👉 Overview

👀 What ?

Google Cloud Platform's (GCP) App Engine Post Exploitation is a cybersecurity practice where an attacker, having already gained unauthorized access to a system, tries to maintain that access and further exploit the system. This often involves escalating privileges, stealing data, installing backdoors, etc.

🧐 Why ?

Understanding GCP App Engine Post Exploitation is crucial for both offensive and defensive cybersecurity. For offensive security professionals, it's a key phase in a successful attack. For defenders, understanding these techniques can help in building robust security measures and in incident response to minimize damage.

⛏️ How ?

Post Exploitation in GCP App Engine typically involves steps like maintaining persistence, escalating privileges, internal reconnaissance, collecting and exfiltrating data. It's important to have a solid understanding of the GCP environment, its services like the App Engine, and the underlying architecture.

⏳ When ?

The practice of post exploitation has been around as long as cybersecurity itself. However, with the advent of cloud platforms like GCP, these techniques have evolved to fit the new landscape.

⚙️ Technical Explanations

In GCP App Engine Post Exploitation, once an attacker has gained initial access, they may use various techniques. Persistence can be achieved by creating new service accounts with broad permissions. Escalating privileges could involve exploiting misconfigurations in IAM roles. Internal reconnaissance could involve mapping network resources and data flows. Data collection and exfiltration might involve accessing Cloud Storage buckets or BigQuery datasets. Understanding these techniques and the GCP environment is crucial for both launching and defending against these attacks.