CloudFox helps you gain situational awareness in unfamiliar cloud environments. It’s an open source command line tool created to help penetration testers and other offensive security professionals find exploitable attack paths in cloud infrastructure.

CLOUDFOX UPDATE REQUIRED: (12/2025): If you are using cloudfox, you need to use v1.17.0 or greater. All earlier versions stopped working after a format change in AWS's public service mapping file.

Overview

CloudFox helps you answer the following common questions (and many more):

• What regions is this AWS account using and roughly how many resources are in the account?
• What secrets are lurking in EC2 userdata or service specific environment variables?
• What workloads have administrative permissions attached?
• What actions/permissions does this [principal] have?
• What role trusts are overly permissive or allow cross-account assumption?
• What endpoints/hostnames/IPs can I attack from an external starting point (public internet)?
• What endpoints/hostnames/IPs can I attack from an internal starting point (assumed breach within the VPC)?
• What filesystems can I potentially mount from a compromised resource inside the VPC?

Demos, Examples, Walkthroughs

• Blog - Introducing: CloudFox
• Video - CloudFox + CloudFoxable A Powerful Duo for Mastering the Art of Identifying and Exploiting AWS Attack Paths
• Video - Penetration Testing with CloudFox
• Video - CloudFox Intro Demos
• Video - Tool Talk: CloudFox AWS sub-command walkthroughs

Intentionally Vulnerable Playground

• CloudFoxable - A Gamified Cloud Hacking Sandbox

Want to chat about CloudFox?

Join us on the RedSec discord server

Quick Start

CloudFox is modular (you can run one command at a time), but there is an aws all-checks command that will run the other aws commands for you with sane defaults:

cloudfox aws --profile [profile-name] all-checks

White Box Enumeration

CloudFox was designed to be executed by a principal with limited read-only permissions, but it's purpose is to help you find attack paths that can be exploited in simulated compromise scenarios (aka, objective based penetration testing).

Black Box Enumeration

CloudFox can be used with "found" credentials, similar to how you would use weirdAAL or enumerate-iam. Checks that fail, do so silently, so any data returned means your "found" creds have the access needed to retrieve it.

Documentation

For the full documentation please refer to our wiki.

Supported Cloud Providers

Provider	CloudFox Commands
AWS	34
Azure	4
GCP	60
Kubernetes	Support Planned

Install

Option 1: Download the latest binary release for your platform.

Option 2: If you use homebrew: brew install cloudfox

Option 3: Install Go, use go install github.com/BishopFox/cloudfox@latest to install from the remote source

Option 4: Developer mode:

Install Go, clone the CloudFox repository and compile from source

# git clone https://github.com/BishopFox/cloudfox.git
# cd ./cloudfox
# Make any changes necessary
# go build .
# ./cloudfox

Option 5: Testing a bug fix

git clone git@github.com:BishopFox/cloudfox.git
git checkout seth-dev 
go build .
./cloudfox [rest of the command options]

Prerequisites

AWS

• AWS CLI installed
• Supports AWS profiles, AWS environment variables, or metadata retrieval (on an ec2 instance)
  • To run commands on multiple profiles at once, you can specify the path to a file with a list of profile names separated by a new line using the -l flag or pass all stored profiles with the -a flag.
• A principal with one recommended policies attached (described below)
• Recommended attached policies: SecurityAudit + CloudFox custom policy

Additional policy notes (as of 09/2022):

Policy	Notes
CloudFox custom policy	Has a complete list of every permission cloudfox uses and nothing else
arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/SecurityAudit	Covers most cloudfox checks but is missing newer services or permissions like apprunner:*, grafana:*, lambda:GetFunctionURL, lightsail:GetContainerServices
arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/job-function/ViewOnlyAccess	Covers most cloudfox checks but is missing newer services or permissions like AppRunner:*, grafana:*, lambda:GetFunctionURL, lightsail:GetContainerServices - and is also missing iam:SimulatePrincipalPolicy.
arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/ReadOnlyAccess	Only missing AppRunner, but also grants things like "s3:Get*" which can be overly permissive.
arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/AdministratorAccess	This will work just fine with CloudFox, but if you were handed this level of access as a penetration tester, that should probably be a finding in itself :)

Azure

• Viewer or similar permissions applied.

