Tabletop Exercise

In telecommunications, a Tabletop Exercise is a discussion-based simulation in which security, network, roaming, legal, and communications teams walk through a realistic incident scenario such as a large-scale SS7 location tracking campaign or a SEPP compromise. The goal is to validate runbooks, escalation paths, and decision authority without touching production systems.

Categories: SignalingRoaming and InterconnectIdentity and Subscriber

Tabletop Exercise in context

Signaling protocols carry the control-plane instructions that set up calls, register subscribers, hand over sessions and route SMS. SS7, Diameter, GTP-C and SIP are the four dominant families, and interconnect exposure of any of them is treated by GSMA FS.11 / FS.19 / FS.20 as a top-tier telecom risk.

Roaming and interconnect are where two operators, often with an IPX or GRX carrier in between, exchange signaling and user-plane traffic. Trust boundaries here are the primary attack surface for location tracking, SMS interception and fraud, which is why GSMA now mandates SEPP with PRINS on 5G interconnect.

To place Tabletop Exercise in the wider telecom-security picture, review Roaming, GRE, Roaming Security Assessment, SMS Home Routing, TCAP Abuse and X.509.

Related terms

Related topic hubs

  • Roaming Security IPX/GRX interconnect risk, home-routed vs local-breakout, SEPP.
  • Signaling Firewall Unified SS7/Diameter/GTP/SMS signaling firewall framework.
  • SS7 Security SS7/MAP/CAP/SCCP attacks and defenses across 2G/3G interconnect.
  • SS7 Firewall GSMA FS.11 category 1/2/3 SS7 message screening at the STP edge.

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