Identity and Access Management (IAM)

• Stands for Identity and Access Management.

• Its a global service.

Icon

IAM Icon

Terminology

User

• People/Application that uses the AWS resources.

• They can be grouped (Group).

Group

• A collection of user makes up Group.

• Groups can only contain users and cannot contain Group.

• A User can belong to multiple Groups.

Policy

• Policy is a JSON Document which describes the permission required by a user/group to access them.

• Sample Policy Document

      {
          "Version": "2012-10-17", //version
          "Id": "PolicyId", //Policy Id
          "Statement": [
          {
              "Sid": "AllowOrgsReadOnlyAndIamGetReport",
              "Effect": "Allow",
              "Action": [
                  "iam:GetOrganizationsAccessReport",
                  "organizations:Describe*",
                  "organizations:List*"
              ],
              "Resource": "*"
          },
          {
              "Sid": "AllowGenerateReportOnlyForThePolicy",
              "Effect": "Allow",
              "Action": "iam:GenerateOrganizationsAccessReport",
              "Resource": "*",
              "Condition": {
                  "StringEquals": {"iam:OrganizationsPolicyId": "p-policy123"}
              }
          }
      ]
      }

• In AWS (or in any CPS), always apply Least Privilege Principle when giving access to resource.
• Policy structure:

  • Policy Version

  • Policy Id

  • Statement

    • Statement Id (optional)

    • Effect (Allow Or Deny) (Mandatory)

    • Principal, basically account to which this policy is applied.

    • Action, List of action/s which can be done using this policy. (Mandatory)

    • Resource, List of AWS resource to which the action/s can be applied. (Mandatory)

    • Condition, Conditions when this policy is applicable. (optional)

• Policy Inheritance is a concept where a user can inherit policies from multiple groups, if user belongs to multiple groups.

• Inline Policy, are policies that are directly applied to a user.

Roles

• When AWS service/s need to perform action/s on behalf of user, IAM Roles enables us to achieve that.

• Roles are assigned permissions policies.

• Taking on a role allows users/AWS services to perform a task on behalf of the user whose role is being assumed.

Principal

• In IAM Policy, following can be the principal.

  • Account
  • Root User
  • IAM Roles
  • IAM Role Sessions
  • IAM User
  • Federated User
  • AWS Service
  • All Principals

References

• All about policies
• What is Principal in Policies