Amazon Web Services SOA-C02 AWS Certified SysOps Administrator - Associate (SOA-C02) Exam Practice Test

Here are the steps to configure Amazon EventBridge to meet the above requirements:

Log in to the AWS Management Console by using the AWS Management Console shortcut from the VM desktop. Make sure that you are logged in to the desired AWS account.

Go to the EventBridge service in the us-east-2 Region.

In the EventBridge service, navigate to the "Event buses" page.

Click on the "Create event bus" button.

Give a name to your event bus, and select "default" as the event source type.

Navigate to "Rules" page and create a new rule named "RunFunction"

In the "Event pattern" section, select "Schedule" as the event source and set the schedule to run every 15 minutes.

In the "Actions" section, select "Send to Lambda" and choose the existing AWS Lambda function named "LogEventFunction"

Create another rule named "SpotWarning"

In the "Event pattern" section, select "EC2" as the event source, and filter the events on "EC2 Spot Instance interruption"

In the "Actions" section, select "Send to SNS topic" and create a new standard Amazon SNS topic named "TopicEvents"

In the "Input Transformer" section, set the Input Path to {“instance” : “$.detail.instance-id”} and Input template to “The EC2 Spot Instance has been interrupted on account.

Now all Amazon EC2 events in the default event bus will be replayable for past 90 days.

Note:

You can use the AWS Management Console, AWS CLI, or SDKs to create and manage EventBridge resources.

You can use CloudTrail event history to replay events from the past 90 days.

You can refer to the AWS EventBridge documentation for more information on how to configure and use the service: https://aws.amazon.com/eventbridge/

Here are the steps to configure an Amazon S3 bucket to serve a static error page in the event of a failure at the primary site:

Log in to the AWS Management Console and navigate to the S3 service in the us-east-2 Region.

Find the existing S3 bucket named lab-751906329398-26023898.com and click on it.

In the "Properties" tab, click on "Static website hosting" and select "Use this bucket to host a website".

In "Index Document" field, enter the name of the object that you want to use as the index document, in this case, "index.html"

In the "Permissions" tab, click on "Block Public Access", and make sure that "Block all public access" is turned OFF.

Click on "Bucket Policy" and add the following policy to allow public read access:

{

"Version": "2012-10-17",

"Statement": [

{

"Sid": "PublicReadGetObject",

"Effect": "Allow",

"Principal": "*",

"Action": "s3:GetObject",

"Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::lab-751906329398-26023898.com/*"

}

]

}

Now navigate to the Amazon Route 53 service, and find the existing hosted zone named lab-751906329398-26023898.com.

Click on the "A record" and update the routing policy to "Primary - Failover" and add the existing ALB as the primary record.

Click on "Create Record" button and create a new secondary failover alias record for the domain lab-751906329398-26023898.com that routes traffic to the existing S3 bucket.

Now, when the primary site (ALB) goes down, traffic will be automatically routed to the S3 bucket serving the static error page.

Note:

You can use CloudWatch to monitor the health of your ALB.

You can use Amazon S3 to host a static website.

You can use Amazon Route 53 for routing traffic to different resources based on health checks.

You can refer to the AWS documentation for more information on how to configure and use these services:

https://aws.amazon.com/s3/

https://aws.amazon.com/route53/

https://aws.amazon.com/cloudwatch/

Graphical user interface, text, application Description automatically generated

Graphical user interface, application, Teams Description automatically generated

Here are the steps to update an existing AWS CloudFormation stack:

Log in to the AWS Management Console and navigate to the CloudFormation service in the us-east-2 Region.

Find the existing stack named 1700182 and click on it.

Click on the "Update" button.

Choose "Replace current template" and upload the updated CloudFormation template from the Amazon S3 bucket named "cloudformation-bucket"

In the "Parameter" section, update the EC2 instance type to us-east-t2.nano and add the IP address range 192.168.100.0/30 for SSH access.

Replace the instance profile IAM role with IamRoleB.

In the "Capabilities" section, check the checkbox for "IAM Resources"

Choose the role CFServiceR01e and click on "Update Stack"

Wait for the stack to be updated.

Once the update is complete, navigate to the stack and click on the "Stack options" button, and select "Prevent updates to prevent accidental deletion"

To get the value of the Prodlnstanceld , navigate to the "Outputs" tab in the CloudFormation stack and find the key "Prodlnstanceld". The value corresponding to it is the value that you need to enter in the text box below.

Note:

You can use AWS CloudFormation to update an existing stack.

You can use the AWS CloudFormation service role to deploy updates.

You can refer to the AWS CloudFormation documentation for more information on how to update and manage stacks: https://aws.amazon.com/cloudformation/

Encrypt the snapshot copies by using AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS). This solution will allow the company to automatically create encrypted snapshots of the EBS volumes and copy them to different AWS Regions with minimal effort.

To manage incomplete multipart uploads in an Amazon S3 bucket, creating an S3 Lifecycle rule to specifically address these uploads is the most effective method. The rule can be configured to automatically delete expired multipart upload parts, which helps in cleaning up unused data and reducing storage costs. Option A is correct as it directly addresses the requirement to manage incomplete uploads effectively. Reference on setting up S3 Lifecycle policies can be found here Amazon S3 Lifecycle.

To create a backup strategy for all Amazon EC2 instances across all the company's AWS accounts using AWS Organizations, AWS Backup is the most operationally efficient solution.

AWS Backup:

AWS Backup provides centralized backup management and automates the backup of data across AWS services.

It supports creating backup plans that can apply to resources across multiple AWS accounts within an AWS Organization.

Using AWS Backup:

Open the AWS Backup console in the management account.

Create a backup plan and define backup policies (e.g., frequency, retention).

Use the backup policies to automatically apply to all EC2 instances in all member accounts of the AWS Organization.

References:

AWS Backup

AWS Backup for Multi-Account

To allow access using current LDAP credentials while migrating to AWS, the best approach is to federate the LDAP directory with IAM using SAML.

Set Up SAML-Based Federation:

AWS supports identity federation using SAML (Security Assertion Markup Language) 2.0. You need to configure your LDAP directory to federate with AWS IAM via SAML.

Objective:

Receive a notification when both disk space usage and DiskReadOps exceed threshold values.

Composite Alarms:

Composite alarms allow combining multiple metric alarms into a single alarm. Notifications are triggered only when all conditions are met.

Steps to Implement:

Step 1: Install the CloudWatch agent on the EC2 instances and configure it to monitor disk space.

Step 2: Create individual metric alarms:

One for disk space usage.

One for the DiskReadOps metric.

Step 3: Create a composite alarm:

Include both metric alarms.

Configure the composite alarm to send notifications to the SNS topic when both conditions are met.

