Veteran-owned elite cybersecurity team expands A-LIGN’s ability to help organizations move beyond compliance and stay ahead of real-world attackers

TAMPA, Fla. – (Sept 1, 2026) – A-LIGN, the leading cybersecurity compliance company, today announced its acquisition of Pathfynder, a specialized offensive and defensive cybersecurity firm. The acquisition expands A-LIGN’s service offerings for enterprises looking to strengthen their security posture and reduce the risk of cyberattacks.

The acquisition comes as enterprises face an increasingly costly, fast-moving, and AI-accelerated threat landscape. As attackers grow more sophisticated and persistent, compliance alone is no longer enough. Countering AI-enabled attacks takes both skilled people and advanced technology working together, and organizations need to know if their defenses can hold up against real adversaries.

Pathfynder, a veteran-owned company, employs a team of elite specialists with decades of cybersecurity, military, and intelligence community experience. They provide technical offensive and defensive cybersecurity services including network, cloud, and web application penetration testing, red team and adversary emulation, testing of complex and emerging capabilities, and forensics and incident response.

“Since our inception, A-LIGN has believed in the power of combined compliance and technical cybersecurity services under one roof,” said Scott Price, CEO of A-LIGN. “The acquisition of Pathfynder enables A-LIGN to offer customers advanced offensive security services delivered by a team that operates independently from our assurance and assessment practice while leveraging institutional knowledge of the customer to enhance the cybersecurity services.”

Pathfynder will remain a highly experienced and specialized team under the A-LIGN parent brand, maintaining its brand as Pathfynder by A-LIGN. This structure preserves the independence between A-LIGN’s assurance and assessment teams and Pathfynder’s penetration testers to protect the integrity of both functions.

For A-LIGN’s more than 6,400 existing customers, it also means access to advanced, real-world security testing from a trusted partner, without the friction of managing another vendor relationship.

“We are excited to join the A-LIGN team and bring our trusted expertise and proven capabilities to their existing suite of services,” said DJ Fuller, founder of Pathfynder. “We share the same core values and mission: helping companies close security gaps and meet regulatory requirements, so they can reduce the risk of financial and reputational damage from a cyberattack.”

To learn more, visit a-lign.com or pathfynder.io.

About A-LIGN
A-LIGN is the leading cybersecurity compliance partner, trusted by over 6,400 organizations worldwide to navigate the complexities of compliance, audit, and risk. With a tech-enabled delivery model and deep domain expertise, A-LIGN has completed more than 36,000 audits. It is the #1 issuer of SOC 2 reports and a top three FedRAMP assessor. Founded in 2009, A-LIGN delivers high-quality, efficient audits across frameworks including SOC 2, ISO 27001, FedRAMP, CMMC, ISO 42001, PCI, and HITRUST. To learn more, visit: https://www.a-lign.com.