Custom Exploit Development + Active Directory Attack Lab · Hacking Project

Construct a reproducible vulnerable Active Directory attack range and custom tooling that demonstrates the complete foothold-to-domain-dominance kill chain together with its defen…

**The problem**
Active Directory remains the backbone of enterprise identity and the single most targeted environment in real intrusions, yet most defenders and testers lack a safe, realistic lab to study the full attack chain from foothold to domain dominance. Understanding techniques like Kerberoasting, AS-REP roasting, delegation abuse, and DCSync in the abstract does not build the muscle memory needed to attack or defend them. Teams need a purpose-built, misconfigured AD range paired with custom tooling to practice end-to-end offensive and detective tradecraft.

**What you'll build**
Build an automatable, intentionally vulnerable Active Directory lab (multi-host domain with realistic misconfigurations) alongside custom exploit and post-exploitation scripts that chain initial access, credential theft, lateral movement, privilege escalation, and domain-level persistence. Pair each attack path with the corresponding detection artifacts, event IDs, and hardening steps so the lab doubles as a purple-team and detection-engineering platform.

**Objective** — Construct a reproducible vulnerable Active Directory attack range and custom tooling that demonstrates the complete foothold-to-domain-dominance kill chain together with its defensive countermeasures.

**Expected outcome** — An IaC-provisioned AD lab plus a documented exploit/post-exploitation toolkit and an attack-to-detection matrix mapping each technique to MITRE ATT&CK IDs, Windows event telemetry, and hardening guidance.

**Difficulty** — Expert — requires Windows/AD internals, Kerberos, custom offensive tooling, and detection engineering across a multi-host environment.

**Primary category** — Penetration Testing / Active Directory Security; Secondary = Detection Engineering, Threat Hunting, Identity & Access Management, DFIR

**Security domains** — Primary = Red Team; Secondary = Purple Team, Blue Team (detection engineering), Incident Response, Security Research, DevSecOps (lab IaC)

**Technical focus** — Active Directory attack paths, Kerberos abuse (Kerberoasting, AS-REP roasting), delegation abuse, DCSync, Pass-the-Hash/Pass-the-Ticket, lateral movement, privilege escalation, domain persistence, BloodHound attack-path analysis, Windows event logging, detection engineering, lab automation/IaC

**Core technologies** — Languages: Python, PowerShell, C#, Ruby; Frameworks/Libraries: Impacket, PowerSploit/PowerView, .NET; Security Tools: BloodHound/SharpHound, Rubeus, Mimikatz (lab-only), CrackMapExec/NetExec, Metasploit, Sysmon, Splunk/ELK; Cloud/Infra: Terraform, Ansible/Vagrant, Hyper-V/ESXi/cloud VMs, Windows Server, Active Directory; AI/Data: attack-path graph analytics, ML anomaly detection on auth logs; Databases: Neo4j (BloodHound), SQL, Elasticsearch

**Where it's valued** — Enterprises of all sizes, financial services, government/defense, healthcare, MSSPs, red-team and IR consultancies, security-training providers

**Careers it builds toward** — Red Team Operator, Active Directory / Identity Security Specialist, Penetration Tester, Detection Engineer, Incident Responder, Purple Team Lead, Security Researcher

**Framework alignment**
• MITRE ATT&CK: Credential Access — Steal or Forge Kerberos Tickets: Kerberoasting (T1558.003), AS-REP Roasting (T1558.004), OS Credential Dumping: DCSync (T1003.006) & LSASS (T1003.001); Lateral Movement — Pass-the-Hash/Ticket (T1550.002/.003), Remote Services (T1021); Privilege Escalation — Domain Policy Modification (T1484), Valid Accounts (T1078); Persistence — Golden/Silver Ticket via T1558; Discovery — Domain Trust/Account Discovery (T1482, T1087.002)
• NIST CSF 2.0: Protect (Identity Management, Authentication), Detect (Adverse Event Analysis), Identify (control validation), Respond (IR playbook development)
• OWASP: N/A (identity/infrastructure focus); tangential to authentication weaknesses
• CIS Controls v8: 5 (Account Management), 6 (Access Control Management), 8 (Audit Log Management), 4 (Secure Configuration), 18 (Penetration Testing); MITRE D3FEND for detection mapping

**Innovation** — Improved Existing Solution — vulnerable AD labs (GOAD, DetectionLab) exist, but a fully IaC-automated range with custom tooling and a native attack-to-detection matrix is a high-value, differentiated training/portfolio product. Scores: Innovation 6/10, Startup 5/10, Enterprise-Readiness 6/10, Patent = No.