Amazon Web Services SOA-C02 AWS Certified SysOps Administrator - Associate (SOA-C02) Exam Practice Test

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 Amazon EventBridge to meet the above requirements:

Log in to the AWS Management Console by using the AWS Management Console shortcut from the VM desktop. Make sure that you are logged in to the desired AWS account.

Go to the EventBridge service in the us-east-2 Region.

In the EventBridge service, navigate to the "Event buses" page.

Click on the "Create event bus" button.

Give a name to your event bus, and select "default" as the event source type.

Navigate to "Rules" page and create a new rule named "RunFunction"

In the "Event pattern" section, select "Schedule" as the event source and set the schedule to run every 15 minutes.

In the "Actions" section, select "Send to Lambda" and choose the existing AWS Lambda function named "LogEventFunction"

Create another rule named "SpotWarning"

In the "Event pattern" section, select "EC2" as the event source, and filter the events on "EC2 Spot Instance interruption"

In the "Actions" section, select "Send to SNS topic" and create a new standard Amazon SNS topic named "TopicEvents"

In the "Input Transformer" section, set the Input Path to {“instance” : “$.detail.instance-id”} and Input template to “The EC2 Spot Instance has been interrupted on account.

Now all Amazon EC2 events in the default event bus will be replayable for past 90 days.

Note:

You can use the AWS Management Console, AWS CLI, or SDKs to create and manage EventBridge resources.

You can use CloudTrail event history to replay events from the past 90 days.

You can refer to the AWS EventBridge documentation for more information on how to configure and use the service: https://aws.amazon.com/eventbridge/

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/

Graphical user interface, application, Teams Description automatically generated

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/Route53/latest/DeveloperGuide/hosted-zones-private.html

To apply an existing Amazon Route 53 private hosted zone to a new VPC, the appropriate step is to associate the private hosted zone with the new VPC. This allows the resources within the VPC to use the custom DNS settings defined in the private hosted zone. Option A is the correct step to ensure that DNS queries from the new VPC are resolved using the specified private hosted zone. Detailed steps for this process can be found in the AWS Route 53 documentation on associating hosted zones with VPCs Associating Hosted Zones with VPCs.

Applying SCPs to an Organizational Unit:

Service Control Policies (SCPs) allow you to manage permissions for multiple AWS accounts within an organization.

Steps:

Go to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to AWS Organizations.

Create an Organizational Unit (OU) if not already created.

Move the target accounts into the OU.

Create an SCP that denies the use of the specific EC2 instance family.

Attach the SCP to the OU.

This approach ensures that the policy is applied consistently across all accounts in the OU.

AWS Organizations SCPs

To efficiently manage application deployments and updates on Amazon EC2 instances within an Auto Scaling group, along with ensuring security through vulnerability scans:

EC2 Image Builder: This AWS service automates the creation, management, and deployment of customized, secure, and up-to-date "golden" server images. By using EC2 Image Builder, you can automate the installation of software, patches, and security configurations.

Custom Recipes: Define a custom recipe in EC2 Image Builder that includes steps to install the application and its dependencies. Additionally, configure the recipe to perform vulnerability scans as part of the image creation process.

Automated Pipeline: Set up an Image Builder pipeline that triggers on a regular schedule (e.g., weekly) to incorporate the latest application updates and security patches into the AMI. The new AMIs can then be automatically used by the Auto Scaling group to launch updated and secure instances.

This solution not only streamlines the management of application deployments and updates but also ensures that all instances launched by the Auto Scaling group meet the latest security and compliance standards, minimizing operational overhead and enhancing security.

Amazon CloudWatch Synthetics allows you to create canaries that monitor your endpoints and APIs. Canaries are scripts that run on a schedule to check your application’s availability and performance, and can detect issues before your customers do.

Create a CloudWatch Synthetics Canary:

Open the Amazon CloudWatch console at Amazon CloudWatch Console.

Navigate to Synthetics and choose Create Canary.

Use the CloudWatch Synthetics Recorder plugin to generate the script for the canary run.

Configure the Canary:

Define the schedule for the canary to run (e.g., every minute).

Specify the endpoint URL of the website.

Configure the canary to check for specific errors or issues based on your requirements.

Create Alarms:

Set up CloudWatch alarms to notify you when the canary detects issues. You can configure the alarm to send notifications via Amazon SNS.

Creating and Managing Canaries

CloudWatch Synthetics

Using an RDS read replica will improve the performance and availability of the RDS instance by offloading read queries to the replica. This will also ensure that the reporting job completes in a timely manner and does not affect the performance of other queries that might be running on the RDS instance. Additionally, updating the reporting job to query the reader endpoint will ensure that all read queries are directed to the read replica.

ElastiCache for Redis offers Global Datastore, which:

Enables low-latency read access in multiple AWS Regions.

Allows read/write in the primary Region, and read-only in secondaries.

Provides data consistency across Regions, which meets the use case.

From ElastiCache Redis Global Datastore documentation:

Global Datastore replicates data between Regions using asynchronous replication. Supports cross-region read scalability.

To ensure high availability and disaster recovery for the RDS for MySQL database, follow these steps:

Create a Cross-Region Read Replica:

In the RDS console, create a cross-Region read replica of the primary database instance. This read replica will provide high availability and the lowest RTO and RPO in case of a disaster.

This question is about:

Running a script every 60 minutes

Sending an SMS message

From the Amazon EventBridge Scheduler Documentation:

EventBridge Scheduler provides cron-based scheduling, and is the recommended tool for time-based invocations (replacing CloudWatch Events for most new use cases).