GCP

• Google Cloud SDK installed and authenticated
• Application Default Credentials configured (gcloud auth application-default login)
• Recommended permissions at appropriate hierarchy levels (see below)

GCP Permissions: Minimal vs Comprehensive

Minimal Permissions (Single Project):

For basic enumeration of a single project, the roles/viewer role provides read access to most resources (includes logging, monitoring, and compute/network viewing).

Comprehensive Permissions (Organization-Wide):

For thorough security assessments across an entire organization:

Scope	Role	Purpose
Organization	roles/resourcemanager.organizationViewer	View organization structure and metadata
Organization	roles/iam.securityReviewer	Review IAM policies across the organization
Organization	roles/cloudasset.viewer	Query Cloud Asset Inventory for all resources
Organization	roles/cloudidentity.groupsViewer	Enumerate Google Groups and memberships
Folder	roles/resourcemanager.folderViewer	View folder hierarchy and metadata
Project	roles/viewer	Read access to most project resources (includes logging.viewer, monitoring.viewer, compute.viewer)
Tooling Project	roles/serviceusage.serviceUsageAdmin	(Optional) Manage API quotas for CloudFox operations

Note: The basic roles/viewer role includes permissions from roles/logging.viewer, roles/monitoring.viewer, and roles/compute.networkViewer, so these don't need to be granted separately.

GCP API Requirements

APIs must be enabled in each project you want to assess. GCP APIs are project-scoped.

API	Service Name	Purpose
Cloud Identity API	cloudidentity.googleapis.com	Group enumeration, inherited role analysis
Cloud Asset API	cloudasset.googleapis.com	Cross-project resource discovery
Cloud Resource Manager API	cloudresourcemanager.googleapis.com	Organization mapping, IAM enumeration
IAM API	iam.googleapis.com	IAM analysis, privilege escalation detection
Compute Engine API	compute.googleapis.com	Instance enumeration, network security
Secret Manager API	secretmanager.googleapis.com	Secrets enumeration
Cloud Functions API	cloudfunctions.googleapis.com	Serverless enumeration
Cloud Run API	run.googleapis.com	Serverless enumeration
Kubernetes Engine API	container.googleapis.com	Container security analysis
BigQuery API	bigquery.googleapis.com	Data security analysis

For detailed setup instructions, see the GCP Setup Guide.

