type: attack-pattern
spec_version: 2.1
id: attack-pattern--57a3d31a-d04f-4663-b2da-7df8ec3f8c9d
created: 2020-08-20T17:51:25.671Z
created_by_ref: identity--c78cb6e5-0c4b-4611-8297-d1b8b55e40b5
revoked: no
external_references: source_name: mitre-attack
url: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1580
external_id: T1580
source_name: Expel IO Evil in AWS
description: A. Randazzo, B. Manahan and S. Lipton. (2020, April 28). Finding Evil in AWS. Retrieved June 25, 2020.
url: https://expel.io/blog/finding-evil-in-aws/
source_name: AWS Head Bucket
description: Amazon Web Services. (n.d.). AWS HeadBucket. Retrieved February 14, 2022.
url: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/API/API_HeadBucket.html
source_name: AWS Get Public Access Block
description: Amazon Web Services. (n.d.). Retrieved May 28, 2021.
url: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/API/API_GetPublicAccessBlock.html
source_name: AWS Describe DB Instances
description: Amazon Web Services. (n.d.). Retrieved May 28, 2021.
url: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonRDS/latest/APIReference/API_DescribeDBInstances.html
source_name: Amazon Describe Instance
description: Amazon. (n.d.). describe-instance-information. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
url: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/reference/ssm/describe-instance-information.html
source_name: Amazon Describe Instances API
description: Amazon. (n.d.). DescribeInstances. Retrieved May 26, 2020.
url: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/APIReference/API_DescribeInstances.html
source_name: Google Compute Instances
description: Google. (n.d.). gcloud compute instances list. Retrieved May 26, 2020.
url: https://cloud.google.com/sdk/gcloud/reference/compute/instances/list
source_name: Mandiant M-Trends 2020
description: Mandiant. (2020, February). M-Trends 2020. Retrieved November 17, 2024.
url: https://www.mandiant.com/sites/default/files/2021-09/mtrends-2020.pdf
source_name: Microsoft AZ CLI
description: Microsoft. (n.d.). az ad user. Retrieved October 6, 2019.
url: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/cli/azure/ad/user?view=azure-cli-latest
source_name: Malwarebytes OSINT Leaky Buckets - Hioureas
description: Vasilios Hioureas. (2019, September 13). Hacking with AWS: incorporating leaky buckets into your OSINT workflow. Retrieved February 14, 2022.
url: https://blog.malwarebytes.com/researchers-corner/2019/09/hacking-with-aws-incorporating-leaky-buckets-osint-workflow/
object_marking_refs: marking-definition--fa42a846-8d90-4e51-bc29-71d5b4802168
modified: 2025-10-24T17:48:49.479Z
name: Cloud Infrastructure Discovery
description: An adversary may attempt to discover infrastructure and resources that are available within an infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) environment. This includes compute service resources such as instances, virtual machines, and snapshots as well as resources of other services including the storage and database services.

Cloud providers offer methods such as APIs and commands issued through CLIs to serve information about infrastructure. For example, AWS provides a DescribeInstances API within the Amazon EC2 API that can return information about one or more instances within an account, the ListBuckets API that returns a list of all buckets owned by the authenticated sender of the request, the HeadBucket API to determine a bucket’s existence along with access permissions of the request sender, or the GetPublicAccessBlock API to retrieve access block configuration for a bucket.(Citation: Amazon Describe Instance)(Citation: Amazon Describe Instances API)(Citation: AWS Get Public Access Block)(Citation: AWS Head Bucket) Similarly, GCP's Cloud SDK CLI provides the gcloud compute instances list command to list all Google Compute Engine instances in a project (Citation: Google Compute Instances), and Azure's CLI command az vm list lists details of virtual machines.(Citation: Microsoft AZ CLI) In addition to API commands, adversaries can utilize open source tools to discover cloud storage infrastructure through [Wordlist Scanning](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1595/003).(Citation: Malwarebytes OSINT Leaky Buckets - Hioureas)

An adversary may enumerate resources using a compromised user's access keys to determine which are available to that user.(Citation: Expel IO Evil in AWS) The discovery of these available resources may help adversaries determine their next steps in the Cloud environment, such as establishing Persistence.(Citation: Mandiant M-Trends 2020)An adversary may also use this information to change the configuration to make the bucket publicly accessible, allowing data to be accessed without authentication. Adversaries have also may use infrastructure discovery APIs such as DescribeDBInstances to determine size, owner, permissions, and network ACLs of database resources. (Citation: AWS Describe DB Instances) Adversaries can use this information to determine the potential value of databases and discover the requirements to access them. Unlike in [Cloud Service Discovery](https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1526), this technique focuses on the discovery of components of the provided services rather than the services themselves.
kill_chain_phases: kill_chain_name: mitre-attack
phase_name: discovery
x_mitre_attack_spec_version: 3.2.0
x_mitre_contributors: Regina Elwell
Praetorian
Isif Ibrahima, Mandiant
x_mitre_deprecated: no
x_mitre_domains: enterprise-attack
x_mitre_is_subtechnique: no
x_mitre_modified_by_ref: identity--c78cb6e5-0c4b-4611-8297-d1b8b55e40b5
x_mitre_platforms: IaaS
x_mitre_version: 1.3