AWS References:

Composite Alarms in CloudWatch:Creating Composite Alarms

CloudWatch Agent Installation:Install CloudWatch Agent

Why Other Options Are Incorrect:

Option B: This would trigger notifications for either condition, not both simultaneously.

Option C: EBSByteBalance% is unrelated to free disk space.

Option D: Detailed monitoring is not required for composite alarms.

NAT Gateway resides in public subnet, and traffic should be routed from private subnet to NAT Gateway: https://docs .aws.amazon.com/vpc/latest/userguide/vpc-nat-gateway.html

Using a CloudWatch alarm with an EventBridge rule provides an automated, direct way to reboot the EC2 instance without extra components like SES or Lambda. This is a straightforward approach with low operational overhead.

To implement a highly available database solution that is ideal for multi-tenant workloads, migrating the database to an Amazon Aurora DB cluster and adding an Aurora Replica is the most suitable solution.

Amazon Aurora:

A fully managed relational database engine that's compatible with MySQL and PostgreSQL.

Provides high availability and durability through multiple replicas and automated failover.

Aurora Replicas:

Aurora Replicas share the same storage as the primary instance, providing increased read throughput and high availability.

In the event of a primary instance failure, an Aurora Replica can be promoted to primary.

Implementation Steps:

Migrate the MySQL database to an Amazon Aurora DB cluster.

Add one or more Aurora Replicas to the cluster to distribute read traffic and enhance availability.

References:

Amazon Aurora

High Availability for Amazon Aurora

To meet the requirements of logging all access attempts to the S3 bucket and receiving immediate notification about any delete events, the company can enable S3 server access logging and set up an Amazon Simple Notification Service (Amazon SNS) notification for the S3 bucket. The S3 server access logs will record all access attempts to the bucket, including delete events, and the SNS notification can be configured to send an alert when a DeleteObject event occurs.

To address the issue of an errant process consuming an entire processor and running at 100%, the SysOps administrator can automate the restarting of the instance using Amazon CloudWatch and AWS Systems Manager.

Enable Detailed Monitoring:

Ensure that detailed monitoring is enabled on the EC2 instance. Detailed monitoring provides data in 1-minute periods, which is crucial for detecting the 2-minute threshold accurately.

To manage user accounts and permissions across multiple AWS accounts and integrate with an on-premises Active Directory, using AD Connector is the most operationally efficient solution. AD Connector serves as a directory gateway with which you can redirect directory requests to your on-premises Microsoft Active Directory without storing any directory data in the cloud. This setup allows IAM Identity Center to use the existing corporate credentials, ensuring centralized management and seamless user access control. Option C perfectly meets these requirements by leveraging existing infrastructure with minimal changes. AWS documentation on AD Connector offers guidance AWS Directory Service AD Connector.

To ensure that the application endpoint has a static public IP address, the SysOps administrator should deploy the application behind an internet-facing Network Load Balancer (NLB):

Network Load Balancer:

An NLB automatically provides a static IP address that can be associated with the load balancer. It supports static IP addresses for each Availability Zone and can handle a high number of requests per second.

To automate the invocation of an AWS Lambda function at the end of each day, you can use Amazon EventBridge (formerly known as CloudWatch Events) to create a scheduled rule.

Create a Scheduled EventBridge Rule:

Open the Amazon EventBridge console at Amazon EventBridge Console.

Choose Create rule.

Provide a name and description for the rule.

For Rule type, choose Schedule.

Define a cron expression that runs the rule at the end of each day. For example, cron(0 0 * * ? *) runs the function at midnight UTC.

Set the Target:

In the Targets section, choose Add target.

For Target type, select Lambda function.

Choose the Lambda function you want to invoke.

Create the Rule:

Review the settings and choose Create rule.

This setup ensures that the Lambda function runs automatically at the specified time every day.

References:

Amazon EventBridge Scheduler

Managing EventBridge Rules

For a Lambda function in Account A to access an S3 bucket in Account B, the correct IAM roles setup includes:

A: In Account A, create a Lambda execution role that has permissions to assume another role in Account B. In Account B, create a role with permissions to access the S3 bucket and trust the Lambda execution role from Account A to assume it. This configuration allows the Lambda function to assume the cross-account role and access the S3 bucket as needed, maintaining security and proper access control. AWS documentation provides more details on setting up cross-account roles for Lambda access AWS Lambda Permissions.

To send local logs from a fleet of servers to Amazon CloudWatch:

Install the Unified CloudWatch Agent: The unified CloudWatch agent is capable of collecting both logs and metrics from servers. This agent supports various operating systems and can be configured according to specific logging requirements.

Configuration of the Agent: The agent's configuration involves specifying which log files to monitor and how they should be processed. This configuration can be done manually or through the AWS Systems Manager for automated deployment across multiple servers.

Send Logs to CloudWatch: Once configured and running, the CloudWatch agent will continuously monitor the specified log files and send the log data to Amazon CloudWatch Logs, allowing you to view, search, and set alarms on log data.

This setup ensures a robust and scalable way to manage log data across a fleet of servers, leveraging AWS native services for seamless integration and management.

To improve security and availability, the best approach is to configure Multi-AZ for both the web and database tiers.

Multi-AZ Auto Scaling for Web Tier: Deploying the web-tier instances in an Auto Scaling group across multiple AZs with an internet-facing ALB provides high availability and fault tolerance.

RDS Multi-AZ for SQL Server: Migrating the SQL Server to RDS with Multi-AZ deployment ensures database redundancy and failover without additional management overhead.

Placing the web tier in multiple Regions would add unnecessary complexity, and migrating the database to DynamoDB is not suitable for applications requiring SQL Server’s relational capabilities.

For high-performance computing (HPC) applications requiring minimal latency between nodes, using a placement group strategy is crucial.

Cluster Placement Group:

Provides low-latency network performance within a single Availability Zone by placing instances close together on the network.

Suitable for applications that require high throughput or low latency.

Partition Placement Group:

Helps reduce the impact of hardware failures by dividing instances into partitions, where each partition can be placed on distinct racks in the data center.

Suitable for applications that need high availability and fault tolerance.

Setting Up Placement Groups:

Create a Placement Group:

Open the Amazon EC2 console at Amazon EC2 Console.

In the navigation pane, choose Placement Groups.

Choose Create placement group, specify the name, and choose either Cluster or Partition as the strategy.

Launch Instances:

When launching new instances, specify the placement group name to ensure they are placed accordingly.

References:

Placement Groups

Creating and Managing Placement Groups

The issue with the inability to upload a file to an Amazon S3 bucket from an EC2 instance in a private subnet is likely due to missing route table entries for the S3 gateway endpoint.

Update the Route Table:

Ensure that the route table associated with the EC2 subnet includes the S3 prefix list destination routes to the S3 gateway endpoint.

This allows the EC2 instance to communicate with the S3 bucket using the S3 gateway endpoint.

