Promotional credits are free or discounted usage allowances a cloud, API, or software provider gives to new users, trial accounts, or partners. They lower the barrier to testing a service and help legitimate customers evaluate cost and performance before paying.
In cyber security, these credits are attractive to fraudsters because they can be turned into real compute, storage, or API calls with little upfront cost. Attackers may automate signups, use disposable identities, or rotate proxies to collect credits at scale and then resell the resulting access or consume it for spam, scraping, or model abuse. Defenders watch for repeated trial creation, suspicious billing patterns, and unusual credit burn rates. Strong registration checks, risk-based limits, and short-lived scoped credentials help reduce abuse while preserving normal onboarding.