// Comparison

How to Hack Like a Ghost vs Pentesting Azure Applications: Which Should You Read?

Two cybersecurity books on Offensive, compared honestly: who each is for, what each does best, and which to read first.

Intermediate

4/52021

Breaching the Cloud

Sparc Flow

A narrated, real-time breach of a fictional data-driven political consulting firm's AWS and Kubernetes environment, written by a working penetration tester who presents at Black Hat and DEF CON.

Intermediate

3/52018

Pentesting Azure Applications

The Definitive Guide to Testing and Securing Deployments

Matt Burrough

Matt Burrough on attacker behaviour against Azure tenants: identity, storage, VMs, key material handling, and the recon paths that work against real subscriptions.

Read this if

Pentesters and red teamers who want cloud-specific tradecraft (AWS, Kubernetes, anonymous attacker infrastructure, OPSEC) delivered as a readable narrative rather than a reference manual. The target is fictional; the vulnerabilities it exploits are patterns seen in real cloud environments.

Cloud pentesters whose scope includes Azure subscriptions. Burrough covers identity (Entra ID), storage account abuse, VM-level recon, key material handling, and the role-based access patterns that drive real Azure post-exploitation.

Skip this if

Readers wanting a structured, chapter-by-chapter reference they can jump around in; the book is a continuous narrative from recon to full compromise, better read start to finish than dipped into. Beginners with no cloud or Linux fundamentals will struggle to keep pace.

Readers focused on AWS or GCP, or anyone wanting current Azure tradecraft. The book pre-dates the current AAD-now-Entra-ID rebrand and several major service updates; treat it as foundational, not current.

Key takeaways

Treats attacker OPSEC and anonymous infrastructure as seriously as the exploitation itself, which most cloud-pentest material skips.
Walks a complete, realistic AWS and Kubernetes attack chain end to end rather than isolated techniques.
The narrative format keeps the tradecraft memorable in a way a reference manual rarely does — closer to Mr. Robot than to a lab manual.

Azure attack patterns center on identity and roles, not network-level vulnerabilities; the book's framing reflects that.
Storage account misconfigurations remain one of the most common Azure findings; the book's coverage of access-key abuse is still relevant.
Cloud pentest reporting differs meaningfully from network pentest reporting; the book's deliverable templates are useful starting points.

How they compare

We rate How to Hack Like a Ghost higher (4/5 against 3/5 for Pentesting Azure Applications). For most readers, that means How to Hack Like a Ghost is the primary pick and Pentesting Azure Applications is a useful follow-up.

Both books target intermediate-level readers, so the choice is about topic, not difficulty.

How to Hack Like a Ghost and Pentesting Azure Applications both cover Offensive, Cloud, so reading them in sequence reinforces the same material from different angles.

Keep reading

How to Hack Like a Ghost

→ Alternatives to How to Hack Like a Ghost → What to read after How to Hack Like a Ghost