Cloud Penetration Testing

Cloud penetration testing is a human-led, authorised assessment of the parts of your cloud estate that you control and configure. A tester works within an agreed scope to find and safely exploit weaknesses across identity and access management (IAM), misconfigurations, workloads, cloud-hosted applications, and APIs, then shows how those weaknesses could be chained into a real attack path that a scanner would not surface on its own.

A common misconception is that this tests the cloud provider itself. Under the shared responsibility model, the provider secures the underlying infrastructure and you secure what you deploy on top of it, so testing focuses on your side of that line, not the platform's data centres or hypervisors.

It suits security leads, IT managers, CTOs, and compliance owners who need assurance before or after a migration, ahead of an audit, in response to a customer due-diligence request, or following an incident. Our UK-based team is familiar with UK compliance expectations, which helps when findings need to satisfy internal governance or external reviewers.

Supported environments include:

• AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform (GCP), including AWS IAM privilege abuse, Azure AD / Entra identity paths, and GCP IAM and Cloud Functions
• Multi-cloud and hybrid estates
• Kubernetes and container workloads
• Serverless functions
• Infrastructure as code (IaC)

How to Choose the Right Level of Cloud Testing

Match the engagement to the trigger. An automated scan suits basic hygiene checks, a cloud configuration or posture review suits config assurance across accounts, and a full cloud penetration test suits adversary-simulated depth when you need proof of exploitability.

A customer assurance request or a migration sign-off rarely needs the deepest engagement, whereas a breach response or a high-risk production system usually does. Matching the trigger to the minimum appropriate level avoids paying for depth you do not need, or under-buying when an auditor expects validated findings.

Self-run tools such as Scout Suite and Pacu are useful for internal review, but they report findings rather than validate whether an attacker could reach sensitive data through them, which is the difference a manual test provides.

Point-in-time testing suits stable estates and fixed audit dates, while continuous or PTaaS coverage suits estates that change frequently through regular deployments, where a single annual snapshot would quickly go stale.

For multi-cloud estates, a single coordinated engagement usually finds cross-platform attack paths that per-platform tests miss, though separate scoping can make sense where teams and accounts are fully siloed. Current engagement options and variants are shown in the product listing.

Suitability, Access, and Pre-Engagement Checks

Before commissioning a test, confirm a short list of readiness points. Cloud provider testing rules differ by platform and by test type, and arranging authorisation is a defined pre-engagement step handled with you, not a burden left entirely to your team.

• Provider permissions: AWS, Azure, and GCP each set out what testing is permitted and what requires prior notification; we confirm this against your scope before any activity begins.
• Production safety: testing is scoped to avoid outages, with high-risk actions agreed in advance so live systems are protected.
• Access provisioning: we define the minimum credentials or roles needed, granted securely and time-bound, then revoked on completion.
• Scope factors: the number of accounts and subscriptions, platforms in use, workload count, container and serverless footprint, and IaC coverage all affect complexity.

The clearer these points are at enquiry, the more accurately the engagement can be scoped.

It also helps to know in advance whether testing should run against production, a staging replica, or both, and who on your side can approve access, since these decisions shape the timeline. Current scoping details and options are set out in the product listing.

Process, Deliverables, and What Auditors Receive

The engagement follows a defined sequence so you know what happens at each stage and what you receive at the end.

• Scoping: agree assets, platforms, access, and testing boundaries.
• Authorised testing: manual assessment and controlled exploitation within the agreed scope.
• Reporting: findings written up with risk ratings and evidence.
• Remediation support and retest: guidance on fixes and confirmation that they hold.

Deliverables include:

• A technical findings report with reproducible evidence
• Risk-rated issues prioritised by business impact
• Clear remediation guidance for technical teams
• An audit-suitable summary for management and reviewers

Auditors and reviewers generally accept a penetration test report because it shows validated, exploited findings with evidence and a named methodology, whereas a raw scan output lists potential issues without confirming they are real or reachable.

A scan can flag hundreds of theoretical findings, while a pentest report ranks the few that are genuinely exploitable and explains the business impact, which is the format reviewers can act on. This is why a pentest report supports certification, audit, and customer assurance needs in a way automated output usually does not.

Current prices, availability, and variants are shown in the live product listing.

Frequently Asked Questions