For the person who has to sign, a pci compliance penetration testing is a list of things to check and a number of days to check them in, and the second is decided by the first long before anyone opens the list. For a merchant or service provider that stores, processes or transmits cardholder data, the checks run over the in-scope systems, the requirements assessed, the quarterly scans and the evidence behind each control; every item is a sample to take, minutes to spend and a chance of a gap that costs hours to close. The compliance officer who works those figures before the audit is scoped budgets the audit and its aftermath together; the one who does not learns the aftermath's cost from the invoice. This page walks what a pci compliance penetration testing covers, how to size its days, its expected gaps and its all-in cost, and where the free sheets on this site do that sizing from the program's own numbers, with no account.
What PCI DSS penetration testing covers
For a merchant or service provider that stores, processes or transmits cardholder data: the in-scope systems, the requirements assessed, the quarterly scans and the evidence behind each control. Each is a control with evidence behind it, and a checklist is the list of controls with a sample size and a minutes-per-sample figure attached whether or not anyone wrote them down. The audit scope sheet on this site takes systems, controls, samples and minutes and returns the samples, the hours, the days and the coverage the days available give, so the checklist has a size before it has a date.
Segmentation testing is a separate requirement from the penetration test
Where a network is segmented to keep systems out of scope, the segmentation itself has to be tested, and it is tested more often than the wider environment for service providers. Programs that buy one annual test and assume it covers both find the gap during an assessment, usually as a flat network somebody added a route to six months earlier. So the scope document should name the segmentation controls and the methods used to confirm them, separately from the application and network testing, and the PCI scope sheet on this site is where the systems either side of the line are listed.
Testing, as a program
Regulatory compliance testing is the scheduled proof that controls operate: a test per control at a frequency, with a failure rate and a remediation cost. The IT control-testing sheet on this site works a year of it, 480 tests and $19,720 on the worked example, and the paid plan keeps every test's result against its control.
What to do with the number
Take it to the budget conversation and to the consultant's proposal. A proposal whose audit days land far from the sheet's is sampling more or less than the program needs, and a budget that covers the assessment and not the remediation is half a budget. The guide this page supports covers the questions for a regulatory compliance consultant. Attestvio Pro keeps every audit with its findings and their remediation against the obligations it tested; the sheets stay free.
Gaps, remediation and the all-in cost
An audit finds gaps at a rate the last audit already measured, and every gap costs remediation hours. The audit sheets on this site for HIPAA, GDPR and PCI, and the IT control-testing sheet for a framework, take the item count, the gap rate, the hours per gap and the hourly cost and return the gaps expected, the remediation hours and the cost with the aftermath in it. For PCI DSS the sheet to start with is the PCI scope sheet. None of them publishes a benchmark rate; each works the program's own.
Questions people ask about pci compliance penetration testing
How long does a pci compliance penetration testing take?
Items times minutes over 60 for the hours, over the hours in an audit day for the days: the audit scope sheet on this site works it from your own systems, controls, samples and minutes with no account, and publishes no benchmark.
What does a pci compliance penetration testing cost all in?
Assessment hours plus the expected gaps times the remediation hours per gap, times the hourly cost. The audit sheets on this site work it from your own gap rate; the worked examples run from $8,800 to $19,720 for the sizes entered.
Does Attestvio run the pci compliance penetration testing?
No. Attestvio sizes it and keeps the findings and their remediation against the obligations; the audit itself is your assessor's or your own team's. The sheets are free either way.