Top Penetration Testing Companies in Costa Rica (2026)

The top penetration testing companies in Costa Rica reflect a market that learned the cost of weak security the hard way. In 2022, Costa Rica became the first country in the world to declare a national state of emergency over a ransomware attack, and cybersecurity has been a national priority ever since. The specialist market here is smaller than in larger tech hubs, so the strongest options are a mix of homegrown firms, regional Latin American providers, and international teams that actively serve the country. This guide profiles them, explains what each does best, and shows how to choose.

Updated: August 2026. Company details are drawn from each vendor's own site and public profiles; several providers listed serve Costa Rica from elsewhere in the region, which we note explicitly. Verify current scope and certifications before you sign.

Why cybersecurity is a national priority in Costa Rica

Costa Rica is one of Latin America's most attractive nearshore technology hubs, home to multinational shared-service centers, a growing fintech scene, and an English-proficient engineering workforce. That same profile makes it a target, and 2022 proved it.

Beginning on 17 April 2022, the Conti ransomware group breached the Finance Ministry and spread across roughly 27 government institutions, crippling tax collection and customs. Conti demanded 10 million dollars, then doubled it to 20 million; the government refused to pay. On 8 May 2022, President Rodrigo Chaves declared a national state of emergency, the first ever declared by a country in response to a cyberattack. Weeks later, a separate Hive ransomware attack hit the Costa Rican Social Security Fund (CCSS), forcing hospitals back to paper records. The incident is now a reference case in international cyber-law analysis.

The lasting effect for buyers is demand. Costa Rican organizations, especially in government, banking, healthcare, and the multinationals based there, now treat penetration testing and continuous security validation as essential rather than optional. For the many nearshore firms serving United States and European customers, a clean third-party penetration test has also become a commercial requirement: enterprise clients increasingly ask for one before they sign, so testing doubles as a sales enabler, not just a defensive measure. Two practical notes shape the list below. First, the country has relatively few pure-play, locally headquartered pentest boutiques, so the market is served heavily by regional and international firms. Second, wherever a provider is based, what matters is manual, human-led penetration testing services delivered by certified testers, not a rebranded automated scan.

How we evaluated these companies

We prioritized providers with a demonstrable penetration testing practice, verifiable certifications, and a genuine connection to the Costa Rican market, whether through a local office or active service delivery. The criteria that matter most:

• Insist on human-led, manual testing. Automated scanners find known issues; skilled testers find business-logic flaws, chained exploits, and privilege escalation that scanners miss.
• Check certifications at the individual level. OSCP, OSEP, and CREST signal offensive skill; ISO 27001 and SOC 2 signal the provider handles your data responsibly.
• Confirm the deliverable. A strong penetration testing report ranks findings by real business risk, includes reproduction steps and evidence, and comes with a retest to verify fixes.
• Match specialty to your stack. Web and API, mobile, cloud, network, and social engineering are distinct disciplines. Buy the one you need.
• Verify local context. For Costa Rica, confirm Spanish and English reporting, familiarity with local regulation, and data-handling terms that fit your compliance obligations.

The comparison table orients your shortlist; the profiles add the detail, and each says plainly whether the firm is local, regional, or international.

Top penetration testing companies in Costa Rica at a glance

The top penetration testing companies in Costa Rica

1. DeepStrike

DeepStrike is our editor's recommendation, and we are transparent about what it is: an international penetration-testing-as-a-service provider that serves Costa Rican and wider Latin American companies remotely, rather than a firm headquartered in San José. We list it first because the delivery model suits how many organizations now want to buy testing.

The core of the offering is human-led, manual testing delivered through a PTaaS platform, so findings surface in real time on a dashboard instead of arriving weeks later in a static PDF. Coverage spans web application and API testing, external and internal network, cloud, mobile, and newer LLM and AI application testing.

Best for: Organizations that want continuous or scheduled testing with a modern reporting workflow, and Costa Rican companies that specifically want an independent, outside partner.

Why it makes our list: Human-led testing with real-time findings, an included retest, and mapping to the frameworks buyers report against, including SOC 2, ISO 27001, PCI DSS, HIPAA, and GDPR. If you answer to SOC 2, our SOC 2 penetration testing guide explains what auditors expect.

2. BorneoCR

BorneoCR is one of the clearest examples of a genuinely Costa Rica-based provider on this list. It delivers a 24/7 AI-assisted security operations center as a service, aimed at small and mid-sized businesses across Central America, and pairs that monitoring with penetration testing, ISO 27001 readiness, virtual CISO services, and brand protection. Published plans start around 199 dollars a month, which puts continuous coverage within reach of smaller organizations.

Best for: Costa Rican SMEs that want ongoing monitoring and testing from a local provider without building an in-house security team.

