CASE STUDY · CROSS-BORDER PAYMENTS AND CUSTODY

Five live attack scenarios, no successful breaches

A custody security simulation against a cross-border payments and crypto custody operation: phishing and dusting attacks aimed at the operations and custody teams.

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/ Engagement

The scope, in short

ENGAGEMENT TYPE
Custody security simulation: phishing attack and crypto dusting attack
SCOPE
5 attack scenarios covering phishing campaigns and dusting attacks across the operations and custody teams
INDUSTRY
B2B cross-border payments and crypto custody
/ Findings overview

All five scenarios blocked

5
ATTACK SCENARIOS SIMULATED
5 / 5
BLOCKED BY EXISTING CONTROLS
/ Key risk areas identified

What the simulation covered

01

Social engineering and phishing attacks designed to harvest credentials from the custody operations team.

02

Crypto dusting attacks intended to de-anonymize wallet addresses and trace transaction origins.

03

Credential harvesting via simulated spear-phishing targeting key personnel.

04

Internal communication interception scenarios testing information security hygiene.

05

Crypto wallet attack vectors simulating real-world advanced threat actor conditions.

/ Outcome

All five simulated attack scenarios were blocked by the client’s existing security controls. No credentials were harvested and no wallet addresses were successfully de-anonymized.

/ Relevant for

If this looks like your environment, it probably behaves like it too

Payment companies launching custody or high-value financial products.

Regulated fintech needing to demonstrate security posture to regulators.

Organizations wanting to validate employee resilience against live attack conditions.

/ FAQ

Questions engagements like this raise

What is a custody security simulation?

A live-fire exercise where testers run real phishing and crypto dusting attacks against a custody team, using the same techniques an advanced threat actor would, to see whether people and controls hold under pressure rather than just in theory.

What is crypto dusting?

Sending tiny, traceable amounts of cryptocurrency to a wallet to link it to other addresses and de-anonymize the entity behind it. It is a reconnaissance technique used against custody and treasury operations before a larger attack.

Why test the team?

Custody breaches usually start with a person rather than a firewall. A phishing simulation measures whether procedures, training, and vigilance actually hold when someone tries to bypass them.

Does a clean result mean no further testing is needed?

No. Attacker techniques evolve, and staff and processes change. Teams handling custody at this level typically repeat simulations on a regular cadence rather than treating one clean result as permanent.

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