Patent attributes
Privilege escalation in a cloud platform comprises provisioning to a client access privileges to the database entities that are covered by a license. A base escalation matrix is provisioned to the client with additional access privileges not covered by the license. An API request is received and the requested CRUD operation is attempted on a first database entity. Responsive to the requested CRUD operation initially failing because the client does not have required access privileges activation of an exception signaling failure of the requested CRUD operation is detected and used as a trigger to fetch the base escalation matrix. The access privileges of the client are escalated by applying the additional access privileges from the base escalation matrix to a user context of the current API query request, and repeating the requested CRUD operation. The escalated access privileges are then removed.