AWS Commands

Provider	Command Name	Description
AWS	all-checks	Run all of the other commands using reasonable defaults. You'll still want to check out the non-default options of each command, but this is a great place to start.
AWS	access-keys	Lists active access keys for all users. Useful for cross referencing a key you found with which in-scope account it belongs to.
AWS	api-gw	Lists API gateway endpoints and gives you custom curl commands including API tokens if they are stored in metadata.
AWS	buckets	Lists the buckets in the account and gives you handy commands for inspecting them further.
AWS	cape	Enumerates cross-account privilege escalation paths. Requires pmapper to be run first
AWS	cloudformation	Lists the cloudformation stacks in the account. Generates loot file with stack details, stack parameters, and stack output - look for secrets.
AWS	codebuild	Enumerate CodeBuild projects
AWS	databases	Enumerate RDS databases. Get a loot file with connection strings.
AWS	ecr	List the most recently pushed image URI from all repositories. Use the loot file to pull selected images down with docker/nerdctl for inspection.
AWS	ecs-tasks	List all ecs tasks. This returns a list of ecs tasks and associated cluster, task definition, container instance, launch type, and associated IAM principal.
AWS	eks	List all EKS clusters, see if they expose their endpoint publicly, and check the associated IAM roles attached to reach cluster or node group. Generates a loot file with the aws eks udpate-kubeconfig command needed to connect to each cluster.
AWS	elastic-network-interfaces	List all eni information. This returns a list of eni ID, type, external IP, private IP, VPCID, attached instance and a description.
AWS	endpoints	Enumerates endpoints from various services. Scan these endpoints from both an internal and external position to look for things that don't require authentication, are misconfigured, etc.
AWS	env-vars	Grabs the environment variables from services that have them (App Runner, ECS, Lambda, Lightsail containers, Sagemaker are supported. If you find a sensitive secret, use cloudfox iam-simulator AND pmapper to see who has access to them.
AWS	filesystems	Enumerate the EFS and FSx filesystems that you might be able to mount without creds (if you have the right network access). For example, this is useful when you have ec:RunInstance but not iam:PassRole.
AWS	iam-simulator	Like pmapper, but uses the IAM policy simulator. It uses AWS's evaluation logic, but notably, it doesn't consider transitive access via privesc, which is why you should also always also use pmapper.
AWS	instances	Enumerates useful information for EC2 Instances in all regions like name, public/private IPs, and instance profiles. Generates loot files you can feed to nmap and other tools for service enumeration.
AWS	inventory	Gain a rough understanding of size of the account and preferred regions.
AWS	lambda	Lists the lambda functions in the account, including which one's have admin roles attached. Also gives you handy commands for downloading each function.
AWS	network-ports	Enumerates AWS services that are potentially exposing a network service. The security groups and the network ACLs are parsed for each resource to determine what ports are potentially exposed.
AWS	orgs	Enumerate accounts in an organization
AWS	outbound-assumed-roles	List the roles that have been assumed by principals in this account. This is an excellent way to find outbound attack paths that lead into other accounts.
AWS	permissions	Enumerates IAM permissions associated with all users and roles. Grep this output to figure out what permissions a particular principal has rather than logging into the AWS console and painstakingly expanding each policy attached to the principal you are investigating.
AWS	pmapper	Looks for pmapper data stored on the local filesystem, in the locations defined here. If pmapper data has been found (you already ran pmapper graph create), then this command will use this data to build a graph in cloudfox memory let you know who can privesc to admin.
AWS	principals	Enumerates IAM users and Roles so you have the data at your fingertips.
AWS	ram	List all resources in this account that are shared with other accounts, or resources from other accounts that are shared with this account. Useful for cross-account attack paths.
AWS	resource-trusts	Looks through multiple services that support resource policies and helps you find any overly permissive resource trusts. KMS is supported but disabled by default. To include KMS resource policies in the output, add this flag to the command: cloudfox aws resource-trusts --include-kms.
AWS	role-trusts	Enumerates IAM role trust policies so you can look for overly permissive role trusts or find roles that trust a specific service.
AWS	route53	Enumerate all records from all route53 managed zones. Use this for application and service enumeration.
AWS	secrets	List secrets from SecretsManager and SSM. Look for interesting secrets in the list and then see who has access to them using use cloudfox iam-simulator and/or pmapper.
AWS	sns	This command enumerates all of the sns topics and gives you the commands to subscribe to a topic or send messages to a topic (if you have the permissions needed). This command only deals with topics, and not the SMS functionality. This command also attempts to summarize topic resource policies if they exist.
AWS	sqs	This command enumerates all of the sqs queues and gives you the commands to receive messages from a queue and send messages to a queue (if you have the permissions needed). This command also attempts to summarize queue resource policies if they exist.
AWS	tags	List all resources with tags, and all of the tags. This can be used similar to inventory as another method to identify what types of resources exist in an account.
AWS	workloads	List all of the compute workloads and what role they have. Tells you if any of the roles are admin (bad) and if you have pmapper data locally, it will tell you if any of the roles can privesc to admin (also bad)
AWS	ds	List all of the AWS-managed directories and their attributes. Also summarizes the current trusts with their directions and types.

