Amazon Exam SAA-C03 Topic 4 Question 26 Discussion

Actual exam question for Amazon's SAA-C03 exam

Question #: 26
Topic #: 4

A company's developers want a secure way to gain SSH access on the company's Amazon EC2 instances that run the latest version of Amazon Linux. The developers work remotely and in the corporate office.

The company wants to use AWS services as a part of the solution. The EC2 instances are hosted in a VPC private subnet and access the internet through a NAT gateway that is deployed in a public subnet.

What should a solutions architect do to meet these requirements MOST cost-effectively?

ACreate a bastion host in the same subnet as the EC2 instances. Grant the ec2: CreateVpnConnection 1AM permission to the developers. Install EC2 Instance Connect so that the developers can connect to the EC2 instances.

BCreate an AWS Site-to-Site VPN connection between the corporate network and the VPC. Instruct the developers to use the Site-to-Site VPN connection to access the EC2 instances when the developers are on the corporate network. Instruct the developers to set up another VPN connection for access when they work remotely.

CCreate a bastion host in the public subnet of the VPC. Configure the security groups and SSH keys of the bastion host to only allow connections and SSH authentication from the developers' corporate and remote networks. Instruct the developers to connect through the bastion host by using SSH to reach the EC2 instances.

DAttach the AmazonSSMManagedlnstanceCore 1AM policy to an 1AM role that is associated with the EC2 instances. Instruct the developers to use AWS Systems Manager Session Manager to access the EC2 instances.

Show Suggested Answer

Suggested Answer: D

AWS Systems Manager Session Manager is a service that enables you to securely connect to your EC2 instances without using SSH keys or bastion hosts. You can use Session Manager to access your instances through the AWS Management Console, the AWS CLI, or the AWS SDKs. Session Manager uses IAM policies and roles to control who can access which instances. By attaching the AmazonSSMManagedlnstanceCore IAM policy to an IAM role that is associated with the EC2 instances, you grant the Session Manager service the necessary permissions to perform actions on your instances. You also need to attach another IAM policy to the developers' IAM users or roles that allows them to start sessions to the instances. Session Manager uses the AWS Systems Manager Agent (SSM Agent) that is installed by default on Amazon Linux 2 and other supported Linux distributions. Session Manager also encrypts all session data between your client and your instances, and streams session logs to Amazon S3, Amazon CloudWatch Logs, or both for auditing purposes. This solution is the most cost-effective, as it does not require any additional resources or services, such as bastion hosts, VPN connections, or NAT gateways. It also simplifies the security and management of SSH access, as it eliminates the need for SSH keys, port opening, or firewall rules.Reference:

What is AWS Systems Manager?

Setting up Session Manager

Getting started with Session Manager

Controlling access to Session Manager

Logging Session Manager activity

by Leonida at Dec 11, 2023, 10:26 PM

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Rene

8 months ago

True, but with Option D, the developers would still need to be granted the AmazonSSMManagedlnstanceCore IAM policy, which could be a bit of a pain to manage. And what if the developers need to do some advanced troubleshooting that requires direct SSH access? The bastion host approach in Option C seems more flexible.

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8 months ago

Good one! Although, to be fair, Option A does seem a bit overly complex for this use case. I think the best solution is still Option C - it's secure, cost-effective, and gives the developers the access they need without too much extra hassle.

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