AWS Single Sign-On (AWS SSO) provides a centralized interface to manage SSO access to multiple AWS accounts and business applications. AWS SSO integrates with AWS Organizations and supports SAML 2.0 identity providers, making it an ideal solution for centrally managing user access and permissions across multiple AWS accounts.

AWS Single Sign-On (AWS SSO):

AWS SSO allows you to manage SSO access and user permissions to all of your AWS accounts and applications.

It integrates seamlessly with AWS Organizations.

Integration with SAML 2.0 IdP:

AWS SSO supports integration with third-party SAML 2.0 identity providers.

This allows centralized management of user identities and access.

Steps to Implement:

Enable AWS SSO in your AWS Organizations management account.

Configure AWS SSO to connect with your third-party SAML 2.0 IdP.

Assign user permissions and roles for each AWS account through AWS SSO.

References:

AWS Single Sign-On

Integrating AWS SSO with SAML 2.0 Identity Providers

When encountering an InstanceLimitExceeded error, this indicates that you have reached your account limit for the number of EC2 instances.

Use Service Quotas:

Open the Service Quotas console.

In the navigation pane, choose "AWS services" and then "Amazon EC2."

Select the quota you want to increase, such as "Running On-Demand Standard (A, C, D, H, I, M, R, T, Z) instances."

Click on "Request quota increase."

Fill in the required information, specifying the new quota value.

Submit the request.

Launch Instances After Approval: Once the quota increase is approved, you will be able to launch additional instances.

References:

EC2 Service Quotas

Service Quotas Console

AWS CloudFormation StackSets Overview:

StackSets allows for deployment of CloudFormation stacks across multiple AWS accounts and Regions.

A stack instance in the "OUTDATED" status indicates that the stack template or parameters differ between the StackSet and the stack instance.

Why the Stack Instance Fails:

The "OUTDATED" status occurs when the stack operation (creation or update) was not successfully completed in a specific Region.

In this case, the most likely reason is that the stack has not yet been deployed in the specified Region.

Steps to Resolve:

Check the deployment status in the CloudFormation StackSets Console.

Identify the Region where the stack is in the "OUTDATED" status.

Retry the stack deployment for that Region by running a stack set update or stack instance operation.

Why Other Options Are Incorrect:

A: Local template changes do not impact CloudFormation unless submitted to AWS. This is unrelated to StackSets.

B: While creating a global resource might fail, it would result in an error status (e.g., "FAILED"), not "OUTDATED."

D: Using an old API version would cause errors in the API request, not affect the stack instance status.

References:

AWS CloudFormation StackSets Documentation

Troubleshooting StackSet Issues

To ensure that database credentials are never stored in plaintext and the password is rotated every 30 days, use AWS Secrets Manager:

Store Credentials in Secrets Manager:

Open the AWS Secrets Manager console.

Click on "Store a new secret."

Select "RDS database credentials" and provide the necessary details (username, password, database instance).

Configure the secret's name and details.

Enable Automatic Rotation:

During the secret creation process, enable automatic rotation.

Specify an automatic rotation schedule of 30 days.

Choose the Lambda function that Secrets Manager will use to update the database password automatically.

Update Lambda Functions:

Update each Lambda function to retrieve the database password from Secrets Manager.

Use the AWS SDK in your Lambda code to access Secrets Manager and fetch the secret value.

References:

AWS Secrets Manager

Rotating AWS Secrets Manager Secrets

Retrieve Secrets from AWS Lambda

CloudWatch Metrics Explorer is a powerful tool for creating dynamic dashboards based on tags. This method is efficient for monitoring Auto Scaling groups:

Use Metrics Explorer: Navigate to the Metrics Explorer in the CloudWatch console and select the CPUUtilization metric. Use the aws:autoscaling:groupName tag to filter the metric, ensuring that it only shows data for EC2 instances within the specified Auto Scaling group.

Create Visualization: Configure the visualization settings as needed and add it to a CloudWatch dashboard.

Monitor Automatically: This setup will automatically update to include metrics from new EC2 instances that join the Auto Scaling group, without any need for manual intervention or scripting.

AWS Documentation Reference:You can learn more about using Metrics Explorer here: Using CloudWatch Metrics Explorer.

To reconfigure the infrastructure to support a microservices approach with the least administrative overhead, using an Application Load Balancer (ALB) with path-based routing is the most suitable solution.

Application Load Balancer (ALB):

ALBs are designed to distribute incoming application traffic across multiple targets, such as EC2 instances, in one or more Availability Zones.

ALBs support path-based routing, which allows you to route requests to different microservices based on the URL path.

Path-Based Routing:

With path-based routing, you can configure your ALB to route requests to specific target groups based on the URL path.

For example, requests to example.com/service1/* can be routed to one microservice, while requests to example.com/service2/* can be routed to another.

Implementation Steps:

Go to the EC2 console and navigate to "Load Balancers."

Create an ALB and configure the listener.

Define rules for path-based routing and create target groups for each microservice.

Register the appropriate EC2 instances with each target group.

References:

Application Load Balancers

ALB Path-Based Routing

Monitoring EC2 Instances with CloudWatch:

Amazon CloudWatch provides monitoring and alarms for AWS resources.

Alarms can be created for metrics like CPUUtilization, and notifications can be sent to Amazon SNS topics.

Steps to Set Up the Solution:

Create an SNS Topic:

Open the Amazon SNS Console.

Create a topic (e.g., "CPU_Alerts").

Add subscriptions for the development team's email addresses.

Create a CloudWatch Alarm:

Open the CloudWatch Console.

Navigate to the Alarms section and select Create Alarm.

Choose the EC2 CPUUtilization metric and set the alarm conditions:

Metric: Average CPU Utilization

Threshold: 80%

Period: 5 minutes

Link the alarm to the SNS topic for notifications.

Test the Alarm:

Simulate high CPU utilization to verify that alerts are sent to the subscribed email addresses.

Why Other Options Are Incorrect:

A and B: Using Amazon SES directly for alerts is not a standard practice for operational efficiency or integration with CloudWatch.

C: Using "sum" instead of "average" for CPU utilization is not appropriate for real-time monitoring, as it aggregates data over a large interval.

References:

Amazon CloudWatch Alarms Documentation

Amazon SNS Documentation

Monitoring CPU Utilization

To enable troubleshooting of EC2 instances marked as unhealthy before they are terminated by the Auto Scaling group, you can use lifecycle hooks:

Add a Lifecycle Hook: Configure a lifecycle hook in the Auto Scaling group. This hook will hold the instance in a "wait" state either when it launches or terminates (in this case, when it's about to be terminated due to health check failure).

Integration with Amazon EventBridge (CloudWatch Events): Set up the lifecycle hook to send an event to EventBridge (formerly CloudWatch Events) when an instance is in the termination lifecycle state.

