows, and immediately flag anything that could cause impact. Critical findings get surfaced in real time - we don't wait for the final report.
Executive summary with risk ratings and business impact, technical findings with reproducible proof-of-concept, remediation guidance your engineers can act on, an attack-chain narrative showing how issues combine, and a free retest to confirm fixes. If any of those are missing, change providers.
A pen test scopes a system - 'test this web app by Friday.' A red team exercise scopes an objective - 'reach our crown-jewel data, by any means, over six weeks, without the blue team noticing.' Red teaming uses phishing, physical intrusion, and custom tradecraft. It tests your people and your SOC, not just your code.
Yes. Our engagements map directly to NESA IAS, UAE PDPL, CBUAE, PCI-DSS, and ISO 27001 testing requirements. Reports are accepted by UAE regulators and auditors, and we can deliver evidence packs formatted for your specific audit cycle.
Every engagement ships with an auditor-ready evidence pack: statement of work, testing methodology, findings register with risk ratings, remediation log, and a retest certificate. You forward it to your auditor - not a formatting exercise for your internal team.
VAPT stands for Vulnerability Assessment & Penetration Testing - the combined approach most UAE buyers ask for by name. The assessment runs automated scans for breadth (every known CVE, misconfiguration, stale patch), and the penetration test layers manual exploitation on top so every finding is validated, chained and prioritised by business impact. Artiflex IT delivers VAPT services UAE clients can hand directly to their NESA, SAMA, PCI-DSS or ISO 27001 auditor.
Ranges, not list prices - every engagement is scoped. As a guide: a focused web application or API test typically sits between AED 30,000 and AED 90,000; a network pen test covering external plus internal between AED 40,000 and AED 120,000; a full red team exercise between AED 150,000 and AED 400,000+ depending on duration and objectives. Final quote follows a 30-minute scoping call - we never quote blind from a form.
Black box testing gives the operator no prior knowledge - they start from the outside with only what an attacker could discover publicly. White box testing provides full access: credentials, source code, architecture diagrams, and internal documentation. Grey box sits in between, usually with user-level credentials. Black box is realistic but slower; white box is faster and more thorough; grey box is the pragmatic default for most UAE engagements because it matches the insider-threat reality most boards actually worry about.
Yes - our methodology, scoping language, testing phases, reporting structure and retest process are all aligned to CREST penetration testing UAE expectations. Accreditations are personal and renewable, so we publish each lead operator's current certification status inside every statement of work. If CREST accreditation is a hard contractual requirement, tell us at scoping and we will confirm the active roster in writing before signature.
Our engagements map to the NESA Information Assurance Standards - scope definition, control testing, risk rating, remediation tracking and retest evidence. Reports are formatted for the NESA audit cycle so your compliance team is not rewriting findings the week before submission. We cover both federal and critical-sector entities, and regularly deliver combined NESA plus ISO 27001 engagements to reduce duplicate testing.
Yes. PCI DSS penetration testing UAE requires external and internal testing at least annually and after significant change - plus segmentation testing to prove your cardholder data environment is actually isolated. Our scoping follows the PCI DSS testing guidance directly, findings reference the relevant PCI requirements, and the evidence pack is formatted to drop into your ROC or SAQ without rework.
Yes - ISO 27001 penetration testing is delivered as part of your wider ISMS. Findings are mapped to Annex A controls, fed into your risk treatment plan, and surfaced during management review so the certification body sees a live, evidence-backed programme rather than a document exercise. We can also bundle pen testing with the security audit and control gap analysis if you are preparing for first-time certification or a recertification cycle.
Yes. Penetration testing Dubai is our most common engagement by volume, but Abu Dhabi government, semi-government and energy clients are a significant part of our roster. We also deliver remote testing across the northern emirates and into Saudi Arabia (including SAMA penetration testing Saudi Arabia engagements). On-site scoping is available across the UAE - whichever emirate your data centre, SOC or head office sits in.
When was your last penetration test?
If the answer is 'over twelve months ago' or 'never,' you're overdue. Our team will scope your environment and return a detailed quote within 24 hours - no discovery call required.