Azure Commands

Provider	Command Name	Description
Azure	whoami	Displays information on the tenant, subscriptions and resource groups available to your current Azure CLI session. This is useful to provide situation awareness on what tenant and subscription IDs to use with the other sub commands.
Azure	inventory	Display an inventory table of all resources per location.
Azure	rbac	Lists Azure RBAC role assignments at subscription or tenant level
Azure	storage	The storage command is still under development. Currently it only displays limited data about the storage accounts
Azure	vms	Enumerates useful information for Compute instances in all available resource groups and subscriptions

GCP Commands

For detailed documentation on each GCP command, see the GCP Commands Wiki.

Provider	Command Name	Description
GCP	whoami	Display identity context for the authenticated GCP user/service account
GCP	iam	Enumerate GCP IAM principals across organizations, folders, and projects
GCP	permissions	Enumerate ALL permissions for each IAM entity with full inheritance explosion
GCP	serviceaccounts	Enumerate GCP service accounts with security analysis
GCP	service-agents	Enumerate Google-managed service agents
GCP	keys	Enumerate all GCP keys (SA keys, HMAC keys, API keys)
GCP	resource-iam	Enumerate IAM policies on GCP resources (buckets, datasets, secrets, etc.)
GCP	domain-wide-delegation	Find service accounts with Domain-Wide Delegation to Google Workspace
GCP	privesc	Identify privilege escalation paths in GCP projects
GCP	hidden-admins	Identify principals who can modify IAM policies (hidden admins)
GCP	identity-federation	Enumerate Workload Identity Federation (external identities)
GCP	instances	Enumerate GCP Compute Engine instances with security configuration
GCP	gke	Enumerate GKE clusters with security analysis
GCP	cloudrun	Enumerate Cloud Run services and jobs with security analysis
GCP	functions	Enumerate GCP Cloud Functions with security analysis
GCP	app-engine	Enumerate App Engine applications and security configurations
GCP	composer	Enumerate Cloud Composer environments
GCP	dataproc	Enumerate Dataproc clusters
GCP	dataflow	Enumerate Dataflow jobs and pipelines
GCP	notebooks	Enumerate Vertex AI Workbench notebooks
GCP	workload-identity	Enumerate GKE Workload Identity and Workload Identity Federation
GCP	inventory	Quick resource inventory - works without Cloud Asset API
GCP	storage	Enumerate GCP Cloud Storage buckets with security configuration
GCP	storage-enum	Enumerate GCS buckets for sensitive files (credentials, secrets, configs)
GCP	bigquery	Enumerate GCP BigQuery datasets and tables with security analysis
GCP	cloudsql	Enumerate Cloud SQL instances with security analysis
GCP	spanner	Enumerate Cloud Spanner instances and databases
GCP	bigtable	Enumerate Cloud Bigtable instances and tables
GCP	filestore	Enumerate Filestore NFS instances
GCP	memorystore	Enumerate Memorystore (Redis) instances
GCP	vpc-networks	Enumerate VPC Networks
GCP	firewall	Enumerate VPC networks and firewall rules with security analysis
GCP	loadbalancers	Enumerate Load Balancers
GCP	dns	Enumerate Cloud DNS zones and records with security analysis
GCP	endpoints	Enumerate all network endpoints (external and internal) with IPs, ports, and hostnames
GCP	private-service-connect	Enumerate Private Service Connect endpoints and service attachments
GCP	network-topology	Visualize VPC network topology, peering relationships, and trust boundaries
GCP	vpc-sc	Enumerate VPC Service Controls
GCP	access-levels	Enumerate Access Context Manager access levels
GCP	cloud-armor	Enumerate Cloud Armor security policies and find weaknesses
GCP	iap	Enumerate Identity-Aware Proxy configurations
GCP	beyondcorp	Enumerate BeyondCorp Enterprise configurations
GCP	kms	Enumerate Cloud KMS key rings and crypto keys with security analysis
GCP	secrets	Enumerate GCP Secret Manager secrets with security configuration
GCP	cert-manager	Enumerate SSL/TLS certificates and find expiring or misconfigured certs
GCP	org-policies	Enumerate organization policies and identify security weaknesses
GCP	artifact-registry	Enumerate GCP Artifact Registry and Container Registry with security configuration
GCP	cloudbuild	Enumerate Cloud Build triggers and builds
GCP	source-repos	Enumerate Cloud Source Repositories
GCP	scheduler	Enumerate Cloud Scheduler jobs with security analysis
GCP	pubsub	Enumerate Pub/Sub topics and subscriptions with security analysis
GCP	logging	Enumerate Cloud Logging sinks and metrics with security analysis
GCP	organizations	Enumerate GCP organization hierarchy
GCP	asset-inventory	Enumerate Cloud Asset Inventory with optional dependency analysis
GCP	backup-inventory	Enumerate backup policies, protected resources, and identify backup gaps
GCP	lateral-movement	Map lateral movement paths, credential theft vectors, and pivot opportunities
GCP	data-exfiltration	Identify data exfiltration paths, potential vectors, and missing security hardening
GCP	public-access	Find resources with allUsers/allAuthenticatedUsers access across 16 GCP services
GCP	cross-project	Analyze cross-project IAM bindings, logging sinks, and Pub/Sub exports for lateral movement
GCP	foxmapper	Run FoxMapper (graph-based IAM analysis) for privilege escalation path discovery
GCP	logging-enum	Scan Cloud Logging entries for sensitive data (credentials, tokens, PII)
GCP	bigquery-enum	Scan BigQuery datasets, tables, and columns for sensitive data indicators
GCP	bigtable-enum	Scan Bigtable instances, tables, and column families for sensitive data indicators
GCP	spanner-enum	Scan Spanner database schemas for sensitive table and column names