Why it makes our list: It combines a round-the-clock SOC with penetration testing and ISO 27001 support under one local roof, so smaller companies get detection and validation together rather than as separate purchases.

3. Delta Protect

Delta Protect is a Mexico-founded cybersecurity company (established in 2019) that serves Costa Rica as part of a wider Latin American footprint spanning Panama, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and beyond. Its work centers on ethical hacking and its Apolo platform, which bundles cybersecurity, human-risk management, and ISO 27001 compliance into one subscription. The company reports serving more than 150 clients, largely SMBs and growth-stage businesses.

Best for: Compliance-driven SMBs that want penetration testing packaged with ongoing posture management and certification support in Spanish and English.

Why it makes our list: The Apolo platform ties testing to compliance frameworks such as ISO 27001, SOC 2, and PCI DSS, which suits companies whose main driver is passing an audit or reassuring enterprise customers.

4. Fluid Attacks

Fluid Attacks is one of Latin America's most established application-security specialists, founded in Colombia in 2001. Its model is continuous hacking: combining automated tooling with expert manual penetration testing across the software development lifecycle, rather than a single point-in-time engagement. The firm serves clients across the region and internationally, with a strong focus on secure development.

Best for: Software companies and teams shipping code frequently that want continuous application security woven into development, not an annual test.

Why it makes our list: Two decades of appsec specialization and a continuous, developer-integrated model make Fluid Attacks a serious choice for organizations whose primary risk lives in their own applications.

5. GBM

GBM is a major regional IT and technology integrator with deep roots across Central America and the Caribbean and a long-standing alliance heritage with IBM. Its cybersecurity practice includes penetration testing across black, grey, and white-box approaches, network-infrastructure and wireless testing, and a Cybersecurity Center that delivers SOC-style monitoring and incident response.

Best for: Enterprises and government bodies that want penetration testing delivered inside a larger, well-resourced technology and managed-services relationship.

Why it makes our list: Scale and a full managed-security stack. For large Costa Rican organizations that already work with a regional integrator, GBM folds offensive testing into monitoring and response under one vendor.

6. Soluciones Seguras

Soluciones Seguras is a Panama-headquartered cybersecurity specialist that operates directly in Costa Rica alongside Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. It focuses on network and perimeter security, threat management, and managed security services, and is well known in the region as a Fortinet-aligned partner with its own engineering and awareness content.

Best for: Organizations prioritizing network, firewall, and perimeter security who want a regional MSSP with an established Central American footprint.

Why it makes our list: A dedicated regional presence and strong network-security engineering make it a practical option for infrastructure-heavy environments, particularly those standardized on Fortinet.

7. Cyber Threat Defense (CT Defense)

Cyber Threat Defense is an international penetration-testing firm, incorporated in 2017 by senior testers, that maintains a dedicated Costa Rica service line, including a mobile-application security testing lab and a white-label partner program for local resellers. Its work concentrates on web, mobile, and infrastructure penetration testing delivered by certified consultants.

Best for: Companies needing focused, certified application and mobile penetration testing, and local agencies wanting a white-label testing partner.

Why it makes our list: A testing-first focus with a purpose-built mobile-app lab and OSCP/CISSP-level consultants gives it depth on application and mobile assessments specifically.

8. Trojan Horse Security

Trojan Horse Security is a United States-based information-security firm that runs a dedicated Costa Rica service line covering network, web-application, physical, and social-engineering penetration testing, plus security audits, digital forensics, and cyber-intelligence work. Its consultants hold recognized credentials including the CISSP.

Best for: Organizations that want the full breadth of an offensive assessment, including physical intrusion and social-engineering testing, from an established international firm.

Why it makes our list: Few providers serving Costa Rica advertise physical and social-engineering testing as clearly. For a business worried about people and premises, not just code, that breadth is the differentiator.

9. Winged IT

Winged IT is a Costa Rica-based cybersecurity provider offering incident response, security architecture, and penetration testing, and it appears among the better-reviewed local firms in regional directories. Its blend of testing and response suits organizations that want help both finding weaknesses and standing up the defenses around them.

Best for: Local companies that want penetration testing alongside hands-on help with incident response and security architecture.

Why it makes our list: Pairing offensive testing with response and architecture work makes it a useful partner for a Costa Rican business maturing its security program rather than buying a one-off test. Confirm the depth of manual testing and the team's certifications before you commit.

How to choose the right penetration testing partner

Use the shortlist as a starting point, then narrow it with a structured comparison rather than a gut call.

