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Jussi Metso

It’s all about The Cloud and The Security

Diagram showing Azure Defender for Cloud moving from old framework with disconnected workloads to new unified Microsoft Defender portal
June 22, 2026June 22, 2026

Enabling Cloud Security in Defender portal

You have been using Defender for Cloud via Azure since it has been in use (2016) and  now you would like to try this new unified cloud security Defender for Cloud experience in Defender portal.

What’s next? You type the url for Defender portal (https://security.microsoft.com) to your favourite browser and hit enter. You log in with your credentials and now what?

You see in the left navigation a Cloud Security option and under that an Overview link. Press that.

After pressing an overview you see this image:

You need to prepare your tenant to enable Defender for Cloud functions in Defender portal. After pressing the button opens the next panel:

Benefits are seen in the picture but what to expect are:

Important:

Microsoft needs to prepare your tenant to enable Cloud Security experiences in the Defender portal. No additional charges will be applied.
 

Prerequisites:

Accounts must have one of the following Entra ID roles:

Global Administrator
Security Administrator
 
In addition, Defender for Cloud with an active Defender security plan is required – plans can be enabled in the Azure portal.
 

Duration:

The tenant preparation process may take up to 6 hours to complete. This means that all the recommendations, graphics, metrics are in place. The UI is shown immediately after pressing the button.
After the preparation is done UI looks like this and you get also a Getting started guide.

I have made an image of what features there are currently in Defender portal and what needs to do in Azure. 

Better feature comparison is found from MS Learn.

Transition is on the way and features are tested very carefully at the moment. 

Follow the Defender for Cloud release notes for the new features. Almost weekly comes something new. 

 

Copyright Jussi Metso
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Jussi Metso

Author is a lifelong IT enthusiast, Microsoft Security MVP and interested in Cloud Security, XDR, SIEM and AI. Motto: Learning is the key for your future.

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