Invoke Lambda Function: Configure EventBridge to trigger an AWS Lambda function when it receives the termination lifecycle event from the Auto Scaling group. This Lambda function can then perform necessary diagnostics, logging, or data capture activities on the instance before it's terminated.

This configuration allows the SysOps administrator to perform necessary investigations on why instances were marked unhealthy before they are automatically replaced, offering a chance to diagnose and potentially correct underlying issues.

The best combination of steps to meet this requirement is to sign in to the new account by using root user credentials and change the support plan, and to create an IAM user that has administrator privileges in the new account.

Signing in to the new account by using root user credentials will allow the SysOps administrator to access the account and change the support plan to AWS Business Support. Additionally, creating an IAM user that has administrator privileges in the new account will ensure that the SysOps administrator has the necessary access to manage the account and make changes to the support plan if necessary.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/vpc/latest/userguide/vpc-network-acls.html

To block traffic to the external IP address identified by Amazon GuardDuty, the SysOps administrator should create a network ACL and add an outbound deny rule for traffic to the external IP address.

Network ACL:

Network ACLs (Access Control Lists) are stateless and operate at the subnet level. They can allow or deny specific inbound and outbound traffic based on rules.

Steps to Implement:

Go to the VPC console and select the network ACL associated with the subnet containing the EC2 instance.

Add an outbound rule to deny traffic to the external IP address provided by GuardDuty.

Ensure the rule is properly placed in the rule number order to be evaluated correctly.

References:

Network ACLs

GuardDuty Documentation

In AWS, there are default limits (also known as quotas) for the number of various resources that can be created in an account. One of these limits is the number of Virtual Private Clouds (VPCs) that can be created in a single AWS account within a Region. The default limit for the number of VPCs per account per Region is typically 5.

If an organization is running multiple applications, each requiring a new VPC, it is possible to reach this limit, causing subsequent CloudFormation stack deployments that attempt to create additional VPCs to fail.

Check VPC Limits:

To verify the current limit and usage of VPCs in your account, you can use the AWS Service Quotas console.

Open the Service Quotas console at Service Quotas Console.

Navigate to AWS services and select Amazon VPC.

Check the VPCs per Region quota to see the limit and how many VPCs are currently in use.

Requesting a Quota Increase:

If the default limit is reached, you can request a quota increase.

In the Service Quotas console, select the quota and choose Request quota increase.

Fill in the required information and submit the request. AWS typically reviews and approves these requests, but it may take some time.

CloudFormation Stack Failure:

When a CloudFormation stack fails due to reaching the VPC limit, the error message will indicate the issue related to the quota being exceeded.

You can view the specific error in the CloudFormation console under the Events tab of the stack.

Preventative Measures:

To avoid this issue, monitor resource usage and limits regularly.

Consolidate applications within fewer VPCs if possible, using subnets and security groups to isolate resources.

References:

Amazon VPC Quotas

Service Quotas for VPC

Requesting a Quota Increase

To provide the ability to recover deleted EBS snapshots for a specified period, creating a Recycle Bin retention rule for EBS snapshots is the appropriate solution.

Recycle Bin:

The Recycle Bin for Amazon EBS snapshots allows you to recover snapshots that were deleted within a specified retention period.

Creating a Retention Rule:

Open the Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager console.

Create a new Recycle Bin retention rule for EBS snapshots and specify the desired retention period.

References:

Amazon EBS Recycle Bin

Objective:

Ensure the mem_used_percent metric from the EC2 instance is available in Amazon CloudWatch.

Root Cause:

The unified CloudWatch agent requires IAM permissions to publish custom metrics to CloudWatch.

If an IAM instance profile is not attached or is missing necessary permissions, the metric will not appear in CloudWatch.

Solution Implementation:

Step 1: Create an IAM role with the required permissions:

Use the AmazonCloudWatchAgentServerPolicy managed policy, which grants permissions for the CloudWatch agent to send metrics.

Step 2: Create an IAM instance profile for the role.

Step 3: Attach the instance profile to the EC2 instance.

Step 4: Restart the unified CloudWatch agent on the EC2 instance to apply the changes:

bash

Copy code

sudo /opt/aws/amazon-cloudwatch-agent/bin/amazon-cloudwatch-agent-ctl -a stop

sudo /opt/aws/amazon-cloudwatch-agent/bin/amazon-cloudwatch-agent-ctl -a start

AWS References:

Unified CloudWatch Agent Configuration:CloudWatch Agent Permissions

Why Other Options Are Incorrect:

Option A: Enabling detailed monitoring only collects predefined metrics; it does not affect custom metrics like mem_used_percent.

Option C: The subnet (public or private) does not affect the collection of metrics by the CloudWatch agent.

Option D: Using IAM user credentials is not a best practice for EC2 instances; instance profiles are the recommended method.

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

The threat of ransomware encrypting and holding company data hostage.

Need to protect an Amazon S3 bucket.

Analyze the Requirements:

Ensure that data in the S3 bucket is protected against unauthorized encryption or deletion.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Deny Post, Put, and Delete on the bucket.

Denying these actions would prevent any uploads or modifications to the bucket, making it unusable.

Option B: Enable server-side encryption on the bucket.

Server-side encryption protects data at rest but does not prevent the encryption of data by ransomware.

Option C: Enable Amazon S3 versioning on the bucket.

S3 versioning keeps multiple versions of an object in the bucket. If a file is overwritten or encrypted by ransomware, previous versions of the file can still be accessed.

Option D: Enable snapshots on the bucket.

Amazon S3 does not have a snapshot feature; this option is not applicable.

Select the Best Solution:

Option C: Enabling Amazon S3 versioning is the best solution as it allows access to previous versions of objects, providing protection against ransomware encryption by retaining prior, unencrypted versions.

References:

Amazon S3 Versioning

Best Practices for Protecting Data with Amazon S3

Enabling S3 versioning ensures that previous versions of objects are preserved, providing a safeguard against ransomware by allowing recovery of unencrypted versions of data.

To receive email notifications when IAM CreateUser API calls are made, you need to create an EventBridge rule that captures these events from CloudTrail and then routes them to an SNS topic that has an email subscription.

Enable CloudTrail:

Ensure AWS CloudTrail is enabled in your account to log API activity. Go to AWS CloudTrail Console and enable it if not already enabled.

Create SNS Topic:

Open the Amazon SNS console at Amazon SNS Console.

Create a new topic and name it (e.g., IAMCreateUserNotifications).

Create an email subscription for the topic by entering your email address and confirming the subscription via the email received.

Create EventBridge Rule:

Open the Amazon EventBridge console at Amazon EventBridge Console.

Create a new rule and provide a name and description.

For the Event source, select AWS events or EventBridge Schema.

In Event pattern, select AWS services and choose CloudTrail as the service.

Specify the event type as AWS API Call via CloudTrail.

