10 Cloud Penetration Testing Companies to Consider in 2026

Cloud penetration testing helps organizations find exploitable weaknesses in AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, Kubernetes, serverless workloads, APIs, and connected infrastructure.

Cloud environments introduce risks that traditional network testing may not catch. Excessive IAM permissions, exposed storage, weak trust relationships, insecure service accounts, misconfigured workloads, and privilege-escalation paths can all create serious attack opportunities.

A strong cloud penetration testing company should combine automated discovery with manual exploitation and understand how identities, cloud resources, applications, and networks connect.

This guide covers 10 providers that offer different approaches to cloud penetration testing in 2026. The list is not ranked because each company fits different environments, budgets, and security requirements.

1. Bright Defense

Bright Defense is a Culver City cybersecurity company founded in 2023 by Tim Mektrakarn and John Minnix.

Its cloud penetration testing covers AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud. Testing can examine IAM users, service accounts, roles, trust relationships, storage, databases, exposed services, applications, APIs, workloads, serverless systems, and privilege-escalation paths.

The company also provides compliance support, vulnerability management, virtual CISO services, and remediation assistance.

Best for: Startups, SaaS businesses, regulated SMBs, healthcare vendors, fintech firms, and defense contractors.

Bright Defense may be particularly useful when a company needs cloud testing that also supports SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA, PCI DSS, CMMC, or NIST requirements.

Published penetration testing packages include:

• $2,750 for 48 testing hours
• $5,250 for 96 testing hours
• $9,250 for 176 testing hours

Cloud pricing may vary with account count, IAM complexity, application scope, containers, and required access levels.

2. Bishop Fox

Bishop Fox is an offensive security company founded in 2005 by Vincent Liu and Francis Brown.

Its cloud testing covers AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, and Kubernetes. Consultants examine identities, roles, service accounts, permission boundaries, credentials, trust relationships, storage, applications, deployment systems, and cross-account attack paths.

The company also develops cloud security tools such as CloudFox and Cirro.

Best for: Enterprises with complex IAM structures, multiple cloud accounts, Kubernetes environments, or high-value applications.

Bishop Fox uses objective-based engagements. A test may focus on goals such as gaining privileged credentials, crossing account boundaries, or reaching sensitive data.

This model works well for advanced offensive validation but may require more detailed scoping than a standard cloud assessment.

Pricing is customized.

3. Rhino Security Labs

Rhino Security Labs is a Seattle-based offensive security company founded in 2013 by Benjamin Caudill.

The firm is particularly known for AWS security research and tools such as Pacu and CloudGoat.

Cloud assessments cover AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud, with testing focused on compromised identities, privilege escalation, persistence, lateral movement, storage exposure, and defense evasion.

Best for: Cloud-native companies and mature security teams that want deep manual exploitation.

Rhino's strongest public research record is around AWS IAM, Lambda, S3, CloudTrail, GuardDuty, and credential abuse.

Its boutique structure can provide specialist attention, although large or multi-region projects may require advance scheduling.

Pricing is customized according to cloud provider, account count, IAM structure, access level, testing depth, and retesting needs.

4. NetSPI

NetSPI provides cloud penetration testing through a human-led, AI-supported PTaaS platform.

Its cloud services cover AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud. Testing can examine IAM, storage, compute, networks, containers, serverless services, key management, applications, and service relationships.

NetSPI can test from both external and authenticated perspectives. This allows its testers to examine what an attacker could do after obtaining legitimate but limited cloud access.

Best for: Large enterprises running repeated cloud tests across many accounts or business units.

Its platform supports live findings, tester communication, remediation tracking, integrations, and historical testing data.

NetSPI may be more than a smaller business needs for one cloud assessment, but it can work well for continued enterprise testing programs.

Pricing is custom.

5. Cobalt

Cobalt provides cloud penetration testing through a credit-based PTaaS platform and a vetted community of pentesters.

Its testing covers AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, hybrid environments, applications, APIs, networks, containers, AI systems, and related infrastructure.

Findings appear in the platform during testing, allowing security and development teams to start remediation before the final report is delivered.

