The fastest way into a cloud environment isn’t through a zero-day exploit or a brute-force attack. Instead, it’s through weak identity and access controls that let attackers simply walk in using valid credentials.
Most breaches don’t begin with advanced tactics; they start with something as simple as a missing policy or a forgotten account. When the goal is protecting sensitive data in the cloud, every layer of access matters more than ever.
Multi-Factor Authentication Can’t Be Optional
Too many cloud breaches begin with someone logging in using a real username and password that never had extra verification tied to it.
Multi-factor authentication is still treated as optional in many services, even when the risks are well known ahead of time. In practice that means employees or contractors might connect to a production environment or customer database with nothing more than a password they reused elsewhere.
Attackers continue to take advantage of that gap, and some of the most high-profile cloud intrusions recently came down to users who were allowed to decide for themselves whether or not to turn on MFA. Companies have started reacting by giving administrators more control over authentication rules but leaving those settings optional doesn’t solve the core issue.
Security teams can close that door by requiring strong authentication through identity providers that override user-level decisions. That includes blocking any older access methods that can’t support MFA and using conditional rules that trigger extra verification when anything suspicious shows up.
Too Much Permission In Too Many Places
Access policies often grow messy over time, especially in large cloud environments. Developers and automation tools need privileges to get their work done, and those permissions tend to stack up. It’s common to find thousands of policies granting access to entire services or broad resource groups. Many of these policies include wildcard entries that let users or scripts do far more than they should.
Cloud platforms sometimes add to the problem with default roles that look convenient but grant overly broad access by default. Services that are tied to machine learning or data analytics frequently pull in storage permissions that span multiple environments, opening paths that attackers could use for lateral movement.
It’s not enough to assign least privilege once and forget it; today, your permissions need to be scoped to specific resources that are trimmed down based on usage and audited regularly. Built-in tools can show which policies are never used or grant unnecessary access. Teams should add controls that prevent excessive privilege from being applied in the first place, especially when new services are brought online.
Public Buckets Are Still Leaking
Open object storage remains a recurring source of breaches. A single misconfigured bucket can give the world access to internal files or customer data, and many attackers know exactly where to look. Some are able to scan thousands of domains a day searching for storage services that haven’t been locked down yet.
The real damage often comes from the kind of data that’s left exposed. Different factors, including secrets, tokens, and access credentials are commonly found in open buckets, and once copied they provide direct access to other systems. The fact is that even one accidental upload can create a chain of compromise that spreads across cloud projects or environments.
Cloud platforms offer simple ways to stop this from happening. Storage services now include public-access blocks that administrators can apply at the account or organization level and those settings should be mandatory. Extra guardrails like service control policies can also restrict who’s allowed to change access settings and how those changes happen.
Hardcoded Keys Open Long-Term Access
Service accounts and automated tasks need a way to authenticate but storing long-lived keys in code or configuration files is one of the most common mistakes. These keys often live for months or years without rotation and many lack basic protections like MFA. Once they’re exposed, they can grant quiet persistent access across multiple projects or environments.
Some cloud providers now scan public code repositories looking for exposed keys and will disable them automatically, but that’s the last line of defense not the first. Instead of relying on permanent credentials teams should move toward short-lived tokens or role-based access that’s tied to workloads and rotated frequently.
Forgotten Accounts Are A Silent Risk
Over time cloud environments accumulate user accounts tied to people who have left the company or automation scripts that are no longer used. These stale or orphaned identities often remain active long after they’re needed, creating easy targets for attackers who look for forgotten entry points.
Recent studies show that most organizations maintain a large number of enabled accounts that no longer belong to current staff or services. These accounts often go unnoticed during audits and may still have access to sensitive systems or data.
One effective fix is linking identity governance to HR processes so that accounts are disabled automatically when someone leaves. Idle accounts that haven’t been used in a set number of days should be flagged for re-certification or automatically locked down.
Root Accounts Don’t Belong In Daily Work
Using root-level credentials in cloud environments should be rare since these accounts are meant for emergencies and setup tasks, not everyday operations. Yet, investigators still find evidence that root access is used for routine actions, which puts the entire environment at risk if those credentials are compromised.
The safest approach is to store root credentials offline and use just-in-time access for elevated tasks. That creates a separation between daily administration and top-level control, and it keeps logs clean when something goes wrong.
The Real Threat Is Identity Misuse
The majority of cloud breaches don’t hinge on new vulnerabilities; rather, they happen because identity is mismanaged and access controls are too loose. Attackers are constantly looking for missing authentication, expired users, hardcoded secrets, and broad permissions because those weaknesses are easier to find than software bugs.
Protecting sensitive data in the cloud means locking down access at every layer, and that starts with strong identity verification, continues with tightly scoped permissions, and ends with constant monitoring.