In the Event source dropdown, select IAM and in the API operation, enter CreateUser.

Add Target:

Add a target and select SNS topic.

Choose the SNS topic you created earlier (IAMCreateUserNotifications).

Configure Permissions:

Ensure that the EventBridge rule has permission to publish to the SNS topic.

This configuration will trigger an email notification whenever an IAM CreateUser API call is made, keeping you informed of new user creations.

References:

Creating an EventBridge Rule That Triggers on an Event

Setting Up a CloudWatch Event to Trigger SNS

Creating CloudTrail Event Rules

AWS Budgets can be used to create a Savings Plans budget and track the daily utilization of the company's Savings Plans. By creating a budget, it will trigger an action when the utilization drops below 90%, which in this case will be to send an email notification via an Amazon SNS topic. This will ensure that the company is notified when their Savings Plans utilization drops below 90%, allowing them to take action if necessary.

Enabling the organizational view in AWS Health will allow the SysOps administrator to consolidate the alerts from each account’s Personal Health Dashboard. It will also provide the administrator with a single view of all the accounts in the organization, allowing them to easily monitor the health of all the accounts in the organization.

To monitor and remediate open SSH ports, AWS Config and Systems Manager Automation are ideal:

AWS Config Rule: Use AWS Config to monitor security groups and detect when SSH (port 22) is open to the public. Config rules can be set up to trigger remediation actions automatically.

Systems Manager Automation Runbook: Create or use a predefined automation runbook that can remove the open SSH rule from security groups, thus closing port 22 to the public.

CloudWatch alarms are not ideal for monitoring security group configurations. Amazon Inspector focuses on vulnerability assessment rather than continuous monitoring for specific port access.

To deliver digital content to authorized users through CloudFront while restricting unauthorized access, you can use an origin access identity (OAI) with signed URLs.

Store Content in S3 with Public Access Blocked:

Ensure the S3 bucket has public access blocked.

Navigate to the S3 console, select the bucket, and configure the "Block Public Access" settings.

To route traffic to the Network Load Balancer (NLB) using Amazon Route 53 cost-effectively, creating an alias record is the best solution.

Alias Record:

Alias records are a Route 53-specific extension to DNS functionality.

They provide a way to map a domain name to an AWS resource, such as an NLB, without incurring additional charges.

Steps to Implement:

Open the Route 53 console.

Select the hosted zone and choose "Create Record Set."

Choose "Alias" and select the NLB from the drop-down list.

References:

Creating Alias Records

When using Amazon Route 53 to manage DNS records for a website hosted behind an Application Load Balancer (ALB), an ALIAS record should be used for the apex domain (e.g., example.com). ALIAS records are designed to map domain names to AWS resources like ALBs, CloudFront distributions, and S3 buckets, providing efficient DNS resolution.

Login to AWS Management Console:

Open the Route 53 console at Amazon Route 53 Console.

Select Hosted Zone:

Select the hosted zone for your domain.

Create Record Set:

Click on Create record.

In the Record name field, leave it blank to indicate the apex domain.

Select ALIAS as the record type.

Choose the Alias Target to be your Application Load Balancer from the dropdown menu.

Save Record Set:

Review the settings and click Create records.

References:

Choosing Between Alias and Non-Alias Records

Routing Traffic to an ELB Load Balancer

The issues experienced by users with legacy browsers typically stem from the SSL/TLS ciphers that are supported or enforced by the ALB. Modern security policies may exclude older ciphers that are necessary for compatibility with older browsers. Here’s how to resolve it:

Access the ALB Settings: Go to the AWS Management Console, navigate to the ALB settings, and locate the SSL negotiation configurations.

Modify Security Policy: Update the SSL/TLS security policy on the ALB to include ciphers that are compatible with legacy browsers. AWS provides predefined security policies, and some of these policies are designed to support older ciphers while still maintaining a level of security that complies with general best practices.

Apply Changes: Once the security policy is updated, the ALB will start using this new configuration, which should resolve compatibility issues with legacy browsers without needing to replace the SSL certificate or alter the infrastructure.

This solution maintains the operational efficiency of the setup and avoids the need for additional resources like a second ALB or new certificates.

The policy provided includes two statements:

The first statement explicitly denies the Update:* action on resources with a LogicalResourceId that begins with "Production".

The second statement allows the Update:* action on all resources.

In AWS IAM policy evaluation logic, explicit denies always take precedence over allows. Therefore, the effect of this policy is that users can update all resources in the stack except for those with a logical ID that begins with "Production".

References:

IAM JSON Policy Elements: Effect

Policy Evaluation Logic

For member accounts in AWS Organizations to receive notifications about estimated costs exceeding a predetermined amount, billing alerts must be enabled in the management/payer account.

Enable Billing Alerts in the Management Account:

Open the AWS Billing and Cost Management console at AWS Billing Console.

In the navigation pane, choose Billing preferences.

Under Billing preferences, ensure that Receive Billing Alerts is enabled.

Create a Budget and Set Up Notifications:

Open the AWS Budgets console at AWS Budgets Console.

Create a budget and configure it to monitor the estimated costs.

Set up notifications for when the budget thresholds are exceeded and specify the email addresses of the managers in the member accounts.

By enabling billing alerts in the management account, you allow member accounts to receive notifications about their estimated costs.

References:

Setting Up Alerts and Notifications

Creating an AWS Budget

The issue where EC2 instances show up as healthy in the Auto Scaling group but unhealthy in the ALB target group is likely due to the target group health check being configured with an incorrect port or path.

Health Checks:

ALB target groups use health checks to determine the health of instances. These health checks are configured with a specific port and path.

If the health check configuration does not match the actual application endpoint on the instances, the instances will fail the health check.

Troubleshooting Steps:

Verify the health check settings for the target group in the ALB. Ensure the port and path are correctly configured to match the application on the EC2 instances.

Adjust the settings if necessary and monitor the health status of the instances in the target group.

To enforce the use of approved EC2 instance configurations across different business units efficiently:

AWS Service Catalog: Utilize AWS Service Catalog to manage and govern commonly deployed IT services. Create a catalog of pre-approved products (in this case, EC2 instance configurations).

Publish Products: Define and publish EC2 instance configurations as products within the Service Catalog. These products will incorporate all the necessary and approved configurations, options, and software.

Launch Constraints: Assign launch constraints to these products, ensuring that users can only launch EC2 instances as defined by the pre-approved configurations.

Control Access: Grant business units access only to the Service Catalog for provisioning EC2 instances. This ensures they use only those configurations that comply with company policies and standards.

This approach not only standardizes resource deployment but also simplifies management and enhances compliance across the organization.

To ensure high availability and failover for RDS, converting the instance to a Multi-AZ deployment is the best practice. Multi-AZ configurations provide automated standby in a different Availability Zone, automatically failing over to the standby in case of instance or Availability Zone issues.