1. Define the scope and the asset first. A web app, a mobile app, a cloud environment, an internal network, and a social-engineering test each need different expertise. Pick providers who specialize in your specific asset.
2. Ask for a sample report. The report is the product. Confirm it ranks findings by real-world risk, includes reproduction steps and evidence, and gives remediation guidance a developer can act on.
3. Verify certifications, then verify the individuals. A firm-level ISO 27001 is good; ask how many testers on your engagement hold OSCP or OSEP, because names on the badge should also be names on the report.
4. Confirm a retest is included. Fixing a finding you cannot verify is not fixing it. A retest that validates remediation should be part of the engagement, not an upsell.
5. Clarify language, data handling, and jurisdiction. Confirm you get reporting in the language your team and auditors need, that data-handling terms fit your obligations, and where your findings are stored.
6. Decide point-in-time versus continuous. A single annual test is a snapshot; if you ship code frequently, a continuous or PTaaS model catches issues between releases. The numbers on how often organizations test are worth reviewing in our penetration testing statistics roundup.

If you are still mapping the basics, our primer on vulnerability assessment and penetration testing (VAPT) explains how scanning and manual testing fit together, and our guide to the penetration testing methodology breaks down each engagement type.
Our roundup of the top penetration testing companies in Mexico shows how the same evaluation logic applies elsewhere in Latin America.

Red flags to watch for

The failure modes are the same whether a provider sits in San José or serves you from abroad, and spotting them early saves you from paying for a report that changes nothing. Watch for these:

• A "penetration test" that is really just a scan. If the proposal has no manual testing, no named testers, and a turnaround measured in hours, you are buying an automated vulnerability scan with a nicer cover page. Ask how much of the work is done by hand.
• No sample report or references. A firm confident in its work will show you a redacted report and connect you with past clients. Reluctance here is a signal.
• Certifications on the website but not on the engagement. A logo wall means little if none of the testers assigned to you hold the credentials. Ask who, specifically, will do the work.
• A retest treated as a paid extra. If validating your fixes costs more, the engagement ends before you know whether anything is actually resolved.
• Vague scope and a flat price. Good providers scope carefully, because scope drives both cost and coverage. A single number with no breakdown usually hides assumptions you discover later.
• No clear answer on data handling or language. Your test data and findings are sensitive, and your auditors may need Spanish or English reporting. A provider that cannot explain where data lives and in what language it reports has not thought about your context.

None of these are unique to Costa Rican providers; they are the universal tells of a weak engagement. Use them as a checklist against every shortlisted vendor, local or international.

The bottom line

Costa Rica's cybersecurity market matured under pressure, and the 2022 emergency turned penetration testing from a nice-to-have into a boardroom priority. Because the pool of locally headquartered specialists is still small, the right choice often blends local knowledge with regional or international depth: a homegrown firm like BorneoCR or Winged IT, a regional leader like Delta Protect, Fluid Attacks, GBM, or Soluciones Seguras, or an international PTaaS partner delivering remotely. Shortlist two or three from the profiles above, ask each for a sample report and a scoped proposal, and choose on the evidence rather than the marketing.

Frequently asked questions

Which is the best penetration testing company in Costa Rica?

There is no single best; the right firm depends on what you are testing and where you are based. For a local SME wanting SOC plus testing, BorneoCR is a strong fit. For compliance-driven SMBs, Delta Protect packages testing with certification support. For continuous application security, Fluid Attacks specializes. For enterprise and government, GBM has the scale. For continuous, remotely delivered PTaaS, DeepStrike is our recommendation.

Are there many locally based penetration testing firms in Costa Rica?

Fewer than in larger tech hubs. Costa Rica has a handful of genuinely local providers, such as BorneoCR and Winged IT, and the market is served heavily by regional Latin American firms and international providers with a dedicated Costa Rica presence. What matters more than a San José address is manual testing by certified people and a report you can act on.

What certifications should a Costa Rican pentest provider have?

Look for hands-on offensive certifications on the individual testers, such as OSCP and OSEP, and firm-level standards such as ISO 27001 and SOC 2. For regulated work, confirm familiarity with the frameworks you report against. Pair certifications with a sample report and references.

How much does penetration testing cost in Costa Rica?

Cost depends on scope, asset complexity, and the depth of manual testing, not the country. Local subscription SOC-and-testing bundles can start in the low hundreds of dollars a month for SMEs, while a scoped application or network penetration test is priced per engagement. Get fixed quotes from two or three providers and compare what is included, especially the retest.

Should I hire a local Costa Rican firm or an international provider?

Both are valid. A local firm offers close collaboration, Spanish-language reporting, and regional context; an international PTaaS provider offers independent, remotely delivered testing with a modern reporting workflow and continuous options. Decide based on your asset, your compliance needs, and how you prefer to work, then compare shortlisted providers on the same criteria.