GCP Penetration Testing
Misconfigured GCP projects expose production data, service accounts, and internal services through overly permissive IAM, public Cloud Storage buckets, open VPC firewalls, and unauthenticated Cloud Functions or APIs. Breaches follow simple mistakes: broad roles at the folder level, default networks, weak logging, and unsecured service identities that enable silent lateral movement across workloads.
Engage Cyphere’s GCP penetration testing to stress test IAM, VPCs, GKE, Cloud Storage, Cloud SQL, Cloud Functions, and Cloud Run against attacker techniques, not just configuration checklists. Cyphere maps privilege escalation paths, weaponises exposed services, validates data exposure, and delivers prioritised remediation aligned to Google’s best practices, tightening your Google Cloud security posture before attackers exploit the same paths.
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Importance of Google cloud penetration testing (CREST Approved)
As Google Cloud is a shared environment, it is logical that security threats will appear in the list of your concerns. Threat actors test your GCP services to identify security vulnerabilities. The only way to mitigate risks is first to know which risks are worth the treatment through Google penetration testing.
Cloud penetration testing is different from traditional penetration testing. This is because everything is Internet facing and it is important to prevent sensitive data losses, stop threat actors from compromising your data or servers. Further, identify and address issues that compromise the integrity of your data.
GCP pentesting is important because it enables you to detect any security weaknesses or vulnerabilities in your Google cloud platform infrastructure. Google cloud platform penetration testing is also equally important for compliance within industry regulations like HIPAA, SOX, FDA, GLBA, GDPR, PCI DSS.
Google Cloud Penetration Testing helps businesses comply with data protection regulations such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). It gives customers the ability to demonstrate that their data is protected and only accessible to those who should have it.
Common attack vectors behind Google cloud attacks
Hackers perform various attacks that can be classified into different categories such as
- Phishing
- Social engineering attacks
- Malware attacks
- Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) attacks
- Brute force/dictionary attacks.
These are more like entry points leading way into the endpoints and further exploitation through lateral movements, credential theft, password spray attacks, etc is performed to reach their objectives. This could include stealing data, stealing hashes/passwords or modifying code to inject backdoors. Malware or viruses are injected into your system to exfiltrate data. Once an attacker has access to your system he can use techniques such as command injection, directory traversal and code injection to interact with backend data.
Key benefits of Google cloud penetration testing
- Helps to ensure that your data and other business-critical components remain protected from attackers
- Helps you keep your costs under control as it gives clarity into your cloud or GCP security maturity levels
- Helps to identify and fix vulnerabilities before they can be exploited by hackers
- Demonstrate your seriousness towards data security to your supply chain and customers
Why choose Cyphere to provide GCP penetration testing services?
Excellent people to work with.
"Very good knowledge of requirement and give us correct findings with excellent remedy to improve our security for our B2B portal site."
Harman was great, really knowledgeable
"Harman was great, really knowledgeable, helpful and on hand to answer any questions. The final report was very clear providing all the technical information."
My experience of the team was 5 star.
"They were so helpful, and their technical delivery and client communication were excellent."
Extremely satisfied
"Extremely satisfied with their approach, speed and end results that I got for my company. Big Thanks."
Experienced Team
"Great experienced team, very knowledgable and helpful, willing to adjust the product to suit the customer. Would recommend."
Professional Work
"A totally professional engagement from start to finish with the highest quality advice and guidance."
High Quality Testing Service
"The service provided by Cyphere is second to none. High quality testing services. Very reliable and professional approach."
Assured Service
"Cyphere provide a personal and assured service, focusing on both pre and post analysis in supporting us to change and embed a security cultured approach."
Recommended Service
"Highly recommend Cyphere for pen testing. The recommendations in the report were comprehensive and communicated so that technical and non-technical members of the team could follow them."
Recommended Pen Testing Service
"Cyphere were great in both carrying out our penetration testing and taking us through the results and remediation steps. We would gladly use them for future projects.
Highly Recommended
"We had penetration tests service for PCI DSS compliance program from the Cyphere! Very professional, efficient communication, great findings that improved our system security posture! Highly recommended!
Exceeded Expectations
"Harman and the team at Cyphere truly are experts in their field and provide an outstanding service! Always going above and beyond to exceed customer expectations.
Skilled Team
I’ve worked with Cyphere on a number of penetration tests in addition to some cyber essentials support and certification! I’ve found them to be highly skilled and professional.
Skilled Team
I’ve worked with Cyphere on a number of penetration tests in addition to some cyber essentials support and certification! I’ve found them to be highly skilled and professional.
Perceptive Reporting
Cyphere undertook pen testing for us recently. The process was very smooth, and the team were flexible in working around our constraints. The report was clear, actionable and perceptive.
