The tabletop exercise grows up
Summary
Tabletop exercises (simulated crisis scenarios where teams discuss how they'd respond to incidents) have long been used in cybersecurity to test preparedness, but they have a key limitation: they test knowledge of plans rather than the ability to actually execute them, since scenarios follow a fixed script regardless of what the team decides. AI with agentic capabilities (AI systems that can take independent actions and adapt to changing conditions) now makes it possible to create dynamic tabletop exercises where simulated roles like threat actors or journalists respond in real time to the team's decisions instead of following a predetermined sequence.
Solution / Mitigation
The source text describes using 'AI agentic capabilities' to address the limitation, specifically stating that 'AI allows us to have an adversary that adapts to defensive decisions rather than following a' (the text cuts off here). The source indicates this would enable 'roles that were previously absent (e.g., the threat actor, the journalist, the regulator, the customer)' to 'respond to the team's decisions in real time rather than following a fixed sequence,' but does not provide specific implementation details, version numbers, or a complete explanation of how to deploy this solution.
Classification
Affected Vendors
Original source: https://www.csoonline.com/article/4155146/the-tabletop-exercise-grows-up.html
First tracked: April 8, 2026 at 08:01 AM
Classified by LLM (prompt v3) · confidence: 65%