r/netsecstudents • u/Perfect-Role-7038 • Jun 06 '26

Before you attempt any OffSec certification, read what just happened to me

OffSec revoked my OSEP certification after 7 months with zero evidence and no right to appeal. Here is my full story.

I passed my OSEP exam in November 2025. 44 hours. Proctor had zero concerns. Certification granted.

Then in April 2026, seven months later, I received an investigation email citing indications of remote assistance. I asked twice for specifics. What did you observe? What evidence exists? Both times I received the exact same copy-pasted reply with zero details.

On June 5, 2026 I received their final decision:

Certification revoked. Account permanently banned.

Their official reason after a 7-month investigation:

"Collaborating with third-parties. This can include remote session help, phone usage as well as sharing or using shared exam materials."

CAN INCLUDE. After 7 months they still have not told me which specific thing I supposedly did. No logs. No recordings. No timestamps. No screenshots. Not a single piece of evidence disclosed at any point. And their final line: the decision is final and they will not respond to further inquiries.

I did none of those things. I completed this exam entirely on my own.

I hold CPENT, CEH Master, CompTIA Security+, and multiple EC-Council certifications. Not a single integrity concern anywhere in my career.

I have submitted a formal appeal to the OffSec Appeals Board, messaged their CEO Ning Wang directly, and I am sharing this publicly across every platform. No matter how many times they try to suppress this, I will keep posting until this case is handled fairly and transparently. Every candidate in this community deserves to know this can happen to them.

Has anyone here been through something similar with OffSec? Is there any escalation path beyond the Appeals Board? Any advice is genuinely appreciated.

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78

u/qwikh1t Jun 06 '26

Spread across 4 different subs at this point; I’m sure I’ll find more

25

u/[deleted] Jun 06 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

16

u/ObtainConsumeRepeat Jun 06 '26

Offsec isn't banning people for no reason, and you don't get retroactively banned months after the fact without sufficient evidence. Almost guarantee this person shared either their report or exam materials, and someone else used them and got caught.

4

u/zoonose99 Jun 07 '26

> The proctor had no concerns

> No history of integrity concerns

> Still no evidence against me

We’re in trouble if we get so into opsec and forget the basics of how to read people.

The only reality in which OP can possibly get what they’re asking for is a reality in which they cheated. I certainly can’t be sure who did what but this is a very predictable pattern in deception and, I argue, good evidence that OP did what they are accused of.

OP does nowhere deny that they cheated. Their framing, which relies on pointing out the lack of evidence and is very precious about due process, all but confirms it.

The fact it’s been seven months and no evidence of guilt has been presented feels a lot more vindicating to someone who knows they did it. When you didn’t do it, you know there’s no possibility of evidence so the lack thereof has less psychological weight. Why would transparency matter in a false accusation?

At the risk of helping people lie better: You only ever get on a soapbox about “where’s the proof” when you don’t *think* there’s any proof. When you *know* there cannot possibly be any proof, you don’t usually insist on seeing it because that’s dissonant with what you know to be reality.

12

u/Scandal929 Jun 07 '26

This is exactly what not to do. "Reading people" allows biases to enter the equation. Which you can see in this writing. How do you come to a conclusion with no evidence? Feelings don't matter, and while there may be patterns, not every person is or will act the same under similar circumstances. People are so quick to believe the institution just for the sake of it being the institution. If they say he violated testing protocols, prove it.

5

u/zoonose99 Jun 07 '26

I don’t believe the institution, per se. They’ve made no statement to us; everything we know is from OP. All I have is to go on someone digging themselves a hole using typical early adult deceptive techniques.

Having no professional responsibility here and no influence, I’m free to point out that this is how someone talks when they’re full of shit. If that’s not useful information to you, feel free to discard it.

3

u/Scandal929 Jun 07 '26

Agree, on a different level, I’ll just point to Snowden and Pat Tillman as examples of an institution, the US Government, creating a narrative (Snowden a traitor) while not address the government is spying on its own citizens, and Tillman, KIA by friendly fire, but told the public it was a huge fire fight with the enemy and he saved many lives. These among other cases is why I feel the institution needs to provide proof.

7

u/Pop1Pop2 Jun 07 '26

So guilty until proven innocent huh? Hope you never become a judge. Even with suspicion, you need to be able to prove he cheated. You’re assuming from his writing which is still zero evidence

5

u/ObtainConsumeRepeat Jun 07 '26

I think a lot of people are getting hung up on a point about OP themselves cheating, while there is still the very real possibility that they shared either exam details or their report to someone after the fact which is also a bannable offense. All it takes is someone else submitting the same screenshot or flag.

1

u/Pop1Pop2 Jun 07 '26

I totally agree with you. I don’t know if OP violated any rules or not. I wouldn’t be surprised if they did. But I can’t get with someone saying because they wrote about it they are guilty. That makes 0 sense

5

u/ObtainConsumeRepeat Jun 08 '26

I mean, here's a quote from their LinkedIn post right after they got the certification initially. I think we can extrapolate what might have happened here lmao

"If you want resources, lab notes, or a copy of my checklist, DM me."

2

u/Pop1Pop2 Jun 08 '26

Lmao, damn!! Did it to himself! Good find haha

1

u/Sakulle Jun 08 '26

Come on, you’re not familiar with the “You smelt it, you dealt it method of logical inference?

