The following steps are very specific to AWS, but with minimal modification they will work for other cloud platforms which support multi factor authentication. And if your cloud provider doesn’t support MFA and the other features you need to follow these steps… find another provider.

  • Register with a dedicated email address that follows this formula: project_name-environment-random_seed@yourorganization.com. Instead of project name you could use a business unit, cost code, or some other team identifier. The environment is dev/test/prod/whatever. The most important piece is the random seed added to the email address. This prevents attackers from figuring out your naming scheme, and then your account with email.
    • Subscribe the project administrators, someone from central ops, and someone from security to receive email sent to that address.
    • Establish a policy that the email account is never otherwise directly accessed or used.
  • Disable any access keys (API credentials) for the root account.
  • Enable MFA and set it up with a hardware token, not a soft token.
  • Use a strong password stored in a password manager.
  • Set the account security/recovery questions to random human-readable answers (most password managers can create these) and store the answers in your password manager.
  • Write the account ID and username/email on a sticker on the MFA token and lock it in a central safe that is accessible 24/7 in case of emergency.
  • Create a full-administrator user account even if you plan to use federated identity. That one can use a virtual MFA device, assuming the virtual MFA is accessible 24/7. This becomes your emergency account in case something really unusual happens, like your federated identity connection breaking down (it happens – I have a call with someone this week who got locked out this way).

After this you should never need to use your root account. Always try to use a federated identity account with admin rights first, then you can drop to your direct AWS user account with admin rights if your identity provider connection has issues. If you need the root account it’s a break-glass scenario, the worst of circumstances. You can even enforce dual authority on the root account by separating who has access to the password manager and who has access to the physical safe holding the MFA card.

Setting all this up takes less than 10 minutes once you have the process figured out. The biggest obstacle I run into is getting new email accounts provisioned. Turns out some email admins really hate creating new accounts in a timely manner. They’ll be first up against the wall when the revolution comes, so they have that going for them. Which is nice.

Share: