SOA-C02 Sample Questions Answers

When an EC2 instance stops responding and the system status checks are failing, the recommended first step is to stop and then start the instance. This action will cause the instance to be moved to a new host, potentially resolving the underlying hardware issue.

Stop and Start the Instance:

In the AWS Management Console, navigate to the EC2 dashboard and stop the affected instance.

After the instance has stopped, start it again to launch it on a new host.

To set up notifications for when combined billing exceeds a certain threshold for all AWS accounts within an organization, follow these steps:

Enable Billing Alerts:

In the payer account, go to the Billing and Cost Management console.

Under "Billing preferences", enable the "Receive Billing Alerts" option.

Set Up a Billing Alarm in CloudWatch:

Navigate to the CloudWatch console.

Create a new billing alarm, specifying the threshold for the combined billing amount.

Set the alarm to publish a notification to an SNS topic when the threshold is breached.

Publish SNS Message:

Create an SNS topic to receive the billing alarm notifications.

Configure the billing alarm to send notifications to the SNS topic.

References:

Setting Up a CloudWatch Billing Alarm

AWS Billing and Cost Management User Guide

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/efs/latest/ug/encryption.html

Amazon EFS supports two forms of encryption for file systems, encryption of data in transit and encryption at rest. You can enable encryption of data at rest when creating an Amazon EFS file system. You can enable encryption of data in transit when you mount the file system.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/organizations/latest/userguide/orgs_manage_policies_scps.html

If you're using AWS Organizations, check the service control policies for any statements that explicitly deny Amazon S3 access. In particular, check the service control policies for statements denying the s3:PutBucketPolicy action. https://aws.amazon.com/tw/premiumsupport/knowledge-center/s3-access-denied-bucket-policy/

Weighted routing in Route 53 allows you to direct a percentage of traffic to different resources by configuring specific weights. For this requirement, you can:

Weighted Routing Policy: This is the most suitable approach for gradually rolling out a new version by controlling traffic distribution.

Weight Configuration: Setting a weight of 80 for the original resource and 20 for the new resource ensures that 80% of the traffic continues to go to the existing version, while 20% is directed to the new version.

Other routing policies, such as failover and multivalue answer, are not intended for traffic distribution based on percentage; they serve different use cases.

AWS WAF (Web Application Firewall) helps protect your web applications from common web exploits and bots. A rate-based rule allows you to control the rate of requests to your application.

Create a Global-Scoped AWS WAF Web ACL:

Navigate to the AWS WAF console.

Create a new Web ACL and choose "Global" for the scope.

Set the default action to "Allow".

Configure a Rate-Based Rule:

Within the Web ACL, add a new rule and select "Rate-based rule".

Define the rate limit (e.g., 2000 requests per 5 minutes).

Set the action to "Block".

Associate Web ACL with CloudFront Distribution:

After creating the Web ACL and rule, go to your CloudFront distribution settings.

In the "General" tab, associate the Web ACL with your CloudFront distribution.

Review and Confirm:

Review the configuration and ensure the Web ACL is correctly associated with the CloudFront distribution.

References:

AWS WAF Rate-Based Rules

Associating AWS WAF with CloudFront

To securely connect to Amazon S3 buckets from Amazon EC2 instances over a private connection without incurring additional costs, you can use a gateway VPC endpoint for S3. This method allows you to create a single gateway VPC endpoint for all S3 buckets in the same region, ensuring secure, private communication.

Create a Gateway VPC Endpoint:

Navigate to the VPC console.

In the navigation pane, choose "Endpoints" and then click "Create Endpoint".

Select "AWS services" and then choose "com.amazonaws..s3" from the service name dropdown.

Select the VPC in which to create the endpoint and the appropriate route tables.

Click "Create endpoint".

Update the Route Tables:

The gateway VPC endpoint will automatically update the selected route tables to include routes that direct S3 traffic through the endpoint.

Ensure that the route tables associated with your subnets include routes for the S3 service pointing to the gateway VPC endpoint.

Verify the Configuration:

Ensure that instances in the VPC can access the S3 buckets using private IP addresses.

Check the routing configuration to confirm that traffic to S3 is routed through the gateway VPC endpoint.

References:

Gateway VPC Endpoints for Amazon S3

Creating a Gateway Endpoint

To identify changes made by the compromised access key, the SysOps administrator should search the AWS CloudTrail event history:

AWS CloudTrail:

CloudTrail logs all API calls made in an AWS account, which includes events initiated by access keys. This makes it the ideal service to investigate changes made using the compromised access key.

One possible cause for the failure of the CloudFormation template to create an EC2 instance in the us-west-2 Region is that the Amazon Machine Image (AMI) ID referenced in the template could not be found in the us-west-2 Region. This could be due to the fact that the AMI is not available in that region, or the credentials used to access the AMI were not configured properly. The other options (resource tags defined in the CloudFormation template are specific to the us-east-I Region, the cfn-init script did not run during resource provisioning in the us-west-2 Region, and the IAM user was not created in the specified Region) are not valid causes for this failure.

Using AWS Systems Manager to schedule a maintenance window for restarting EC2 instances outside business hours provides a straightforward and automated approach.

AWS Systems Manager Maintenance Window: Allows for daily scheduling, ensuring that restarts occur consistently outside of business hours.

AWS-RestartEC2Instance Runbook: This runbook can be assigned to the maintenance window, automating the reboot process and minimizing manual intervention.

Reduced Disruption: The scheduled restart ensures the application remains operational during business hours.

To immediately notify software developers if an AWS Lambda function experiences an error, follow these steps:

Create an SNS Topic:

Navigate to the Amazon SNS console and create a new topic.

Add email subscriptions for each developer to the SNS topic.

To centrally store traffic logs for a website delivered through Amazon CloudFront and ensure all data is encrypted at rest, using an S3 bucket with default server-side encryption is the optimal solution.

Create an S3 Bucket:

Open the Amazon S3 console at Amazon S3 Console.

Create a new S3 bucket for storing the logs.

Enable Default Encryption:

Select the S3 bucket, navigate to Properties, and enable Default encryption.

Choose AES-256 for server-side encryption.

Configure CloudFront Logging:

Open the Amazon CloudFront console at Amazon CloudFront Console.

Select the CloudFront distribution and navigate to Edit.

In the logging section, enable logging and specify the S3 bucket created for log storage.

This setup ensures that all logs are encrypted at rest using AES-256 and stored centrally in an S3 bucket.

References:

Amazon CloudFront Access Logs

Amazon S3 Default Encryption

To reduce costs effectively for jobs that are flexible in their scheduling and have a clear, predictable runtime:

Spot Instances with Defined Duration (Spot Blocks): Spot Instances offer significant discounts compared to On-Demand pricing. For workloads like the described jobs that have a predictable duration (slightly less than 2 hours), requesting Spot Instances with a defined duration (also known as Spot Blocks) is ideal. This option allows you to request Spot Instances guaranteed to not be terminated by AWS due to price changes for the duration specified.

Cost Efficiency: This method ensures that the instances will run for the duration required to complete the jobs without interruption, unless AWS experiences an exceptional shortage of capacity. The cost savings compared to On-Demand Instances can be substantial, especially for regular, predictable workloads.

Risk Mitigation: Although Spot Instances can be interrupted, using them with a defined duration reduces the risk of interruptions within the set time frame, making them suitable for jobs that can tolerate a restart in rare cases of interruption after the block time expires.

This strategy combines cost savings with the performance requirements of the jobs, making it an optimal choice for tasks that are not time-critical but need completion within a predictable timeframe.

To launch EC2 instances when there are no available private IPv4 addresses in the VPC, the SysOps administrator should associate a secondary IPv4 CIDR block with the VPC and create a new subnet for the VPC.

Associate a Secondary IPv4 CIDR Block:

Open the VPC console.

Select the VPC and choose "Actions" -> "Edit CIDRs."

Add a secondary IPv4 CIDR block to increase the number of available IP addresses.

Create a New Subnet:

After adding the secondary CIDR block, create a new subnet within this CIDR block.

This new subnet will provide additional private IP addresses for launching new EC2 instances.

References:

Associating a CIDR Block with Your VPC

Creating a Subnet

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

Engineers need to connect to EC2 instances in a private subnet for troubleshooting.

The instances are using Windows or Amazon Linux AMIs.

The team already has an IAM role for authorization.

Analyze the Requirements:

Provide secure and efficient access to the instances without exposing them directly to the internet.

Utilize existing IAM role for access control.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Use AWS Systems Manager Session Manager.

Allows secure and auditable SSH or RDP access to EC2 instances without the need for bastion hosts or opening inbound ports.

Add a policy to allow the ssm:StartSession action.

Option B: Use Elastic IP and security group.

Exposes instances to direct access, increasing security risks.

Option C: Use a bastion host.

Requires additional infrastructure and maintenance.

Option D: Use an internet-facing Network Load Balancer.

Exposes instances to direct access via load balancer, not ideal for private subnets.

Select the Best Solution:

Option A: Using AWS Systems Manager Session Manager is the most secure and efficient solution. It eliminates the need for additional infrastructure and avoids exposing instances to the internet.

References:

AWS Systems Manager Session Manager

Controlling Access to Session Manager

AWS Systems Manager Session Manager provides secure and auditable access to EC2 instances in a private subnet using IAM roles.

To reduce the time required for new instances to become available in an Auto Scaling group, pre-installing the necessary software in the AMI used by the Auto Scaling group is the most effective solution.

Use EC2 Image Builder:

Utilize EC2 Image Builder to create a custom AMI that includes all the required software and configurations.

This reduces the setup time during instance launch, as the user data script will no longer need to install the software.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/object-lock-overview.html In governance mode, users can 't overwrite or delete an object version or alter its lock settings unless they have special permissions. With governance mode, you protect objects against being deleted by most users, but you can still grant some users permission to alter the retention settings or delete the object if necessary. You can also use governance mode to test retention-period settings before creating a compliance-mode retention period. In 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.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/systems-manager/latest/userguide/systems-manager-automation.html

To ensure all EC2 instances have the required tags and terminate any noncompliant instances, AWS Config can be used to check the compliance, and AWS Systems Manager Automation can be invoked to take action on noncompliant instances.

Create AWS Config Rule:

Open the AWS Config console at AWS Config Console.

Create a new rule to check for the required tags on EC2 instances. Use the managed rule required-tags.

Create AWS Systems Manager Automation Document:

Open the AWS Systems Manager console at AWS Systems Manager Console.

Create an Automation document to terminate noncompliant instances.

Link AWS Config Rule to Automation:

In the AWS Config console, configure the rule to invoke the Systems Manager Automation document if an instance is found to be noncompliant.

References:

AWS Config Rules

AWS Systems Manager Automation

AWS Config Managed Rules

To provision AWS accounts for each team with a defined baseline and governance guardrails in a scalable and efficient way, using AWS Control Tower is the best solution.

AWS Control Tower:

AWS Control Tower provides a straightforward way to set up and govern a secure, multi-account AWS environment based on best practices.

It uses Account Factory, a feature that automates the creation of new AWS accounts with predefined configurations.

Creating Accounts with Control Tower:

Navigate to the AWS Control Tower console.

Use Account Factory to create a new account.

Customize the account template to include the necessary configurations, such as organizational units (OUs), guardrails, and baselines.

Advantages:

Ensures consistent security and compliance across all accounts.

Automates account creation and configuration, saving time and reducing errors.

References:

AWS Control Tower

Setting Up Account Factory

Dedicated Hosts are physical servers that are dedicated to a single customer, ensuring that the customer’s workloads are not shared with other customers or with other AWS accounts within the company. This will ensure that the company’s security policy is followed and that sensitive workloads are running on hardware that is not shared with other customers or with other AWS accounts within the company.

When managing performance and cost for EC2 instances across different families, the following steps are recommended:

Utilize AWS Compute Optimizer: This service provides recommendations for EC2 instances based on historical usage patterns and existing configurations. It helps identify optimal EC2 instance types and sizes that could deliver better performance and cost savings for your specific workload.

Implement Compute Savings Plans: After determining the most suitable instance types and sizes through Compute Optimizer, purchasing Compute Savings Plans can offer significant cost savings. These savings plans apply to any instance family across any region, providing flexibility and cost efficiency without upfront commitment to specific instance types.

AWS Documentation Reference:Further details can be found in the AWS documentation on Compute Optimizer and Compute Savings Plans:

AWS Compute Optimizer

AWS Compute Savings Plans.

Snapshot Deletion Policy:

The Snapshot Deletion Policy ensures that a snapshot is created when an RDS instance is deleted as part of a CloudFormation stack deletion.

Steps:

Update your CloudFormation template to include the DeletionPolicy attribute for the RDS instance resource.

Example template snippet:

Resources:

MyDBInstance:

Type: AWS::RDS::DBInstance

Properties:

# DB instance properties

DeletionPolicy: Snapshot

 This configuration retains a snapshot of the RDS instance data when the stack is deleted.

 Reference: AWS CloudFormation DeletionPolicy

To encrypt an existing Amazon RDS DB instance that is not encrypted, you cannot directly enable encryption. Instead, you need to follow these steps:

Take a Snapshot:

Open the Amazon RDS console at Amazon RDS Console.

Select the DB instance and take a snapshot.

Copy and Encrypt the Snapshot:

After the snapshot is created, select the snapshot and choose Copy Snapshot.

In the copy snapshot dialog, enable encryption and choose a KMS key.

Restore the Encrypted Snapshot:

Once the encrypted snapshot is created, select it and choose Restore Snapshot.

Provide the necessary details to create a new DB instance from the encrypted snapshot.

This process ensures that the new DB instance is encrypted at rest.

References:

Encrypting Amazon RDS Resources

Copying an Amazon RDS Snapshot

 Lambda Function to Rotate IAM Access Keys:

A Lambda function can be used to automate the rotation of IAM access keys based on their age.

Steps:

Write a Lambda function that checks the age of IAM access keys.

The function should rotate keys that are at least 30 days old.

Deploy the Lambda function.

 Amazon EventBridge Rule:

EventBridge can trigger the Lambda function periodically and when a new key is created.

Steps:

Create an EventBridge rule that triggers the Lambda function on a schedule (e.g., daily) and on IAM key creation events.

https://docs .aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/default-bucket-encryption.html

You can set the default encryption behavior on an Amazon S3 bucket so that all objects are encrypted when they are stored in the bucket. The objects are encrypted using server-side encryption with either Amazon S3-managed keys (SSE-S3) or AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS) customer master keys (CMKs).

https://aws.amazon .com/blogs/security/how-to-prevent-uploads-of-unencrypted-objects-to-amazon-s3/

How to Prevent Uploads of Unencrypted Objects to Amazon S3#

By using an S3 bucket policy, you can enforce the encryption requirement when users upload objects, instead of assigning a restrictive IAM policy to all users.

To ensure all objects in the S3 bucket are encrypted, including future objects, the following steps should be taken:

Enable Default Server-Side Encryption:

Edit the properties of the S3 bucket to enable default server-side encryption. This ensures that all new objects written to the bucket are encrypted by default.

Navigate to the S3 console, select the bucket, go to the "Properties" tab, and under "Default encryption", select the encryption method (SSE-S3, SSE-KMS, etc.).

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

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.

To make the application highly available, update the Auto Scaling group to launch new instances in a second Availability Zone within the same AWS Region.

Understand High Availability Requirements:

High availability involves distributing instances across multiple Availability Zones to ensure the application remains accessible even if one Availability Zone experiences issues.

To make the application accessible only through the CloudFront distribution and not directly through the Application Load Balancer (ALB), you can add a custom HTTP header to the origin settings for the CloudFront distribution. You can then create a rule in the ALB listener to forward requests that contain the matching custom header and its value to the origin. You can also add a default rule to the ALB listener to return a fixed response code of 403 for requests that do not contain the matching custom header. This will allow you to redirect all requests to the CloudFront distribution and block direct access to the application through the ALB.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonCloudFront/latest/DeveloperGuide/restrict-access-to-load-balancer.html

If a user is unable to connect to an EC2 instance via RDP, the issue could be related to network ACLs or route table configurations.

Network ACL Blocking Traffic:

A network ACL (NACL) associated with the bastion's subnet might be blocking traffic on port 3389 (RDP).

Open the Amazon VPC console and navigate to Network ACLs.

Check the inbound and outbound rules for the NACL associated with the subnet. Ensure that port 3389 is allowed.

Route Table Missing Route to Internet Gateway:

The subnet's route table may not have a route to the internet gateway, which is necessary for internet connectivity.

Open the Amazon VPC console and navigate to Route Tables.

Check the route table associated with the subnet. Ensure there is a route with destination 0.0.0.0/0 pointing to the internet gateway (igw-xxxxxxxx).

Ensuring proper configuration of network ACLs and route tables will enable the required internet connectivity for RDP access.

References:

Network ACLs

Route Tables

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.

Retain the Security Group:

When deleting a CloudFormation stack, you can specify resources to be retained instead of deleted.

Steps:

Go to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to CloudFormation and select the stack.

Choose to delete the stack.

In the deletion options, specify that the security group should be retained.

This will delete the stack but keep the security group, ensuring no impact on other applications.

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

Auto Scaling groups automatically adjust the number of EC2 instances to handle the load on your application. A target tracking scaling policy adjusts the capacity of the Auto Scaling group based on a target metric, such as CPU utilization or application latency.

Create an Auto Scaling Group:

Navigate to the EC2 console and select "Auto Scaling Groups".

Create a new Auto Scaling group and specify the launch template or configuration for your EC2 instances.

Configure Target Tracking Scaling Policy:

In the Auto Scaling group settings, add a scaling policy.

Choose "Target Tracking" and select a predefined metric such as "Average CPU Utilization".

Set the target value (e.g., 50% CPU utilization).

Attach ALB to Auto Scaling Group:

In the "Load Balancing" section of the Auto Scaling group settings, attach your existing ALB.

This ensures that new instances are automatically registered with the ALB.

Review and Create:

Review the Auto Scaling group settings and create the group.

References:

Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling

Target Tracking Scaling Policies

Understand the Problem:

A user attempts to deploy a CloudFormation template to create an S3 bucket but the stack creation fails.

The user authenticates using Active Directory credentials.

Analyze the Requirements:

Identify permissions required for successful CloudFormation stack creation.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: The user's IAM policy does not allow the cloudformation:CreateStack action.

Without this permission, the user cannot create CloudFormation stacks.

Option B: The user's IAM policy does not allow the cloudformation:CreateStackSet action.

StackSet is used for managing stacks across multiple accounts and regions, not relevant for a single stack creation.

Option C: The user's IAM policy does not allow the s3:CreateBucket action.

This permission is required to create an S3 bucket as part of the stack.

Option D: The user's IAM policy explicitly denies the s3:ListBucket action.

This permission is not required for bucket creation but for listing existing buckets.

Option E: The user's IAM policy explicitly denies the s3:PutObject action.

This permission is required to put objects in a bucket, not to create the bucket.

Select the Best Solution:

Option A and C: The user must have permissions for cloudformation:CreateStack and s3:CreateBucket to successfully create the stack and the S3 bucket.

References:

AWS CloudFormation Permissions

IAM Policies and Permissions

Ensuring the user has the required permissions for cloudformation:CreateStack and s3:CreateBucket is crucial for successful stack creation.

To optimize the cost of a workload running in multiple AWS Regions using AWS Lambda and EC2 On-Demand Instances, the SysOps administrator should purchase Compute Savings Plans based on the usage during the past 30 days.

Compute Savings Plans:

Compute Savings Plans provide the most flexibility and can be applied across various compute services such as EC2, AWS Lambda, and Fargate.

They offer significant savings compared to On-Demand pricing.

Analysis and Purchase:

Analyze the compute usage over the past 30 days to determine the baseline usage.

Purchase Compute Savings Plans based on this baseline to maximize savings while maintaining flexibility across different regions and compute services.

AWS Storage Gateway provides a hybrid cloud storage service that enables on-premises applications to seamlessly use AWS cloud storage. The gateway-stored volumes configuration is suitable for scenarios where all data must be available locally and the backup application can write only to block-based storage that is POSIX-compliant.

Deploy AWS Storage Gateway:

Launch the AWS Storage Gateway service from the AWS Management Console.

Download and deploy the Storage Gateway VM on your on-premises infrastructure.

Activate the Gateway:

Activate the Storage Gateway by connecting it to your AWS account.

Follow the setup wizard to complete the activation process.

Configure Gateway-Stored Volumes:

Create a gateway-stored volume where the primary data is stored locally, and an asynchronous copy is stored in AWS.

Specify the size of the volume and configure it to match your backup application's requirements.

Connect the Backup Application:

Present the created volume to your on-premises backup application as an iSCSI target.

Configure the backup application to write data to the iSCSI target provided by the Storage Gateway.

Monitor and Manage:

Use the AWS Management Console to monitor the gateway and the volumes.

Ensure that the data is being backed up to AWS correctly and that local copies are maintained as required.

References:

AWS Storage Gateway User Guide

Gateway-Stored Volumes

Split-tunnel routing allows you to specify that only the traffic destined for your VPC is routed through the VPN tunnel. All other internet traffic is routed through the user’s local network.

Steps:

Open the Client VPN Console:

Sign in to the AWS Management Console.

Open the Amazon VPC console.

Modify the Client VPN Endpoint:

Select the Client VPN endpoint.

Choose "Modify Client VPN endpoint".

Enable the "Split-tunnel" option.

Update Route Table:

Ensure that the route table associated with the Client VPN endpoint routes traffic destined for the VPC IP range to the appropriate target (e.g., VPC subnet).

This configuration ensures that only traffic destined for resources in the VPC is sent over the VPN tunnel, while other traffic uses the user’s local internet connection.

References:

Split-Tunnel VPN Routing

AWS Client VPN Documentation

Understand the Problem:

The requirement is to delete the CloudFormation stack without deleting the DynamoDB table.

Analyze the Requirements:

Ensure the DynamoDB table is preserved when the CloudFormation stack is deleted.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Add a Retain deletion policy to the DynamoDB resource.

The Retain policy ensures that the DynamoDB table is not deleted when the stack is deleted.

Option B: Add a Snapshot deletion policy to the DynamoDB resource.

Snapshot policy is not applicable to DynamoDB tables and would not retain the table itself.

Option C: Enable termination protection on the CloudFormation stack.

Prevents stack deletion entirely but does not specifically protect the DynamoDB table.

Option D: Update the IAM policy with a Deny statement for dynamodb:DeleteTable.

Prevents deletion of the table but is not a CloudFormation stack-specific solution.

Select the Best Solution:

Option A: Adding a Retain deletion policy to the DynamoDB resource in the CloudFormation stack ensures the table is preserved when the stack is deleted.

References:

AWS CloudFormation Deletion Policy

Using the Retain deletion policy ensures that the DynamoDB table is not deleted when the CloudFormation stack is deleted, preserving critical data.

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.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/elasticloadbalancing/latest/application/load-balancer-cloudwatch-metrics.html

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 enable decryption of objects, the role only requires minimal permissions with least privilege:

kms

Necessary for reading and decrypting the data encrypted with KMS.

kms

Allows the role to check key properties, confirming it’s the correct key for decryption.

kms

Useful if multiple keys are in use and validation against an alias is needed.

These permissions are sufficient for decryption without granting additional permissions like encryption or key management.

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

There are two applications, one in an on-premises data center and the other on an Amazon EC2 instance.

DNS resolution fails when the on-premises application tries to connect to the EC2 instance.

The goal is to implement DNS resolution between on-premises and AWS resources.

Analyze the Requirements:

Need to resolve the hostname of the EC2 instance from the on-premises network.

Utilize the existing AWS Site-to-Site VPN connection for DNS queries.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Set up an Amazon Route 53 inbound resolver endpoint with a forwarding rule for the onprem.private hosted zone.

This allows DNS queries from on-premises to be forwarded to Route 53 for resolution.

The resolver endpoint is associated with the VPC, enabling resolution of AWS resources.

Option B: Set up an Amazon Route 53 inbound resolver endpoint without specifying the forwarding rule.

This option does not address the specific need to resolve onprem.private DNS queries.

Option C: Set up an Amazon Route 53 outbound resolver endpoint.

Outbound resolver endpoints are used for forwarding DNS queries from AWS to on-premises, not vice versa.

Option D: Set up an Amazon Route 53 outbound resolver endpoint without specifying the forwarding rule.

Similar to Option C, this does not meet the requirement of resolving on-premises queries in AWS.

Select the Best Solution:

Option A: Setting up an inbound resolver endpoint with a forwarding rule for onprem.private and associating it with the VPC ensures that DNS queries from on-premises can resolve AWS resources effectively.

References:

Amazon Route 53 Resolver

Integrating AWS and On-Premises Networks with Route 53

Using an Amazon Route 53 inbound resolver endpoint with a forwarding rule ensures that on-premises applications can resolve EC2 instance hostnames effectively.

Scaling Policies in Auto Scaling:

When multiple scaling policies trigger at the same time, each policy is executed independently.

If both policies are set to add 5 instances when CPU utilization reaches 80%, they will both be executed when the threshold is met.

Therefore, the total number of instances added will be the sum of the instances specified in both policies.

In this case, 5 instances from one policy and 5 instances from the other policy will result in a total of 10 instances being added.

Steps to Configure and Verify Scaling Policies:

Go to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to EC2 and select "Auto Scaling Groups."

