Articles

Cloud penetration testing is a specialised form of penetration testing that focuses on identifying vulnerabilities in the infrastructure, configuration, and accessibility of cloud resources. Regular penetration testing is focused on testing an application directly by identifying vulnerabilities that malicious actors might exploit directly in the application.

However, when applications are hosted in the cloud, the security of the cloud infrastructure itself becomes crucial. Tools and services provided by the cloud environment play a key role in safeguarding applications, potentially nullifying application level vulnerabilities. At the same time, this cloud configuration introduces a level of complexity that is not usually present in traditional hosting environments.

Automated penetration testing differs from regular penetration testing by utilising a set of tools and services that continuously test applications to identify and exploit both new and old vulnerabilities. Most tools available in the cloud and application security space have some level of automation, with some tools operating entirely automatically, requiring a small number of initial commands and configuration. These automated tools handle various components of the testing process, such as discovery, identification, scanning, and simulated attacks.