Microsoft Defender for Cloud
Cloud environments change fast. New workloads, new services and new risks appear daily, often without full visibility or clear ownership. Microsoft Defender for Cloud provides continuous assessment across Azure, hybrid and multi-cloud environments to help organisations understand and reduce cloud security risk.
CloudGuard ensures your cloud is configured, interpreted and operationalised in a way that delivers measurable improvement, not just recommendations. We work closely with your team to turn platform insight into structured action that supports long-term cloud security posture improvement.
Our service includes enablement across Azure subscriptions, validation of logging and workspace configuration, and review of role-based access controls to support stronger governance and clearer security oversight.
Funded Workshops Available
Microsoft funding may be available to support your implementation, helping reduce the cost of assessment, onboarding and optimisation.
CloudGuard delivers Microsoft-backed security engagements designed to help you quickly identify risk, validate the platform and establish a clear improvement plan, without the full upfront investment typically required.
Potential benefits include:
- Reduced cost of initial deployment and configuration
- Funded cloud security posture assessments
- Support for pilot or proof-of-value projects
- Faster time to value
- CloudGuard will guide you through eligibility and structure the engagement to ensure maximum value from available Microsoft funding.
Take Control of Cloud Security Posture
Overview
Microsoft Defender for Cloud is a cloud security posture management and workload protection platform designed to help organisations identify security weaknesses across cloud resources.
It continuously assesses your environment against security best practice and recognised compliance standards such as GDPR, highlighting misconfigurations, vulnerabilities and policy gaps. This gives IT teams a clearer understanding of where risk exists and what needs attention first.
iT is available across a range of licensing tiers. Core CSPM capabilities are included with an Azure subscription at no additional cost, while Defender CSPM premium and additional modules, including Defender for Containers, Servers, Kubernetes, Storage and SQL, extend protection with enhanced threat protection and vulnerability management features.
When implemented correctly, Microsoft Defender supports structured prioritisation, clearer reporting and stronger control over cloud security posture. CloudGuard ensures the platform reflects how your cloud environment is actually organised and governed, so findings are relevant, actionable and aligned to your operational priorities.
Outcomes
Our Defender for Cloud service focuses on structured security improvement, not just platform deployment. Each implementation we undertake is tailored to your specific cloud environment, security needs and organisation.
You gain clear visibility of cloud risk across workloads, subscriptions and services. Security recommendations are prioritised against operational impact, helping teams focus on changes that reduce exposure rather than simply clearing alerts. Shared responsibility is clarified, making ownership of controls and remediation actions explicit.
Our team of security experts translate findings into practical actions to ensure measurable improvement in cloud security posture, rather than reactive remediation.
Why it matters
Cloud security challenges rarely come from a single failure. They build up over time through small configuration changes, unclear ownership and limited oversight. Microsoft Defender addresses this by providing constant feedback and support rather than intermittent reports.
It helps teams identify risk earlier, track improvement through secure score measurement and maintain a clearer view of security posture as environments evolve. This supports more confident decision-making and reduces the likelihood of avoidable security incidents.
Where Cloud Security Often Breaks Down
Lack of clear visibility
Cloud environments expand rapidly across subscriptions, services and teams. Without continuous visibility, organisations lose track of asset configuration and exposure. Periodic reviews fail to capture ongoing change, allowing misconfigurations to persist and increasing the likelihood of preventable risk.
Unclear responsibility
Shared responsibility between cloud providers and customers is frequently misunderstood. Configuration, access control and data protection are often assumed to sit elsewhere, creating gaps in ownership. Over time, this weakens accountability, increases exposure and complicates audit response.
Too much noise
Cloud security tools generate high volumes of findings, often without sufficient context. Without structured prioritisation, teams struggle to assess urgency or operational impact. Critical issues are buried beneath lower-value alerts, increasing fatigue and weakening confidence in security reporting.
Microsoft Defender for Cloud with CloudGuard
Focused configuration, not default settings
The platform is powerful, but default configurations rarely reflect how organisations actually operate. We work with your team to tailor policies, controls and recommendations to your environment. This includes aligning coverage across subscriptions, validating workspace architecture and retention settings, and reviewing access controls to support least-privilege security practices. This avoids generic findings and helps ensure insights are relevant, proportionate and aligned to operational priorities, rather than creating unnecessary noise or unrealistic remediation tasks.
Our deployment covers enablement of Defender for Cloud across all available Azure subscriptions, validation of Log Analytics workspace architecture, including location and data retention policies, and alignment of role-based access controls to ensure the principle of least privilege is consistently applied.
For organisations with hybrid or multi-cloud environments, deployment extends to on-premises and other cloud provider resources through the Azure Arc agent, supporting AWS and GCP workloads alongside native Azure coverage. Where Defender for SQL is in scope, the Azure Monitoring Agent is deployed to SQL servers as part of the licensing requirement.