Cobalt also connects with tools such as Jira, GitHub, Slack, and Azure DevOps.

Best for: SaaS companies and development teams that need cloud tests launched quickly.

Its credit system can work well for organizations that test several assets throughout the year. Companies planning only one or two projects should compare the credit model with fixed-scope alternatives.

Pricing is based on annual credit packages.

6. Praetorian

Praetorian is an Austin-based offensive security company founded in 2010 by Nathan Sportsman.

Its cloud testing covers AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, Kubernetes, containers, serverless environments, infrastructure as code, CI/CD systems, and hybrid cloud infrastructure.

The firm focuses heavily on attack paths rather than individual configuration findings.

Assessments may examine IAM relationships, federated access, exposed credentials, storage, databases, virtual machines, APIs, CI/CD systems, and cloud-to-on-premises trust.

Best for: Security-mature organizations with complex cloud architecture.

Praetorian also offers continuous security services through Praetorian Guard and develops cloud security tooling such as Aurelian.

The company is better suited to organizations that need deep cloud attack analysis than companies looking only for a basic compliance scan.

Pricing is customized.

7. TrustedSec

TrustedSec provides cloud penetration testing with a strong focus on AWS, Azure, Microsoft 365, and Entra ID environments.

Assessments can begin externally and later move into an assumed-access scenario where testers receive a low-privilege account or workload identity.

This allows the team to examine what happens after an attacker compromises a user, developer workstation, application, or cloud workload.

Best for: Enterprises with AWS, Azure, Microsoft 365, Entra ID, and hybrid identity environments.

Testing may cover identities, authentication, applications, APIs, storage, permissions, workloads, and connections back into internal systems.

TrustedSec can also connect cloud assessments with phishing, internal network testing, incident response, and red team work.

Pricing is custom.

8. Coalfire

Coalfire provides cloud penetration testing through its DivisionHex offensive security practice.

The company has substantial experience with FedRAMP, PCI DSS, HIPAA, SOC, ISO, HITRUST, NIST, and CMMC.

Cloud testing can examine applications, APIs, identities, storage, workloads, networks, authentication, segmentation, exposed services, privilege escalation, and cloud-to-on-premises attack paths.

Best for: SaaS providers, government contractors, cloud companies, and highly regulated enterprises.

Coalfire is particularly relevant when cloud testing must support a formal authorization or compliance program.

Organizations should confirm independence requirements when using the same provider for advisory and formal assessment work.

Pricing is customized according to architecture, regulatory requirements, systems, objectives, and duration.

9. IBM X-Force Red

IBM X-Force Red is IBM's global offensive security team.

Its cloud work covers applications, identities, DevOps systems, networks, databases, workloads, APIs, hybrid infrastructure, and connected systems.

Assessments can begin from an external position or from an assumed-breach scenario. Testers then examine privilege escalation, lateral movement, credential abuse, and access to sensitive information.

IBM also brings threat intelligence, incident response, malware research, and security consulting into the wider engagement.

Best for: Global enterprises, financial institutions, governments, healthcare organizations, and companies with complex hybrid-cloud infrastructure.

IBM X-Force Red offers project-based, subscription, and managed testing programs.

Pricing depends on cloud scope, geography, identities, DevOps systems, attack objectives, and delivery model.

10. Mandiant

Mandiant provides cloud penetration testing informed by frontline incident response and threat intelligence.

The company supports AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, hybrid environments, and multi-cloud architectures.

Testing can cover identities, applications, APIs, networks, storage, cloud resources, and connected infrastructure.

Consultants may attempt agreed objectives such as accessing sensitive records, privileged systems, payment information, or intellectual property.

Best for: Large organizations that want cloud testing connected to current attacker behavior and incident response knowledge.

Mandiant can also perform red team and purple team exercises to evaluate whether internal security operations detect attacker activity.

Active penetration testing and architecture assessments are separate scopes, so companies should define exactly which services are required.

Pricing is customized.

What Cloud Penetration Testing Should Cover

A cloud penetration test should go beyond configuration checks.