Outstanding Cybersecurity Partner
Cyphere has been outstanding partner to our agency. I've tried many in the past but they have been extremely meticulous in getting our systems secured.
Helpful Services
Cyphere has been an excellent partner and helped us achieve our goals with a great level of expertise, communication and helpfulness making the whole process easy to understand and complete.
High Standards
Harman and his team were excellent throughout, they understood and completed the tasks (external penetration test) within tight deadlines to a high standard.
Communicative & Responsive Team
I had an amazing experience working with Cyphere! Their communication was top-notch, making the entire process smooth and efficient. I found their team to be incredibly responsive and attentive to my needs.
Efficient Service
Worked with team at Cyphere for a cyber security assessment, gap analysis etc. The team has delivered a very professional, efficient service at all stages of the process to date.
Google cloud platform pentesting techniques
We perform GCP penetration testing using various techniques to identify google cloud security issues with your Google cloud infrastructure.
- Prepare your Google Cloud Platform (GCP) pentesting plan
- Identify all the components that can be potentially attacked on GCP
- Carry out Google penetration testing of all the identified components
- GCP Pentest the cloud environment with public tools
- Report on all findings and recommended actions to fix vulnerabilities.
Most frequently asked questions on GCP pentesting
Our Google cloud penetration testing services helps you strengthen your Google cloud environments by identifying security loopholes and fixing them. By using the information provided by us during penetration testing, companies can take necessary steps to improve their security procedures to prevent future breaches or remove hackers from their systems.
You do not need to seek prior permission from Google to carry out google cloud penetration testing on virtual machines and services. However, based on the scope of the job you may need to inform your security team or other users that you are about to run security tests on the G-Suite applications or Google storage buckets they use within your organisation.
Google cloud pentesting is a method for identifying vulnerabilities in Google cloud computing systems and networks. Penetration testers use the same tools, techniques and experience as attackers/hackers to identify security issues.
If you are using google cloud pentesting for any kind of business purpose then you should go for penetration testing. It is important to test your GCP infrastructure for vulnerabilities before you publish it for the world to use. A secure platform will ensure that all the data being stored by you remains safe with minimal chances of getting hacked.
Yes, there is a major difference between automated scanning and penetration testing. An automated scan focuses on finding vulnerabilities in the system without verifying they are true and in the context of the environment. GCP Pentest focus is deeper to identify the issues, exploit them safely, and a step further to see how far a threat actor can go in such a situation. It helps to understand the threats close to a real-life situation before addressing them. This makes GCP vulnerability assessment and penetration testing different in terms of time spent, skill-set required, and costs.
Penetration testers use a 3-phased approach to penetration testing. The phases are listed below:
- Planning and reconnaissance
- Attack
- Reporting
Common exploitation tricks/ techniques to break into Google cloud infrastructure
1. Gaining access to compromise network
Attackers gain access after trying reverse shell access by uploading a backdoor through the platform upload system or command injection.
2. Nefarious data manipulation attack (Insertion, Modification and Deletion)
The hacker uses insertion, modification and deletion attacks to do harm either by using a script or an automated tool. He could try to upload a backdoor through the platform upload system or command injection.
3. Hacking authentication mechanism and bypass authorisation restrictions
The attacker hacks authentication mechanisms, such as authorisation tokens for SDK, Google cloud portal APIs etc to perform privilege escalations within your GCP environment.
4. Elevating privileges and escalating account access
The hacker uses a cloud data transfer service to upload a program that says it is being used for an authorised purpose, but in reality, runs malicious code within your Google cloud environment.
5. Direct code execution by uploading dangerous file types
This attack occurs when the attacker uploads a program of malicious code that gains control over your system and then executes itself within the cloud environment.
GCP Penetration Testing Methodology
Our security testing approach involves benchmark based assessments as well as standard GCP penetration testing methodology extended to include Microsoft cloud specific security concerns. We support industry-leading testing standards and methodologies unless the scope is a red team:
- OWASP
- Mitre Att&ck Framework
- Penetration Testing Execution Standard
- NIST SP 800-115
Types of Google Cloud Penetration Testing
Black Box Testing
In this approach, testers simulate attacks without prior knowledge or access to your cloud systems. They rely solely on publicly available information, making it a realistic assessment of your security against external threats.
White Box Testing
Here, testers are granted admin-level access to your Google Cloud systems, enabling them to thoroughly analyze the internal infrastructure and configurations. Also referred to as visible penetration testing, this method provides deep insight into potential vulnerabilities.
Gray Box Testing
Combining elements of both black and white box testing, grey box testing simulates attacks by internal users with limited access or external hackers. It evaluates the organization's ability to detect, respond to, and mitigate attacks under varying levels of access and visibility.
