AWS S3 Security

• AWS S3 Security is a shared responsibility between AWS and the Customer
• As a managed service, S3 is protected by the AWS global network security procedures
• AWS handles basic security tasks like guest operating system (OS) and database patching, firewall configuration, and disaster recovery.
• Security and compliance of S3 is assessed by third-party auditors as part of multiple AWS compliance programs including SOC, PCI DSS, HIPAA, etc.
• AWS S3 provides several other features to handle security, which are customers’ responsibility.

S3 Data Protection

Refer blog post @ S3 Data Protection

S3 Encryption

Refer blog post @ S3 Encryption

S3 Permissions

Refer blog post @ S3 Permissions

S3 Object Lock

• S3 Object Lock helps to store objects using a write-once-read-many (WORM) model.
• S3 Object Lock can help prevent objects from being deleted or overwritten for a fixed amount of time or indefinitely.
• S3 Object Lock can help meet regulatory requirements that require WORM storage or add an extra layer of protection against object changes and deletion.
• Object Lock can be enabled only for new buckets. For an existing bucket, you need to contact AWS Support.
• Enabling Object Lock automatically enables versioning for the bucket.
• Once Object Lock is enabled, you can’t disable Object Lock or suspend versioning for the bucket.
• S3 Object Lock provides two retention modes that apply different levels of protection to the objects
  • Governance mode
    • Users can’t overwrite or delete an object version or alter its lock settings unless they have special permissions.
    • Objects against can be protected from being deleted by most users, but you can still grant some users permission to alter the retention settings or delete the object if necessary.
    • Can be used to test retention-period settings before creating a compliance-mode retention period.
  • Compliance mode
    • A protected object version can’t be overwritten or deleted by any user, including the root user in your AWS account.
    • When an object is locked in compliance mode, its retention mode can’t be changed, and its retention period can’t be shortened.
    • Compliance mode helps ensure that an object version can’t be overwritten or deleted for the duration of the retention period.

S3 VPC Gateway Endpoint

• A VPC endpoint enables connections between a VPC and supported services, without requiring that you use an internet gateway, NAT device, VPN connection, or AWS Direct Connect connection.
• VPC is not exposed to the public internet.
• A Gateway Endpoint is a gateway that is a target for a route in your route table used for traffic destined to either S3.

S3 Security Best Practices

S3 Preventative Security Best Practices

• Ensure S3 buckets use the correct policies and are not publicly accessible
  • Use S3 block public access
  • Identify Bucket policies and ACLs that allow public access
  • Use AWS Trusted Advisor to inspect the S3 implementation.
• Implement least privilege access
• Use IAM roles for applications and AWS services that require S3 access
• Enable Multi-factor authentication (MFA) Delete to help prevent accidental bucket deletions
• Consider Data at Rest Encryption
  
• Enforce Data in Transit Encryption
  
• Consider S3 Object Lock to store objects using a “Write Once Read Many” (WORM) model.
  
• Enable versioning to easily recover from both unintended user actions and application failures.
• Consider S3 Cross-Region replication
• Consider VPC endpoints for S3 access to provide private S3 connectivity and help prevent traffic from potentially traversing the open internet.
  

S3 Monitoring and Auditing Best Practices

• Identify and Audit all S3 buckets to have visibility of all the S3 resources to assess their security posture and take action on potential areas of weakness.
  
• Implement monitoring using AWS monitoring tools
• Enable S3 server access logging, which provides detailed records of the requests that are made to a bucket useful for security and access audits
  
• Use AWS CloudTrail, which provides a record of actions taken by a user, a role, or an AWS service in S3.
  
• Enable AWS Config, which enables you to assess, audit, and evaluate the configurations of the AWS resources
  
• Consider using Amazon Macie with S3 to automatically discover, classify, and protect sensitive data in AWS.
  
• Monitor AWS security advisories to regularly check security advisories posted in Trusted Advisor for the AWS account.
  

AWS Certification Exam Practice Questions

• Questions are collected from Internet and the answers are marked as per my knowledge and understanding (which might differ with yours).
• AWS services are updated everyday and both the answers and questions might be outdated soon, so research accordingly.
• AWS exam questions are not updated to keep up the pace with AWS updates, so even if the underlying feature has changed the question might not be updated
• Open to further feedback, discussion and correction.

References

AWS_S3_Security