Modify DB instance: AWS allows for seamless conversion of an existing Single-AZ RDS instance to a Multi-AZ deployment, making it more resilient to outages without requiring significant application changes.

Failover mechanism: In Multi-AZ, failover is managed automatically by AWS, minimizing application downtime.

To effectively use Amazon CloudFront as a content delivery network for an application using an Application Load Balancer as the origin, several configuration steps need to be correctly implemented:

DNS Configuration: Ensure that the DNS records for the domain serving the content point to the CloudFront distribution's DNS name rather than directly to the ALB. If the DNS still points to the ALB, users' requests will bypass CloudFront, leading directly to the ALB and maintaining the existing load on your web servers.

TTL Settings: The Time to Live (TTL) settings in the CloudFront distribution dictate how long the content is cached in CloudFront edge locations before CloudFront fetches a fresh copy from the origin. If the TTL values are set to 0, it means that CloudFront does not cache the content at all, resulting in each user request being forwarded to the ALB, which does not reduce the load.

AWS Documentation Reference:For more information on DNS and TTL configurations for CloudFront, you can refer to the following AWS documentation:

Configuring DNS

CloudFront TTL Settings.

To configure replication of a DynamoDB table to another AWS Region for disaster recovery, you should use DynamoDB Global Tables. Global Tables use DynamoDB Streams to replicate changes across multiple regions.

Enable DynamoDB Streams:

Navigate to the DynamoDB console.

Select your table and enable DynamoDB Streams.

Add a Global Table Region:

With Streams enabled, go to the Global Tables tab.

Add a new region to the table, specifying the region where you want to replicate the data.

Automatic Replication:

DynamoDB will handle the replication of data across regions automatically, ensuring data consistency and high availability.

References:

DynamoDB Global Tables

Enabling DynamoDB Streams

AWS Compute Optimizer provides recommendations for optimizing the performance and cost of your AWS resources, including Lambda functions.

Steps:

Enable AWS Compute Optimizer:

Open the AWS Compute Optimizer console.

Choose "Get started".

Enable Compute Optimizer for your account.

View Lambda Function Recommendations:

After enabling Compute Optimizer, allow some time for data collection and analysis.

Navigate to the "Lambda Function Recommendations" section in the Compute Optimizer console.

Review the recommendations for your Lambda functions, which may include adjustments to memory size or other configurations to improve performance and reduce costs.

Export Recommendations:

In the Compute Optimizer console, you can export the recommendations to a CSV file for further analysis and action.

References:

AWS Compute Optimizer

Optimizing Lambda Function Configurations

You might want to use Transfer Acceleration on a bucket for various reasons: ->Your customers upload to a centralized bucket from all over the world. ->You transfer gigabytes to terabytes of data on a regular basis across continents. ->You can't use all of your available bandwidth over the internet when uploading to Amazon S3." https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/transfer-acceleration.html

AWS WAF (Web Application Firewall) helps protect web applications from common web exploits that could affect application availability, compromise security, or consume excessive resources. AWS WAF can mitigate cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities by filtering and monitoring HTTP requests based on custom rules.

Create a Web ACL:

Navigate to the AWS WAF console.

Create a new Web ACL and associate it with your application.

Add Rules to Mitigate XSS:

Use AWS Managed Rules for common threats, including XSS.

Create custom rules to inspect requests and block malicious scripts.

Associate Web ACL with Resources:

Attach the Web ACL to your CloudFront distribution, API Gateway, or Application Load Balancer to filter incoming requests.

References:

AWS WAF Developer Guide

AWS WAF Managed Rules

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

The web application experiences performance degradation during random periods of increased traffic.

Analyze the Requirements:

Implement a scalable solution to handle varying traffic loads.

Maintain application performance during traffic spikes.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Monitor application latency with CloudWatch alarm and increase instance size.

Manually resizing instances is not efficient for handling random traffic spikes.

Option B: Use EventBridge rule to add EC2 instance to ALB.

This approach is not as efficient as Auto Scaling for dynamic traffic management.

Option C: Deploy to an Auto Scaling group with target tracking scaling policy.

Automatically adjusts the number of instances based on traffic demand.

Ensures consistent application performance by scaling in response to traffic changes.

Option D: Deploy to an Auto Scaling group with scheduled scaling policy.

Suitable for predictable traffic patterns but not for random traffic spikes.

Select the Best Solution:

Option C: Using an Auto Scaling group with a target tracking scaling policy ensures the application scales dynamically based on traffic, maintaining performance.

References:

Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling

Target Tracking Scaling Policies

Auto Scaling with a target tracking policy provides a robust solution for handling random traffic increases by dynamically adjusting the number of instances.

To achieve maximum cost savings and flexibility for a 24/7 running application across different AWS regions and operating systems, the best approach is to use a Compute Savings Plan. Compute Savings Plans provide the most flexibility by automatically applying to any EC2 instance usage regardless of instance family, size, OS, tenancy, or AWS Region, and also apply to AWS Fargate and AWS Lambda usage.

Understand Compute Savings Plans:

Compute Savings Plans offer significant savings over On-Demand prices, with the flexibility to use the compute option that best suits your needs.

Purchase a Compute Savings Plan:

Login to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to the Savings Plans section.

Choose Purchase Savings Plan and select Compute Savings Plan.

Define the hourly commitment amount and the term length (one or three years).

Monitor and Optimize Usage:

Ensure that your usage aligns with the Savings Plan to maximize savings.

Use AWS Cost Explorer and Savings Plans Utilization reports to monitor usage.

References:

Savings Plans

Compute Savings Plans

To address the issue of slow startup times during unexpected traffic surges, a warm pool for the Auto Scaling group is an effective solution:

Warm Pool Concept: A warm pool allows you to maintain a set of pre-initialized or partially initialized EC2 instances that are not actively serving traffic but can be quickly brought online when needed.

Management of Instances: Instances in the warm pool can be kept in a stopped state and then started much more quickly than launching new instances, as the machine-specific data caches are already created.

Scalability and Responsiveness: During a surge in traffic, especially unpredictable ones like those triggered by advertisements, instances from the warm pool can be rapidly activated to handle the increased load, ensuring that the application remains responsive without the typical delays associated with boot processes.

This method significantly reduces the time to scale out by utilizing pre-warmed instances, enhancing the application's ability to cope with sudden and substantial increases in traffic.

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

The company has a stateless application on 10 EC2 On-Demand Instances in an Auto Scaling group.

At least 6 instances are needed to meet service requirements.

The goal is to maintain uptime cost-effectively.

Analyze the Requirements:

Maintain a minimum of 6 instances to meet service requirements.

Optimize costs by using a mix of instance types.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Use a Spot Fleet with an On-Demand capacity of 6 instances.

Spot Fleets allow you to request a combination of On-Demand and Spot Instances.