Important areas include:

• IAM permissions
• Service accounts
• Role trust relationships
• Federated identities
• Storage permissions
• Network security groups
• Cloud applications
• APIs
• Serverless workloads
• Kubernetes and containers
• Secrets and credentials
• Cloud-to-on-premises connections
• Privilege escalation
• Lateral movement
• Logging and detection controls

A configuration review may tell you that a policy is too permissive.

A penetration test should determine whether that policy can actually be abused to reach more sensitive systems or data.

How to Choose a Cloud Penetration Testing Company

The best provider should demonstrate cloud-specific offensive security experience rather than general penetration testing knowledge alone.

Confirm Cloud Control Plane Testing

Ask whether the provider tests the cloud infrastructure itself rather than only the applications hosted inside it.

A cloud assessment should examine:

• IAM policies
• Role trust
• Service accounts
• Instance metadata
• Storage permissions
• Key management
• Logging
• Cross-account relationships
• Privilege escalation paths

A scanner-only configuration review is not the same as cloud penetration testing.

Check the Assigned Testers

Ask who will actually perform the assessment.

Relevant experience may include:

• OSCP
• GIAC cloud security credentials
• AWS security certifications
• Azure security certifications
• Practical cloud offensive security experience

More important than the certificate is whether the tester understands the exact platform being assessed.

Strong AWS IAM experience does not automatically translate into deep Azure identity knowledge.

Choose the Access Level

Cloud penetration tests commonly use three access models.

Access ModelWhat It TestsExternal OnlyPublic services, exposed storage, internet-facing assetsRead-Only AccessIAM policies, trust relationships, configurations, loggingFoothold SimulationPrivilege escalation after a compromised low-privilege account

The second and third models usually reveal much more about realistic cloud attack paths.

Two quotes may differ considerably because one includes assumed-access testing while the other includes only internet-facing assets.

Review a Sample Cloud Report

A useful cloud finding should state:

• Affected account
• Resource identifier
• Misconfigured role or policy
• Reproduction steps
• Attack path
• Security impact
• Provider-specific correction

Generic vulnerability descriptions and CVSS scores alone are not enough.

The report should help engineers locate and correct the exact cloud resource responsible for the risk.

Confirm Retesting

Retesting should appear in the contract.

The agreement should explain:

• Whether retesting costs extra
• How many retests are included
• When retesting can occur
• Whether the final report will be updated
• Whether an attestation letter is available

This becomes especially important when the test supports SOC 2, ISO 27001, PCI DSS, or customer security reviews.

What Affects Cloud Penetration Testing Cost?

Cloud penetration testing prices vary primarily with scope and testing depth.

Major cost factors include:

• Number of AWS accounts, Azure subscriptions, or Google Cloud projects
• Number of IAM users, roles, service accounts, and policies
• Kubernetes and container coverage
• Applications and APIs
• Serverless functions
• CI/CD systems
• Infrastructure as code
• External versus authenticated testing
• Multi-cloud trust relationships
• Retesting requirements

A small single-account environment requires much less work than a multi-account cloud estate with Kubernetes, hundreds of identities, several applications, and connected on-premises systems.

Which Cloud Penetration Testing Company Fits Your Needs?

Bright Defense may suit startups and smaller regulated organizations that want multi-cloud testing connected to compliance and remediation.

Bishop Fox, Rhino Security Labs, and Praetorian may be better choices for technically complex environments where IAM abuse and advanced attack paths are the main concern.

NetSPI is well suited to large organizations that need recurring cloud assessments and centralized remediation tracking.

Cobalt may work well for software teams that need rapid testing and strong development workflow integration.

TrustedSec is particularly relevant to AWS, Azure, Microsoft 365, and Entra ID environments.

Coalfire is a practical option when penetration testing supports FedRAMP or another formal compliance program.

IBM X-Force Red and Mandiant may fit large global enterprises that need cloud testing combined with threat intelligence, adversary simulation, and incident response experience.

The final decision should depend on platform expertise, manual exploitation depth, IAM testing, access model, reporting quality, remediation support, retesting terms, and total scope.

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