Practical guide to hardening accounts and identities in Aws, azure and google cloud

To harden cloud accounts and identities in AWS, Azure and Google Cloud, standardize identity hygiene (MFA, strong auth, no shared users), restrict and monitor privileged roles, isolate workloads by accounts/subscriptions/projects, and automate guardrails and alerting. Start small: protect break‑glass accounts, root/global admins, and service principals before tuning fine‑grained permissions.

Concise hardening checklist for cloud accounts and identities

• Enable phishing‑resistant MFA and disable shared or anonymous admin accounts across AWS, Azure and Google Cloud.
• Remove direct user access keys where possible; prefer SSO, short‑lived tokens and managed identities.
• Create separate accounts/subscriptions/projects for production, non‑production and security tooling.
• Lock down root/owner roles, break‑glass accounts and directory/global admin roles with strict procedures.
• Apply least privilege using groups, custom roles and access reviews; block wildcard permissions.
• Continuously monitor sign‑ins, privilege changes and service account key use; respond with tested playbooks.
• Document your guia segurança IAM AWS Azure Google Cloud with a simple, versioned baseline per environment.

Threat model and prerequisites for AWS, Azure and GCP identities

This guia prático de segurança em nuvem AWS Azure Google Cloud focuses on:

1. Compromise of human identities (phishing, password reuse, MFA fatigue, OAuth consent abuse).
2. Abuse of cloud‑native identities (IAM roles, service principals, service accounts, keys and tokens).
3. Privilege escalation via misconfigured roles, inheritance, trust policies and cross‑cloud federation.

Who this is for:

• Teams in Brazil (pt_BR context) running workloads in at least one of AWS, Azure or Google Cloud.
• Intermediate admins who know the consoles/CLI and want melhores práticas hardening contas e identidades AWS and equivalents in other clouds.
• Organizations considering serviços de consultoria segurança em nuvem e hardening IAM but first wanting an internal baseline.

When you should not apply these steps yet:

• You do not have admin rights in any of the target tenants/accounts/projects (coordinate with the owner first).
• There is no basic backup and change‑management process: secure that first so you can roll back mistakes safely.
• You are in the middle of a major incident without forensic support: prioritize triage with your IR team before structural changes.

AWS account and IAM hardening checklist (practical steps)

Prerequisites for the AWS part of this guia segurança IAM AWS Azure Google Cloud:

• Access to at least one AWS payer/management account and the ability to assume an OrganizationAccountAccessRole or equivalent.
• Permissions to manage IAM, AWS Organizations, CloudTrail, CloudWatch, IAM Identity Center (or legacy SSO), and GuardDuty.
• CLI installed and configured on a secure admin workstation:
  • aws configure sso for SSO‑based access, or short‑lived access keys if SSO is not ready.

AWS prioritized identity hygiene actions

1. Lock down the root user safely – Enable MFA on the root user, store credentials offline in a secured vault, and stop using it for daily tasks.
   • Verification: aws iam get-account-summary --query 'SummaryMap.AccountMFAEnabled'
2. Centralize identities with IAM Identity Center or external IdP – Prefer SSO and identity federation instead of local IAM users.
   • Action: configure SAML/OIDC with your IdP and map groups to permission sets.
   • Verification: list users and ensure no new long‑lived IAM users are being created.
3. Remove unused IAM users and access keys – Audit IAM users and disable or delete inactive ones.
   • Command: aws iam generate-credential-report --output text && aws iam get-credential-report --query 'Content' --output text | base64 --decode > cred-report.csv
4. Restrict administrator access – Create a small admin group mapped to an AWS managed or custom admin policy, enforce MFA, and require just‑in‑time elevation if possible.
5. Segment environments using AWS Organizations – Separate production, non‑production, and security tooling into different accounts under OUs with Service Control Policies (SCPs).
6. Harden IAM roles and trust policies – Reduce sts:AssumeRole to only trusted principals, avoid "Principal":"*", and log role assumptions.