Ensuring a minimum of 6 On-Demand Instances guarantees the required capacity while leveraging lower-cost Spot Instances to meet additional demand.

Option B: Update the Auto Scaling group with a minimum of 6 On-Demand Instances and a maximum of 10 On-Demand Instances.

This option ensures the minimum required capacity but does not optimize costs since it only uses On-Demand Instances.

Option C: Update the Auto Scaling group with a minimum of 1 On-Demand Instance and a maximum of 6 On-Demand Instances.

This does not meet the requirement of maintaining at least 6 instances at all times.

Option D: Use a Spot Fleet with a target capacity of 6 instances.

This option relies entirely on Spot Instances, which may not always be available, risking insufficient capacity.

Select the Best Solution:

Option A: Using a Spot Fleet with an On-Demand capacity of 6 instances ensures the necessary uptime with a cost-effective mix of On-Demand and Spot Instances.

References:

Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling

Amazon EC2 Spot Instances

Spot Fleet Documentation

Using a Spot Fleet with a combination of On-Demand and Spot Instances offers a cost-effective solution while ensuring the required minimum capacity for the application.

When attempting to deploy a CloudFormation template from one region (us-west-2) to another (eu-west-1), the deployment might fail due to region-specific resources and services.

Amazon Machine Image (AMI) Availability:

AMIs are region-specific. If the template references an AMI that is only available in us-west-2 and not in eu-west-1, the stack will fail to deploy in eu-west-1.

To resolve this, identify the AMI used in us-west-2 and find or create a similar AMI in eu-west-1.

Service Availability:

Some AWS services are not available in all regions. If the template includes resources or services that are not available in eu-west-1, the stack will fail.

Check the AWS Regional Services List to ensure all services and resource types in the template are available in eu-west-1.

References:

Copy an AMI

AWS Regional Services List

Increasing DB Instance Size:

Increasing the instance size provides more CPU and memory resources, which can help handle higher loads.

Steps:

Go to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to RDS and select the DB instance.

Modify the instance to increase its size.

Apply the changes during the next maintenance window or immediately if it is a critical issue.

Monitoring Performance:

After resizing, monitor the instance during the next report run to ensure that it handles the load effectively.

To efficiently monitor and identify noncompliant resources in terms of tagging within AWS, using AWS Config with a managed rule for required tagging is most appropriate:

AWS Config Setup: Configure AWS Config to monitor and record configurations of AWS resources within your environment.

Managed Rule for Required Tags: Utilize the "required-tags" managed rule in AWS Config, which checks whether your resources have the specific tags you define as mandatory. This rule can be customized to specify which tags are required and can automatically evaluate all existing and new resources in your environment.

Compliance Reporting: AWS Config provides detailed compliance reporting that helps you identify resources that do not meet the tagging requirements, facilitating easy remediation.

This approach leverages AWS Config’s capabilities for continuous monitoring and evaluation without needing to write custom code or manage additional services, providing an operationally efficient solution for compliance management.

To ensure that the new web subnet can communicate with the database instance, follow these steps:

Create an Inbound Allow Rule for MySQL/Aurora (3306):

On the network ACL for the database subnets, add an inbound allow rule to permit traffic from the third web subnet on port 3306 (MySQL/Aurora).

To stop EC2 instances in a development environment when they are not in use, you can create a CloudWatch alarm based on CPU utilization.

Create CloudWatch Alarm:

Navigate to the CloudWatch console.

Select "Alarms" and click on "Create Alarm".

Choose the EC2 instance metric for CPU utilization.

Set the condition to trigger the alarm when the average CPU utilization is less than 5% for a continuous 30-minute period.

If users are unable to connect to a specific Ubuntu EC2 instance using AWS Systems Manager Session Manager while other instances are accessible, the issue is likely due to IAM permissions:

Instance Profile Permissions: Ensure that the EC2 instance has the necessary IAM permissions to interact with Systems Manager. The AmazonSSMManagedInstanceCore managed policy includes permissions required for the SSM Agent on the instance to communicate with the AWS Systems Manager service.

Attach Managed Policy: Attach the AmazonSSMManagedInstanceCore policy to the IAM role that is associated with the Ubuntu instance's instance profile. This step is crucial as it authorizes the instance to use Systems Manager services, including Session Manager.

Verify Configuration and Connectivity: After updating the instance profile, verify that users can connect via Session Manager. This solution does not require any changes to network security settings like security groups.

By ensuring that the instance has the appropriate IAM permissions, you resolve issues related to access control and Systems Manager functionality, allowing authorized personnel to connect securely without using SSH or RDP.

 IAM Identity Center SAML Metadata:

This metadata is required to establish the trust relationship between AWS IAM Identity Center and the external SAML 2.0 identity provider.

Steps:

Download the IAM Identity Center SAML metadata from the AWS Management Console.

Provide this metadata to the external IdP.

 IdP Metadata:

The metadata from the IdP, including the public X.509 certificate, is needed to configure the trust relationship.

Steps:

Obtain the IdP metadata, which includes the entity ID, endpoints, and X.509 certificate.

Configure the IAM Identity Center with this information.

 AWS Config Managed Rule:

AWS Config can be used to assess, audit, and evaluate the configurations of AWS resources. The managed rule can check if instances are launched from approved AMIs.

Steps:

Go to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to AWS Config.

Create a managed rule that checks for EC2 instances running approved AMIs.

Configure the rule to use a list of approved AMIs.

 Automatic Remediation with Systems Manager Automation:

AWS Systems Manager Automation runbooks can automate the process of remediating non-compliant resources.

Steps:

Create a Systems Manager Automation runbook that terminates instances not running approved AMIs.

Attach the runbook to the AWS Config rule for automatic remediation.

The least privilege required for reading encrypted data involves kms:Decrypt to decrypt, kms:DescribeKey to understand key properties, and kms:ListAliases if needed to identify the key alias.

To minimize costs while moving from EC2 instances to AWS Fargate, Compute Savings Plans are the most flexible and cost-effective option. Compute Savings Plans apply to a variety of compute services including AWS Fargate, Amazon EC2, and AWS Lambda, allowing for greater flexibility in managing costs as the company transitions to using only Fargate.

Compute Savings Plans:

Savings Plans provide significant savings over On-Demand pricing, up to 66% savings.

Compute Savings Plans offer the flexibility to move across instance types, AWS Regions, and operating systems.

Payment Options:

The No Upfront payment option provides the most flexibility and avoids large upfront capital expenditures.

The Partial Upfront payment option offers more savings but requires an initial payment.

1-Year Term:

A 1-year term is suitable for the company's 6-month transition period, allowing for cost savings without a long-term commitment.

References:

AWS Savings Plans

Compute Savings Plans

To restrict access to content in specific countries using CloudFront, enabling the geo restriction feature in the CloudFront distribution is the most operationally efficient solution.