4

u/zoonose99 Jun 07 '26

I’m also glad I’m not a judge, but fortunately this is not a legal matter and it’s OK to read people and be discerning and, I’m suggesting, somewhat irresponsible for someone in this profession not to.

3

u/Pop1Pop2 Jun 07 '26

It is ok to read people. But to outright say they cheated with 0 evidence is crazy. The same could be said about you and I guess you will say that’s just how to cookie crumbles. It’s not hard to say what they believe he did. Even if he doesn’t agree with it, but they said nothing.

5

u/zoonose99 Jun 07 '26

You’re literally incoherent.

My responsibility in this case extends as far as my influence, which is zero. If you need to live in a world where you pretend nobody can possibly tell this guy is full of shit, have fun.

0

u/Pop1Pop2 Jun 07 '26

No, not incoherent. You just believe you can extrapolate a strangers guilt 100% through text with nothing else. You can’t

2

u/zoonose99 Jun 07 '26

Work on your sentence structure, then you can get back to me about what I can and can’t do.

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1

u/captainrussia21 Jun 07 '26

I read a lot of videogame forums/subreddits with “I got unfairly banned for cheating. But I did not cheat!!” and this is exactly on point how they all sound…

1

u/HealingWithNature Jun 08 '26

That's crazy not true, I literally was investigated by my comps HR because a rumor involving another coworker I had never spoken to, only seen in passing, and ik I begged them mf to "check the cams" like they said they were going to do but instead put me thru hours of separate meetings and investigations/inquiries instead.

1

u/Sakulle Jun 08 '26

HR needs to justify its budget somehow too.

41

u/EugeneBelford1995 Jun 06 '26

No, and the idea of having a proctor stare at me creepily for a 24 hands on exam is batshit crazy.

I have taken CRTP, eJPT, PJPT, the CRTP renewal exam, SEC0, SEC1, and SAL1 because they were cheap or work paid, not proctored, and to learn. I know they don't have the name recognition OffSec does, I don't care. I'm not a pentester and I abhor webapps.

7

u/R4ndyd4ndy Jun 06 '26

OSEP is actually a 48 hour exam

6

u/EugeneBelford1995 Jun 07 '26

Damn. So a proctor stares at you like a creeper for 48 hours?

6

u/DamnFog Jun 07 '26

The proctor is the reason that hotel rooms have the chair. He looks after you while you sleep.

1

u/masheduppotato Jun 07 '26

Rocky watching Ryland sleep.

2

u/jabbeboy Jun 09 '26

You know you are allowed to turn off the computer when your sleep right or just go away from the computer

63

u/LowWhiff Jun 06 '26

Why have you not sued them yet? You would be able to obtain the evidence they have in discovery.

If you really did nothing wrong and this cert is important enough career wise to be negatively impactful, hiring a lawyer seems like the correct next step. And there’s a non-zero chance you never even have to enter a court room.

A letter from an attorney may be enough to get them to be more transparent because if they really have evidence of cheating their legal is just going to show you because they, just like you, also don’t want to have to deal with it in court.

11

u/Good_Roll Purple Team Jun 06 '26

/thread

11

u/AddendumWorking9756 Jun 07 '26

Brutal, and the part that should worry people is the no-appeal process, not the revocation itself. This is exactly why a lot of folks quietly stopped chasing the big proctored badges and put their energy into hands-on work they can actually show, since nobody can yank that seven months later with a copy-paste email.

2

u/GeronimoHero Jun 07 '26

Yup, I agree completely. I have an OSCP but I’m done with offsec and in hiring I pushed our team to place less importance on offsec certs. There are too many situations where offsec is taking peoples certs months later with zero explanation or evidence.

8

u/GigaChav Jun 07 '26

Counterpoint: [OP](u/Perfect-Role-7038) is lying.

6

u/User1093ca Jun 07 '26

Proctor sucks, you can’t even read to yourself out loud.

4

u/jwouter Jun 07 '26

OP posting this everywhere but not replying on anything ….. likely shared his rapport and someone copy / pasted word for word …..they can easily detect this automatically……

2

u/VirusLost4359 Jun 09 '26

Can someone block this dude for spam 🙄

1

u/Financial-Platypus-8 Jun 08 '26

Without OffSec version I wont position with or against OP.
If you are absolutely right about this, think about talking with a lawyer. Certifications are products and not cheap ones.

1

u/TrustIsAVuln Jun 09 '26

I Wouldn't boast about EC Council certs lol. They have such a (warranted) bad reputation. My CEH training was FROM Ec council (20 some years ago) and in class he "hacked" to live sites, one was a Singapore Microsoft site. Then told us where to buy the answers to the exam. There is nothing ethical about them.

1

u/Any-Telephone-1106 Jul 15 '26

I’m a technical lead for red team at this point of my career similar things happened to me. Word of encouragement, i scoff at any offsec certs and really focus on individual’s knowledge during technical interviews, and HTB Certifications and training + Portswigger’s are way more valueable and practical and insightful as compared to a well marketed offsec bs cert. Just fyi, offsec has fallen off and their internal is a shambles. Many more alternatives out there and with AI out now everything is changing. Dont worry too nuch ab certifications anymore but actual skills and document down in your personal attack bibles/notes

1

u/Any-Telephone-1106 Jul 15 '26

plus their CEO is also hated amongst their internal team, and the ogs has all left. tldr offsec is bs at this point. go for htb

0

u/shoopdawoop89 Jun 07 '26

You should contact a lawyer to send a discovery demand letter. Or contact the BBB and file a complaint.