Select your Auto Scaling group and review the scaling policies.

Ensure that both scaling policies are configured to trigger at 80% CPU utilization.

Monitor the Auto Scaling group's activity to verify the addition of instances when the CPU utilization threshold is reached.

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.

Understand the Problem:

All AWS resources must be tagged according to a company policy.

Continuous identification and enforcement of non-compliant resources are required.

Analyze the Requirements:

Monitor resources for compliance with tagging policies.

Enforce tagging policies and provide ongoing compliance reporting.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: AWS CloudTrail.

Tracks user activity and API usage but does not enforce tagging policies.

Option B: Amazon Inspector.

Provides security assessments but does not monitor or enforce resource tagging.

Option C: AWS Config.

Monitors and evaluates the configurations of AWS resources.

AWS Config rules can be used to enforce tagging policies and continuously monitor compliance.

Option D: AWS Systems Manager.

Provides operational insights and management but does not specifically enforce tagging compliance.

Select the Best Solution:

Option C: AWS Config is designed for compliance and configuration monitoring, making it the ideal service for enforcing and identifying non-compliant resource tags.

References:

AWS Config

Managing Resource Tag Compliance with AWS Config

AWS Config provides the necessary tools to enforce and monitor resource tagging compliance, ensuring all resources adhere to the set policy.

The most likely reason for the unexpected placement of EC2 instances is that one Availability Zone did not have sufficient capacity for the requested EC2 instance type.

Capacity Constraints:

AWS manages EC2 instance placement based on available capacity in the Availability Zones.

If a particular Availability Zone does not have enough capacity for the instance type you requested, AWS will place instances in other Availability Zones with sufficient capacity.

Auto Scaling Group Configuration:

Even if the Auto Scaling group is configured to use all three Availability Zones, instances might not be evenly distributed if one zone lacks the required capacity.

This can result in instances being placed in the remaining zones with available capacity.

Monitoring and Mitigation:

Monitor the capacity limits and instance distribution using CloudWatch and the Auto Scaling group's activity history.

Consider using smaller instance types or different instance families to avoid capacity issues in specific zones.

References:

Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling

Troubleshooting Amazon EC2 Capacity Issues

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

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

To view a list of security groups that are open to the internet on port 3389, the most appropriate tool is AWS Trusted Advisor.

AWS Trusted Advisor:

AWS Trusted Advisor provides real-time guidance to help you provision your resources following AWS best practices.

It includes a security check that identifies security groups with unrestricted access.

Using Trusted Advisor:

Go to the AWS Trusted Advisor console.

In the "Security" category, look for the check that identifies security groups with unrestricted access.

Review the report to find security groups that allow unrestricted access on port 3389 (RDP).

References:

AWS Trusted Advisor

AWS Trusted Advisor Best Practices

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

Users report that file retrieval from the Amazon EFS file system is slower than normal.

Analyze the Requirements:

Improve the performance of the EFS file system to handle increased usage and file retrieval speed.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Configure the file system for Provisioned Throughput.

Provisioned Throughput mode allows you to specify the throughput of your file system independent of the amount of data stored.

This option is suitable for applications with high throughput-to-storage ratio requirements and ensures consistent performance.

Option B: Enable encryption in transit on the file system.

While this enhances security, it does not directly improve performance.

Option C: Identify any unused files in the file system, and remove the unused files.

This may free up some resources but does not address the root cause of slow performance.

Option D: Resize the Amazon EBS volume of each of the EC2 instances.

EFS performance issues are not directly related to the size of EBS volumes attached to EC2 instances.

Select the Best Solution:

Option A: Configuring the file system for Provisioned Throughput ensures consistent performance by allowing you to set the required throughput regardless of the amount of data stored.

References:

Amazon EFS Performance

Provisioned Throughput Mode

Configuring Provisioned Throughput for Amazon EFS provides a consistent and higher performance level, which is suitable for high throughput requirements.

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

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.

To ensure that the AWS CloudFormation template works in every region, you should use the Mappings section to specify region-specific AMI IDs. This allows the template to dynamically reference the correct AMI ID based on the region where the stack is being deployed.

