KARAN TANK.

Security field notes / 2026

I break things for a living.
Then I make them harder to break.

Senior Security Engineer with a blue-team foundation and an offensive-security curiosity. I investigate the attack path, then turn it into a stronger defense.

Open field notes → Start a conversation

02 / Built through practice

Credentials that back the craft.

Recognized training, hands-on assessment, and a commitment to keep developing.

OSCP PlusOSCP+GPENGPENeCPPTeCPPTv3GCIHGCIHGSECGSECGFACTGFACTSecurity PlusSecurity+TryHackMeTHM Jr PenTest

01 / The human behind the hostname

Not just another wall of certs and tools.

I got into security through operations: looking at suspicious activity and asking what really happened. That habit changed the way I test systems today.

I’m Karan, a Senior Security Engineer at Thales’ Advanced Security Response Team. I have worked across SOC operations, application defense, threat detection, and offensive testing.

Outside work, I’m happiest when I am building a lab, following a strange attack path, or writing down the one detail that turned a dead end into a useful finding.

04 / Signal map

Four ways I show up on a security problem.

The point is what I can bring to the table.

01

App security

Find the gap between the intended workflow and the route an attacker can actually take.

02

Offensive testing

Turn enumeration into an evidence-backed attack narrative—without treating a scanner as the answer.

03

Detection & response

Ask what the attack would leave behind, then help defenders see it sooner.

04

Automation

Remove repetitive investigation work so people can spend time on judgment.

03 / Field notes

Proof of curiosity, not a dump of everything I have done.

Two entry points for anyone who wants to see the way I think through a technical problem.

Offensive security / reflection

eCPPTv3: the decisions that mattered

A frank writeup about preparation, focus, false starts, and the lessons I carried into future assessments.

 Authorized lab archive / 52 notes

Proving Grounds, made browseable

Labs are grouped by security problem—web, Active Directory, Linux escalation, and infrastructure—so the collection reads like a skill map.

05 / The route here

Blue → purple → red, with a few useful detours.

My experience is a progression from investigating events to modelling how they happen—and designing better controls.

City of Brampton

Information Security Analyst

Microsoft

Datacenter Technician

SecureOps

SOC Analyst → Senior Analyst

Imperva

SOC Engineer

Thales ASRT

Security Engineer → Senior

06 / Operating system

Questions before tools.

This is the habit I bring to lab work and real-world security engineering alike.

“What are we protecting, how could it fail, and what would that failure look like?”

My starting prompts

  • What is the real attack surface?
  • Which route is likely, not merely possible?
  • What evidence would it leave behind?
  • How do we reduce the risk for real?

07 / Now playing

What has my attention right now.

A portfolio should feel alive, not frozen at the date it was published.

Learning

Advanced offensive tradecraft

Hands-on paths, not passive courses.

Building

Repeatable security checks

Automation that creates room for better analysis.

Exploring

Purple-team thinking

Testing that makes detection and prevention more useful.

08 / Credibility kit

The tools behind the work.

Credentials are up front. This is the practical toolkit that supports the work behind them.

Tools by context

Offensive

Find & validate

Kali Burp Suite Nmap Nessus Metasploit OWASP ZAP

Operations

Detect & respond

Splunk CrowdStrike Carbon Black Defender Wireshark

Application edge

Protect & observe

Imperva WAF DDoS Bot Management HTTP debugging

Automation

Build & repeat

Python Bash PowerShell GitHub Docker Postman