Authors

• Carlos Vendramini
• Seth Art (@sethsec)
• Joseph Barcia

Contributing

Wiki - How to Contribute

FAQ

How does CloudFox compare with ScoutSuite, Prowler, Steampipe's AWS Compliance Module, AWS Security Hub, etc.

CloudFox doesn't create any alerts or findings, and doesn't check your environment for compliance to a baseline or benchmark. Instead, it simply enables you to be more efficient during your manual penetration testing activities. If gives you the information you'll likely need to validate whether an attack path is possible or not.

Why do I see errors in some CloudFox commands?

• Services that don't exist in all regions - CloudFox tries a few ways to figure out what services are supported in each region. However some services don't support the methods CloudFox uses, so CloudFox defaults to just asking every region about the service. Regions that don't support the service will return errors.
• You don't have permission - Another reason you might see errors if you don't have permissions to make calls that CloudFox is making. Either because the policy doesn't allow it (e.g., SecurityAudit doesn't allow all of the permissions CloudFox needs. Or, it might be an SCP that is blocking you.

You can always look in the ~/.cloudfox/cloudfox-error.log file to get more information on errors.

Prior work and other related projects

• SmogCloud - Inspiration for the endpoints command
• SummitRoute's AWS Exposable Resources - Inspiration for the endpoints command
• Steampipe - We used steampipe to prototype many cloudfox commands. While CloudFox is laser focused on helping cloud penetration testers, steampipe is an easy way to query any and all of your cloud resources.
• Principal Mapper - Inspiration for, and a strongly recommended partner to the iam-simulator command
• Cloudsplaining - Inspiration for the permissions command
• ScoutSuite - Excellent cloud security benchmark tool. Provided inspiration for the --userdata functionality in the instances command, the permissions command, and many others
• Prowler - Another excellent cloud security benchmark tool.
• Pacu - Excellent cloud penetration testing tool. PACU has quite a few enumeration commands similar to CloudFox, and lots of other commands that automate exploitation tasks (something that CloudFox avoids by design)
• CloudMapper - Inspiration for the inventory command and just generally CloudFox as a whole