AWS identity monitoring and verification table

Control	What to check	Example verification command
Root MFA enabled	Root not used; MFA active	aws iam get-account-summary --query 'SummaryMap.AccountMFAEnabled'
No long‑lived admin keys	Admins via SSO, no active access keys	aws iam list-users --query 'Users[*].UserName' then inspect credential report
CloudTrail for all accounts	Trails enabled, immutable storage	aws cloudtrail describe-trails --include-shadow-trails
GuardDuty enabled	Monitoring across all regions	aws guardduty list-detectors
SCPs enforced	OU‑level guardrails in place	aws organizations list-policies --filter SERVICE_CONTROL_POLICY

Azure AD, management groups and subscription hardening checklist

Preparation checklist before Azure step‑by‑step actions:

• Global Administrator or Privileged Role Administrator rights in the target Azure AD tenant.
• Owner or User Access Administrator on management groups/subscriptions to change RBAC.
• Azure CLI installed and logged in with az login, and familiarity with how to proteger identidades e acessos na nuvem Azure.
• At least one secure break‑glass account stored in a vault and tested.

1. Secure Azure AD tenant and break‑glass accounts – Create 1-2 cloud‑only break‑glass users with strong passwords, no conditional access, and admin roles. Store credentials offline and test sign‑in quarterly.
2. Enable MFA and Conditional Access baseline – Require MFA for all users, with stricter policies for administrators.
   • Use named locations, device compliance, and sign‑in risk rules where licensing permits.
   • Ensure at least one policy excludes break‑glass accounts to prevent lockout.
3. Limit directory roles and privileged accounts – Reduce Global Administrator assignments; prefer Privileged Identity Management (PIM) for just‑in‑time elevation.
   • Action: review Global Administrator, Privileged Role Administrator, and Owner role assignments regularly.
4. Standardize management groups and subscriptions – Create a root management group and child groups for production, non‑production, and platform/security.
   • Assign RBAC at management group level instead of subscription/resource group where possible.
5. Harden subscription‑level RBAC – Remove user assignments with broad Owner or Contributor rights, replacing them with custom roles granting only required actions.
6. Secure service principals and app registrations – Avoid secrets when you can use certificates or managed identities; remove unused applications and review consented permissions.
   • Regularly audit Application.ReadWrite.All and similar high‑impact OAuth permissions.
7. Enable logging and access monitoring – Turn on Azure AD sign‑in logs, audit logs, and Azure Activity Logs; forward to Log Analytics, Sentinel or another SIEM.

Azure identity controls and checks table

Control	What to verify	Example verification command
MFA and Conditional Access	All users require MFA; admins have stricter rules	az ad conditional-access policy list --query "[].{name:displayName,state:state}"
Directory role minimization	Few Global Admins; PIM in use	az role assignment list --include-classic-administrators
Management group hierarchy	Root and environment‑based structure present	az account management-group list
Service principal hygiene	No expired/unused secrets; minimal permissions	az ad sp list --query "[].appDisplayName"
Activity and sign‑in logs	Logs flow to Log Analytics/SIEM	az monitor diagnostic-settings list --resource <resource-id>

Google Cloud IAM, organizations and service account hardening checklist

Use this checklist to validate basic identity hardening in Google Cloud projects and folders:

• Organization node exists and all projects belong to it; no orphaned projects under personal accounts.
• No human users with roles/owner on projects; restrict to dedicated admin groups at folder/org level.
• Service accounts follow naming conventions per application, not per person, with one primary purpose each.
• No user‑managed service account keys unless strictly necessary and time‑bound.
• Workload identities (Workload Identity Federation / Workload Identity Pools) used for external workloads instead of long‑lived keys.
• Cloud Identity / Google Workspace integrated; SSO and MFA configured for admins and users.
• IAM policy bindings reviewed regularly to avoid allUsers or allAuthenticatedUsers on sensitive resources.
• Central logging via Cloud Logging and Cloud Audit Logs for Admin Read, Data Read and Data Write events.
• Security Command Center or equivalent used for continuous posture management, including identity‑related misconfigurations.