Geo Restriction in CloudFront:

CloudFront allows you to use geographic restrictions, also known as geo-blocking, to prevent users in specific geographic locations from accessing content that you're distributing through a CloudFront distribution.

Enabling Geo Restriction:

Go to the CloudFront console.

Select your distribution and click on "Restrictions."

Choose "Edit" and then enable "Geo restriction."

Specify the countries you want to restrict by selecting "Whitelist" or "Blacklist" and entering the appropriate country codes.

Operational Efficiency:

This method leverages CloudFront's built-in capabilities to restrict access at the edge locations, ensuring that unauthorized requests are blocked before reaching your origin.

It is a straightforward and scalable solution without requiring changes to your S3 bucket policy or application logic.

References:

Using Geo Restriction to Restrict Access to Your Content

To centrally manage application logs and retain them for no more than 90 days, you can use the Amazon CloudWatch Logs agent to send logs to a CloudWatch log group and configure the log group's retention period.

Update the Launch Template User Data:

Navigate to the EC2 console.

Select the launch template used by the Auto Scaling group.

Edit the launch template to include the following user data script:

#!/bin/bash

yum update -y

yum install -y awslogs

cat < /etc/awslogs/awslogs.conf

[general]

state_file = /var/lib/awslogs/agent-state

[/var/log/messages]

file = /var/log/messages

log_group_name = /my-log-group

log_stream_name = {instance_id}/messages

datetime_format = %b %d %H:%M:%S

[/var/log/secure]

file = /var/log/secure

log_group_name = /my-log-group

log_stream_name = {instance_id}/secure

datetime_format = %b %d %H:%M:%S

EOF

systemctl start awslogsd

systemctl enable awslogsd

Replace /my-log-group with the name of your CloudWatch log group.

Configure the Log Group Retention Period:

Navigate to the CloudWatch console.

In the navigation pane, choose "Logs".

Select the log group created by the CloudWatch Logs agent.

Click on "Actions" and then "Edit retention settings".

Set the retention period to 90 days.

Verify the Configuration:

Ensure that logs from the EC2 instances are being sent to the CloudWatch log group.

Verify that the log group's retention period is correctly set to 90 days.

References:

Amazon CloudWatch Logs Agent

Setting Log Retention in CloudWatch

To ensure that the application running on an Amazon EC2 instance can read, write, and delete messages from the SQS queues in the most secure manner, the recommended approach is to use IAM roles for EC2 instances. This approach avoids the need to embed or export long-term AWS credentials, which can be a security risk.

Create an IAM Role for EC2:

Navigate to the IAM console in the AWS Management Console.

Choose "Roles" in the navigation pane, then click "Create role".

Select "AWS service" as the type of trusted entity and choose "EC2" as the use case. Click "Next: Permissions".

Attach the Required Permissions:

On the "Attach permissions policies" page, you can either select an existing policy or create a custom policy.

For a custom policy, click "Create policy" and use the following JSON policy to allow the required SQS actions:

json

Copy code

{

"Version": "2012-10-17",

"Statement": [

{

"Effect": "Allow",

"Action": [

"sqs:SendMessage",

"sqs:ReceiveMessage",

"sqs:DeleteMessage"

],

"Resource": "arn:aws:sqs:region:account-id:queue-name"

}

]

}

Replace region, account-id, and queue-name with appropriate values for your SQS queues.

Assign the Role to the EC2 Instance:

After creating the role with the necessary permissions, navigate to the EC2 console.

Select the instance that needs access to the SQS queues.

In the "Actions" menu, choose "Security", then "Modify IAM role".

Attach the newly created IAM role to the instance.

Verify the Permissions:

Ensure that the IAM role is properly attached to the EC2 instance.

Test the application to confirm that it can successfully perform the required actions (read, write, delete) on the SQS queues.

References:

IAM Roles for Amazon EC2

Amazon SQS Policy Examples

To review the VPC configuration of developer AWS accounts securely, the best practice is to use cross-account IAM roles with read-only access.

Create an IAM Policy with Read-Only Access:

Navigate to the IAM console in each developer account.

Create a new policy with read-only access to VPC resources. For example:

"Version": "2012-10-17",

"Statement": [

{

"Effect": "Allow",

"Action": [

"ec2:DescribeVpcs",

"ec2:DescribeSubnets",

"ec2:DescribeRouteTables",

"ec2:DescribeSecurityGroups",

"ec2:DescribeNetworkAcls"

],

"Resource": "*"

}

]

}

Save the policy.

Create a Cross-Account IAM Role:

In the IAM console, choose "Roles" and then "Create role".

Select "Another AWS account" and enter the AWS account ID of the security administrator's account.

Attach the read-only policy created in step 1 to the role.

Save the role and note the role ARN.

Assume the Role from the Security Administrator's Account:

In the security administrator's account, navigate to the IAM console.

Use the "Switch Role" option to assume the cross-account role created in the developer account using the role ARN.

The security administrator can now access the VPC configuration of the developer accounts with read-only permissions.

References:

Cross-Account Access

Creating and Managing IAM Policies

To meet the requirement of consistent performance of 10,000 IOPS with the least cost, the SysOps administrator should use a General Purpose SSD (gp3) Amazon EBS volume:

General Purpose SSD (gp3) EBS Volume:

The gp3 volume type can be provisioned with the required IOPS without the need for additional capacity, making it a cost-effective solution compared to Provisioned IOPS SSD (io1) volumes.

AWS CloudFormation StackSets extends the capability of stacks by enabling you to create, update, or delete stacks across multiple accounts and AWS Regions

If a Lambda function is not being invoked by an Amazon EventBridge (formerly CloudWatch Events) rule, the likely issue is a missing permission. The Lambda function needs permission to be invoked by the EventBridge rule.

Steps:

Add Permission to Lambda Function:

Open the AWS Lambda console.

Select your Lambda function.

Choose "Configuration" and then "Permissions".

Under the "Resource-based policy" section, add a policy that grants EventBridge permission to invoke your function.

Example policy:

json

Copy code

{

"Version": "2012-10-17",

"Statement": [

{

"Effect": "Allow",

"Principal": {

"Service": "events.amazonaws.com"

},

"Action": "lambda:InvokeFunction",

"Resource": "arn:aws:lambda:REGION:ACCOUNT_ID:function:FUNCTION_NAME",

"Condition": {

"ArnLike": {

"AWS:SourceArn": "arn:aws:events:REGION:ACCOUNT_ID:rule/RULE_NAME"

}

}

}

]

}

Verify the EventBridge Rule:

Open the Amazon EventBridge console.

Select the rule that targets your Lambda function.

Ensure that the rule is correctly configured to match events and the target is your Lambda function.

References:

AWS Lambda Permissions Model

Amazon EventBridge Rules