Steps:

Add Mappings to the Template:

Define the AMI IDs for each region in the Mappings section of the CloudFormation template.

json

Copy code

{

"Mappings": {

"RegionMap": {

"us-east-1": { "AMI": "ami-0123456789abcdef0" },

"us-west-2": { "AMI": "ami-abcdef0123456789" }

}

}

}

Reference the Mapping in the Template:

Use the Fn::FindInMap function to reference the correct AMI ID based on the region.

json

Copy code

{

"Resources": {

"MyEC2Instance": {

"Type": "AWS::EC2::Instance",

"Properties": {

"ImageId": { "Fn::FindInMap": [ "RegionMap", { "Ref": "AWS::Region" }, "AMI" ] },

}

}

}

}

Deploy the Template:

Deploy the CloudFormation stack in any region, and it will use the correct AMI ID.

CloudWatch alarms allow you to monitor AWS resources, and you can configure an SNS topic to send an email notification each time one of the alarms is triggered. This will ensure that the company receives email notifications each time one of the service quotas is exceeded, allowing the company to take action as needed.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/ri-convertible-exchange.html

Cluster Placement Group:

Cluster placement groups are used to ensure low-latency networking between EC2 instances. They place instances physically close to each other within the same Availability Zone.

Steps:

Go to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to EC2 and select "Placement Groups."

Create a new cluster placement group.

Back up the existing EC2 instance to an AMI.

Launch new EC2 instances from the AMI into the cluster placement group.

Ensure all instances are in the same Availability Zone.

To optimize the routing of requests to the application for users in different geographic locations, use Amazon Route 53's latency-based routing:

Latency Routing Policy: Modify the Route 53 DNS settings for app.anycompany.com by changing the routing policy to latency. This policy routes user requests to the server that has the lowest latency relative to the user's location.

Configure Latency Records: Create latency records for each ALB—one for the ALB in us-west-2 and another for the new ALB in ap-southeast-2. Route 53 will automatically direct traffic to the endpoint that provides the lowest latency connection to the user.

Seamless User Experience: By using latency routing, the URL remains the same (app.anycompany.com), but the backend service location varies based on which endpoint is likely to respond the fastest. This setup provides a seamless experience for users, reducing latency without requiring any changes to how they access the application.

This method leverages Route 53's advanced DNS capabilities to ensure optimal performance and user experience by dynamically routing traffic based on geographic latency considerations.

AWS WAF (Web Application Firewall) helps protect web applications from common web exploits that could affect availability, compromise security, or consume excessive resources. It can be used to mitigate cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities.

Set Up AWS WAF:

Open the AWS WAF console at AWS WAF Console.

Create a new Web ACL.

Add Rules for Protection:

Add managed rules that include protection against common vulnerabilities, including XSS.

AWS provides managed rule groups, such as the AWS Managed Rules for Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) which include protections against XSS.

Associate WAF with the Application:

Associate the Web ACL with the resources you want to protect (e.g., CloudFront distribution, Application Load Balancer).

References:

AWS WAF

AWS WAF Managed Rules

To configure Route 53 for high availability with failover between a primary and a secondary server, the following steps should be taken:

Create Health Checks:

Create HTTP health checks for both the primary and secondary servers. Ensure these health checks are configured to look for HTTP 2xx or 3xx status codes.

To support a wide variety of cloud storage workloads, Amazon EFS offers two performance modes, General Purpose mode and Max I/O mode. You choose a file system's performance mode when you create it, and it cannot be changed. If the PercentIOLimit percentage returned was at or near 100 percent for a significant amount of time during the test, your application should use the Max I/O performance mode. https://docs.aws.amazon.com/efs/latest/ug/performance.html

To resolve DNS across VPCs in different accounts, you should:

Authorization: In Account B, initiate a VPC association authorization for the private hosted zone. This action allows another AWS account to associate a VPC with this hosted zone.

Association: In Account A, after receiving the authorization from Account B, associate its VPC with the private hosted zone that exists in Account B. This step will enable EC2 instances within the VPC in Account A to resolve DNS records hosted in Account B.

AWS Documentation Reference:AWS provides detailed guidance on associating VPCs with private hosted zones across accounts in their documentation: Associating VPCs and Private Hosted Zones Across Accounts.

For high-performance computing (HPC) applications that require minimized network latency and maximized network throughput, the best strategy is to use a cluster placement group. Here’s why:

Cluster Placement Group:

Instances in a cluster placement group are placed within a single Availability Zone, which allows them to communicate using high-bandwidth, low-latency connections.

This is ideal for HPC workloads that require high network throughput and low latency.

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/

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/

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