Google Cloud IAM quick checks table

Control	What to verify	Example verification command
Owners minimized	Only groups or admin projects have owner‑like roles	gcloud projects get-iam-policy PROJECT_ID --format=json
Service account key usage	No unnecessary user‑managed keys	gcloud iam service-accounts keys list --iam-account SA@PROJECT_ID.iam.gserviceaccount.com
Organization‑level policies	Constraints for allowed domains, external sharing, etc.	gcloud resource-manager org-policies list --organization ORG_ID
Audit logs enabled	Admin & Data access logging active	Check Audit Logs section in Cloud Console per service
MFA for admins	Security keys or MFA enforced for privileged users	Review security settings in Cloud Identity / Workspace admin console

Cross-cloud federation, SSO and least-privilege patterns

Frequent mistakes when attempting unified segurança em nuvem AWS Azure Google Cloud with federation and SSO:

• Granting broad administrator roles to federated identities without clear separation of duties per cloud.
• Trusting entire external tenants or domains instead of explicit groups or service principals.
• Using static secrets (client secrets, access keys) instead of short‑lived tokens or workload identities.
• Failing to align group design between the IdP and cloud RBAC/IAM, leading to permission sprawl.
• Creating circular trust relationships between clouds that allow lateral movement after one compromise.
• Not enforcing MFA and conditional access on the primary identity provider used for all clouds.
• Mixing human and machine access in the same roles or groups, making auditing and revocation difficult.
• Lack of consistent naming and tagging across AWS accounts, Azure subscriptions and GCP projects.
• Ignoring vendor‑provided hardening guides and relying only on default policies or legacy settings.
• Skipping small proof‑of‑concepts: rolling out complex federation patterns directly to production.

Automation, detection and incident response playbook for identity breaches

After the basics, choose one or more automation and monitoring strategies instead of fully manual control:

1. Cloud‑native security centers and policies – Use AWS Security Hub, Azure Security Center/Defender for Cloud, and GCP Security Command Center to enforce policies and alert on misconfigurations.
   • Recommended when you want fast value with minimal custom code, leveraging each provider's controls.
2. Central SIEM with correlated identity signals – Forward CloudTrail, Azure AD and GCP Audit Logs into a SIEM for unified detections and alerts.
   • Recommended for organizations that already operate a SOC and need cross‑cloud correlation.
3. Infrastructure as Code guardrails – Use tools such as Terraform, Bicep or CloudFormation plus policy‑as‑code (e.g., OPA, Azure Policy) to codify your identity baseline.
   • Recommended when you have DevOps maturity and want reproducible, reviewable changes.
4. Managed serviços de consultoria segurança em nuvem e hardening IAM – Engage specialized partners to implement and operate the above if in‑house skills are limited.
   • Recommended for teams with strict timelines, complex compliance or limited security headcount.

Regardless of the option, document a simple identity incident playbook: detect suspicious sign‑ins, isolate affected principals, rotate credentials, review logs for lateral movement, and then implement permanent fixes to your IAM baseline.

Common implementation clarifications and edge cases

Should I centralize all identities in a single IdP before hardening the clouds?

It is strongly recommended but not mandatory. You can start by hardening built‑in identities in each cloud, then gradually migrate to a central IdP with SSO. Avoid blocking progress waiting for a perfect identity architecture.

How do I avoid locking everyone out with stricter MFA and Conditional Access?

First create and test break‑glass accounts, then roll out new policies in report‑only or staged mode. Start with a small pilot group, monitor sign‑in logs, and only then expand to all users and admins.

What is the safest way to clean up old IAM users and service accounts?

Export credentials and access logs, identify inactive or low‑use principals, then disable them before deletion. Monitor for errors from affected applications for a defined period; if none appear, you can safely remove the accounts.

Do I need separate AWS accounts, Azure subscriptions and GCP projects for every team?

Not necessarily. Prioritize separation by sensitivity and environment (production vs. non‑production). Within those, you can group multiple teams if RBAC and tagging are used correctly and logs remain centralized.

How often should I review high-privilege roles and permissions?

A practical baseline is quarterly reviews of admin groups, custom roles and service principals. In high‑risk or regulated environments, consider monthly reviews or near real‑time alerts for privilege changes.

Can I rely only on cloud-native security centers and skip a SIEM?

For small and medium environments this is often acceptable, especially when starting. As multi‑cloud usage grows or compliance demands centralized logging, plan a phased migration to a SIEM with correlated detections.

What is the priority if I have almost no time: monitoring or configuration changes?

Start with a few high‑impact configuration changes that reduce risk immediately: MFA, break‑glass, root/admin lock‑down. In parallel, enable basic logging and alerts so you can see and react to suspicious activity.