IT systems are migrating to the cloud at an accelerated pace; however, this rapid pace has caused security teams to struggle to keep up. New cloud technologies such as containers and cloud storage require new security strategies and security testing procedures.
Cloud computing is the delivery of IT resources over the Internet with the pay-as-you-go principle. We can access lots of technology services such as computing power, storage, and databases instead of buying, owning, maintaining physical data centers and servers. As we know, there are lots of popular cloud computing providers such as AWS, Google, Microsoft Azure, and Oracle that we use every day for our workloads. As the popularity of cloud services increases, attackers focus on cloud services and cloud vulnerabilities. Attackers use lots of sustained attacks against managed cloud service providers and their customers. If companies are using cloud technologies, they need to make sure it is secure. At this point, they need cloud penetration testing. Cloud penetration testing is an attack simulation performed to find vulnerabilities that can be exploited or to find any misconfigurations in a cloud-based system. With cloud penetration testing, companies learn about the strengths and weaknesses of their cloud system to improve its overall security posture.
The global cloud security market size in 2019
Companies have experienced at least one cloud data breach in the past 18 months
Organization’s IT environment is at least somewhat in the cloud
Enterprises consider security to be the most important criterion when picking a cloud vendor.
Penetration testing should be performed on a regular basis to ensure more consistent IT and network security management. In addition to regularly scheduled analysis and assessments required by regulatory mandates, tests should also be run whenever:
There are quite a few vulnerabilities that can lead to a compromised cloud account. Mentioning each one is beyond the scope of this section so, the most prominent ones are mentioned below:
APIs are widely used in cloud services to share information across various applications. However, insecure APIs can also lead to a large-scale data leak. Sometimes using APIs improperly can allow hackers to upload malware on your server or delete data. Improper access control and lack of input sanitization are also the main causes of APIs getting compromised which can be uncovered during cloud penetration testing.
Cloud service misconfigurations are the most common cloud vulnerability today (misconfigured S3 Buckets, in particular ). The most common cloud server misconfigurations are improper permissions, not encrypting the data and differentiation between private and public data.
Outdated software contains critical security vulnerabilities that can compromise your cloud services. Most of the software vendors do not use a streamlined update procedure or the users disable automatic updates themselves. This makes the cloud services outdated which hackers identify using automated scanners. As a result, cloud services using outdated software are compromised by a large number.
Most businesses try to get their cloud infrastructure built for as cheap as possible. So, due to poor coding practices, such software often contains bugs.
Your organization will grow and change over time. Factors such as a change in staff members, business lines, processes, and technology are good reasons to conduct a penetration test. We advise you to perform penetration tests of your business regularly to ensure that your systems are up to date and your employees have been properly trained
Cybersecurity is ever-evolving because cybercriminals are always innovating new ways to intrude networks and exploit vulnerabilities. Hence, it is important to perform penetration testing whenever there is a major change in the environment.
Often, regulatory bodies like PCI DSS and HIPAA encourage penetration testing to comply with regulations.