Clear prioritisation and practical guidance
Security recommendations only add value when teams understand what to act on and why. Our experts help interpret Defender for Cloud findings, providing clarity around risk, ownership and urgency. This structured approach supports better decision-making, helping teams focus on changes that genuinely reduce exposure rather than reacting to every alert equally.
Where required, the service can also be extended to provide broader visibility into identity permissions and externally exposed assets, helping organisations understand risk beyond standard Defender for Cloud recommendations.
Ongoing posture improvement, not one-off setup
Cloud security is not static. As environments change, posture must be reviewed and refined. We support ongoing use of the solution, helping teams track progress through secure score, maintain visibility as workloads evolve, and embed continuous improvement into everyday operations rather than treating security as a one-off project.
Optional Add-On Modules
In addition to the core Defender for Cloud deployment, CloudGuard offers two specialist add-on modules for organisations that require deeper visibility into their identity posture and external attack surface.
Cloud Infrastructure Entitlement Management (CIEM)
The CIEM module provides visibility into identity risk across your cloud environment. This includes:
- Inventory of identities, roles and permissions across subscriptions and tenants
- Identification of over-privileged, unused and inactive identities, including users, service principals and managed identities
- Review of role assignments, custom RBAC roles and privileged escalation paths
- Evaluation of Just-In-Time (JIT) and Privileged Identity Management (PIM) adoption
- Mapping of identity-based attack paths
- Recommendations for least privilege enforcement and identity governance improvement
External Attack Surface Management (EASM)
The EASM module extends visibility beyond your internal environment to assess how your organisation appears from the outside. This includes:
- Deployment of the EASM resource within your Azure environment
- Discovery of externally exposed assets, including domains, endpoints and IP addresses
- Correlation of externally visible resources with internal Defender posture data
- Review of DNS hygiene, certificate management and expired or misconfigured assets
- Prioritisation of high-risk exposures to support focused remediation
Who this service is for
Microsoft Defender for Cloud is suited to organisations using cloud platforms that need clearer visibility, stronger governance and more consistent security control.
It is suitable for:
- Organisations using cloud platforms – Businesses running workloads in the cloud that need better visibility and control across their environments.
- Teams managing sensitive or important data – Organisations that require stronger oversight and more consistent security practices to protect critical information.
- Businesses without dedicated security resources – Teams that need additional support to manage cloud security effectively and act on recommendations.
- Organisations with growing or changing environments – Businesses experiencing increased cloud usage or complexity that need to maintain consistent security as they scale.
- Teams looking to improve security over time – Organisations that want to move towards a more structured, proactive approach to managing cloud risk.
Why CloudGuard
CloudGuard goes beyond platform deployment. We ensure your cloud is configured, interpreted and operationalised in line with your architecture, governance model and risk priorities.
Our role is to turn security insight into action. By aligning configuration, prioritisation and ongoing posture improvement, we help organisations strengthen cloud security faster, with clearer oversight and less operational strain.
If you want practical security improvements rather than just recommendations, speak with us today about how we can support your team
Frequently asked questions
What does it actually do?
Microsoft Defender continuously assesses cloud environments to identify security misconfigurations, vulnerabilities and policy gaps. It provides prioritised recommendations that help organisations understand risk and improve cloud security posture across Azure, hybrid and multi-cloud environments.
Is it only for Azure?
No. While it integrates deeply with Azure, Microsoft Defender for Cloud can also provide visibility and protection across hybrid and multi-cloud environments, including supported workloads running outside Azure. Azure Arc is used to extend coverage to on-premises and other cloud provider resources, including AWS and GCP.
What licence do we need?
Core CSPM capabilities are available with an existing Azure subscription at no additional cost. Defender CSPM premium and additional modules, such as Defender for Containers, Servers, Kubernetes, Storage and SQL, are available as paid add-ons for organisations requiring enhanced threat protection and vulnerability management. CloudGuard can advise on the right licensing configuration for your environment.
Do we still need security expertise if we use Microsoft Defender for Cloud?
Yes. The platform highlights risk and recommendations, but teams still need to interpret findings and decide what to address first. CloudGuard helps translate insight into clear, practical actions.
How does CloudGuard support Microsoft Defender?
CloudGuard helps with configuration, interpretation and ongoing use of Microsoft Defender We ensure it reflects your environment, reduces noise and supports continuous improvement in cloud security posture.
What are the CIEM and EASM modules?
CIEM (Cloud Infrastructure Entitlement Management) provides deep visibility into identity risk, covering permissions, over-privileged accounts and identity-based attack paths. EASM (External Attack Surface Management) maps your organisation’s external exposure, helping identify and prioritise risks associated with internet-facing assets. Both are available as optional add-ons to the core Defender for Cloud deployment.
