The Most Important Regulations for Businesses: Offensive and Defensive Security Requirements
Posted on June 16, 2025
In the digital age, protecting your business isn’t just good practice—it’s the law. Governments and industry bodies worldwide have set clear requirements for how companies must defend themselves and test those defenses. Understanding both sides—offensive and defensive security—is crucial for compliance and resilience.
Here’s your guide to the most relevant regulations, what they require, and why you can’t focus on just one side of the security equation.
Major Security Regulations
1. GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) – EU
Focuses on data privacy and protection for individuals within the EU and European Economic Area (EEA). It sets stringent rules for how personal data is collected, processed, and stored.
Defensive: Emphasizes robust data protection by design and by default. This includes implementing strong technical and organizational measures such as data encryption, stringent access controls, comprehensive incident response plans, and ensuring data processing activities are lawful and transparent.
Offensive: Stresses the importance of ongoing security validation. It mandates the regular testing, assessment, and evaluation of security measures. This often translates to conducting periodic penetration tests and thorough vulnerability assessments to proactively identify and address weaknesses.
2. PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) – Global
A global security standard for organizations that handle branded credit cards from major card schemes. It aims to reduce credit card fraud by increasing controls around cardholder data.
Defensive: Focuses on building and maintaining a secure network for cardholder data. This involves strict controls like network segmentation to isolate sensitive data, robust firewalls, consistent use of anti-malware solutions, and strong encryption for data at rest and in transit.
Offensive: Requires rigorous and continuous testing of security controls. Specifically, it mandates annual penetration testing and at least quarterly vulnerability scans on all systems and networks within the scope of cardholder data environment.
3. HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) – US
A U.S. federal law designed to provide privacy standards to protect patients' medical records and other health information provided to health plans, doctors, hospitals and other healthcare providers.
Defensive: Mandates comprehensive safeguards to protect electronic Protected Health Information (ePHI). This includes implementing physical security measures for facilities, technical controls for systems (like access controls and audit logs), and administrative policies and procedures.
Offensive: Requires organizations to conduct regular and thorough risk analyses to identify potential threats and vulnerabilities to ePHI. Periodic security testing, including vulnerability assessments, is crucial for effectively performing these risk analyses and uncovering new weaknesses.
4. NIS2 Directive – EU
An EU-wide legislation on cybersecurity. It provides legal measures to boost the overall level of cybersecurity in the EU by ensuring Member States are well equipped and prepared.
Defensive: Aims to achieve a high common level of cybersecurity across the EU for essential and important entities. It demands robust cybersecurity risk management practices, including supply chain security, incident detection capabilities, and well-defined response and recovery plans.
Offensive: Calls for entities to regularly assess the effectiveness of their cybersecurity measures. This includes conducting security audits, penetration testing, and potentially more advanced attack simulations to ensure resilience against evolving threats.
5. ISO/IEC 27001 & 27002 – Global
International standards for information security management. ISO/IEC 27001 specifies the requirements for establishing, implementing, maintaining and continually improving an information security management system (ISMS), while ISO/IEC 27002 provides guidelines for organizational information security standards and information security management practices.
Defensive: Provides a framework for establishing, implementing, maintaining, and continually improving an Information Security Management System (ISMS). It covers a wide range of controls related to risk assessment, security policies, asset management, access control, and more.
Offensive: Recommends ongoing security verification activities as part of the ISMS continual improvement process. This includes scheduled technical vulnerability scans and security testing to ensure controls are effective and to identify areas for enhancement.
6. SOC 2 (System and Organization Controls 2) – US/Global
A reporting framework developed by the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) for service organizations to report on non-financial internal controls relevant to security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, or privacy of a system.
Defensive: Pertains to service organizations and reports on controls relevant to security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, or privacy (Trust Services Criteria). It mandates strict operational controls, including monitoring, logging, change management, and incident response protocols.
Offensive: Requires service organizations to provide evidence of ongoing risk assessment and the effectiveness of their controls. This often involves demonstrating regular security testing, such as penetration tests and vulnerability scans, as part of their audit evidence.
7. Cyber Essentials & Cyber Essentials Plus – UK
A UK government-backed scheme that helps organizations guard against the most common cyber threats and demonstrate their commitment to cybersecurity.
Defensive: Provides a foundational level of cybersecurity for UK organizations. It sets a baseline for essential security controls, including secure configuration of firewalls and routers, robust patch management, strong access control mechanisms, and effective malware protection.
Offensive: The 'Plus' certification elevates the assurance by adding a hands-on technical audit. This includes an external vulnerability scan and an internal assessment performed by a qualified third party to verify that the controls are correctly implemented and effective.
8. FISMA (Federal Information Security Management Act) – US
United States legislation that defines a comprehensive framework to protect government information, operations, and assets against natural or man-made threats.
Defensive: Requires U.S. federal agencies to develop, document, and implement comprehensive agency-wide information security programs to protect their information and information systems. This includes risk management, security controls implementation, and continuous monitoring.
Offensive: Demands that federal agencies to conduct periodic assessments of their security controls to determine their effectiveness. This typically includes independent security assessments, vulnerability scanning, and penetration tests.
9. NERC CIP (Critical Infrastructure Protection) – North America
A set of requirements designed to secure the assets required for operating North America's bulk power system.
Defensive: Focuses on the security of the North American bulk power system. It requires utility companies to identify and safeguard their critical cyber assets through layered security controls, personnel training, and robust incident response and recovery plans.
Offensive: Mandates regular security assessments to ensure the effectiveness of protective measures. This includes periodic vulnerability assessments and penetration testing of critical cyber assets and their associated networks.
10. CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act) / CPRA (California Privacy Rights Act) – US
A state statute intended to enhance privacy rights and consumer protection for residents of California, United States. The CPRA amended and expanded the CCPA.
Defensive: Grants California consumers various privacy rights and requires businesses handling their personal information to implement and maintain 'reasonable security procedures and practices' appropriate to the nature of the information. This is somewhat principles-based, encouraging proactive data protection.
Offensive: While not explicitly mandating specific tests, regular security testing, such as vulnerability assessments, is highly recommended to demonstrate that 'reasonable security' measures are in place, to identify weaknesses, and to show ongoing due diligence for compliance.
11. ENS (Esquema Nacional de Seguridad) – Spain
Establishes the security policy in the use of electronic means in Spain, and consists of basic principles and minimum requirements that guarantee adequate protection of information for public sector entities and their technology providers.
Defensive: Establishes a framework of minimum security requirements for public sector organizations in Spain, and their technology providers. It covers areas like access controls, risk management, security policies, incident response plans, and data protection measures.
Offensive: Stipulates the need for regular security audits and penetration testing to verify compliance with its security measures and to proactively detect and address vulnerabilities within the information systems and services.
Why Both Sides Matter
Defensive security is your digital armor—firewalls, monitoring, policies, and staff awareness. Offensive security is your ‘red team’ testing those defenses with the same creativity and persistence as real attackers.
Modern regulations recognize this dual need. Just having technical controls isn’t enough—you must prove they work by challenging them regularly. Auditors and regulators increasingly want to see evidence of both.
Best Practices for Compliance
- Establish a Strong Defensive Baseline: Implement technical controls (firewalls, encryption, patching), train staff, and set clear policies.
- Schedule Regular Offensive Security Testing: Use a mix of vulnerability scanning, penetration testing, and red teaming to uncover gaps.
- Document Everything: Maintain clear records of tests, remediations, and improvements for auditors.
- Stay Informed: Regulations evolve—review requirements annually and adjust your security program.
- Work with Security People: Partner with qualified providers for both offensive and defensive security to maximize your compliance and peace of mind.