From the Amazon SNS Documentation:

SNS can send SMS messages by publishing to a topic that has a phone number subscribed.

To ensure that all users within the AWS Organization have read-level access to a specific Amazon S3 bucket, while preventing access outside the organization, you can specify a wildcard principal ("Principal": "*") and use the PrincipalOrgId condition key in the bucket policy.

Specify the Principal:

Use "Principal": "*". This means that any principal can access the bucket, but the actual access will be controlled by the condition.

Add Condition with PrincipalOrgId:

Add a condition to restrict access based on the PrincipalOrgId. This condition ensures that only the principals from the specified AWS Organization can access the bucket.

Example bucket policy:

{

"Version": "2012-10-17",

"Statement": [

{

"Effect": "Allow",

"Principal": "*",

"Action": "s3:GetObject",

"Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::bucket-name/*",

"Condition": {

"StringEquals": {

"aws:PrincipalOrgID": "o-exampleorgid"

}

}

}

]

}

To view the cost details of each project in an AWS account using Cost Explorer, you need to activate cost allocation tags and tag the resources with a project identifier.

Activate Cost Allocation Tags:

Navigate to the AWS Billing and Cost Management console.

In the navigation pane, choose "Cost allocation tags".

Select the tags you want to activate (e.g., "Project") and click "Activate".

Tag Resources with Project Identifier:

Go to the AWS Management Console for each service where resources are deployed (e.g., EC2, S3, RDS).

For each resource, add a tag with the key "Project" and a value that identifies the project (e.g., "ProjectA").

Ensure that all relevant resources are tagged appropriately.

View Cost Allocation in Cost Explorer:

Navigate to the Cost Explorer console.

Use the "Group by" option to group costs by the "Project" tag.

Review the cost details for each project based on the tags applied to the resources.

Using Cost Allocation Tags

Analyzing Your Costs with Cost Explorer

The requirement to share the same underlying files among EC2 instances with data consistency is best met by using Amazon Elastic File System (EFS), which supports concurrent access from multiple EC2 instances. A new launch template version should include user data scripts that mount the EFS file system on each instance launched by the Auto Scaling group. Older instances can be cycled out to ensure all instances use the new configuration. Option A is correct and provides the necessary solution while ensuring data consistency and availability. For implementation guidance, refer to the AWS documentation on integrating EFS with EC2 Amazon EFS Integration with EC2.

To meet the requirement of using only IPv6 for all EC2 instances while allowing outbound internet access and preventing inbound internet access, an egress-only internet gateway is the correct solution. An egress-only internet gateway allows outbound communication over IPv6 and blocks inbound communication, ensuring that the instances can access the internet but are not directly accessible from the internet.

Create an Egress-Only Internet Gateway:

Open the Amazon VPC console at Amazon VPC Console.

In the navigation pane, choose Egress-only internet gateways.

Choose Create egress-only internet gateway, and then attach it to your VPC.

Create a Custom Route Table:

In the VPC console, navigate to Route Tables.

Create a new route table or select an existing one.

Add a route with the destination set to ::/0 (which represents all IPv6 addresses) and the target set to the egress-only internet gateway.

Attach the Route Table to IPv6-Only Subnets:

Associate the route table with the IPv6-only subnets in your VPC.

This configuration ensures that your IPv6-only EC2 instances can access the internet while being protected from inbound internet traffic.

Egress-Only Internet Gateways

IPv6 Addresses

To enforce compliance with tagging policies in real-time:

AWS Config Setup: Implement an AWS Config rule to continuously monitor and evaluate EC2 instances for compliance with the tagging requirements. The required-tags managed rule can be configured to specifically check for the presence of a 'department' tag.

Automatic Remediation: Configure AWS Config to automatically execute the AWS-TerminateEC2Instance Systems Manager Automation document as a remediation action. This runbook will terminate any EC2 instance identified as noncompliant due to missing required tags.

Operational Efficiency: This setup allows for the enforcement of company tagging policies automatically and in near real-time, reducing the manual overhead of monitoring and ensuring compliance.

This method provides an efficient and effective solution to ensure that all EC2 instances meet the company's tagging requirements and that any noncompliant instances are dealt with promptly.

geolocation "Geolocation routing lets you choose the resources that serve your traffic based on the geographic location of your users, meaning the location that DNS queries originate from. For example, you might want all queries from Europe to be routed to an ELB load balancer in the Frankfurt region."

Could be confused with geoproximity - "Geoproximity routing lets Amazon Route 53 route traffic to your resources based on the geographic location of your users and your resources. You can also optionally choose to route more traffic or less to a given resource by specifying a value, known as a bias. A bias expands or shrinks the size of the geographic region from which traffic is routed to a resource" the use case is not needed as per question.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/Route53/latest/DeveloperGuide/routing-policy.html

To troubleshoot connectivity issues for an EC2 instance that's not accessible via RDP after moving to a private subnet, VPC flow logs are the most direct and useful tool. VPC flow logs capture information about the IP traffic going to and from network interfaces in your VPC, enabling you to identify whether the traffic to the EC2 instance is being allowed or rejected. Setting up flow logs for the EC2 instance’s network interface will help pinpoint any blocks or drops in traffic that could be causing the timeout error. Option C is the correct action as it directly investigates the traffic flow, which is crucial for resolving connectivity issues. AWS documentation on VPC flow logs provides further details VPC Flow Logs.

The most likely reason for being unable to authenticate an AWS CLI call to an AWS service is the absence of an access key. AWS CLI requires an access key and secret key to authenticate requests.

Access Key and Secret Key:

AWS uses access keys to identify and authenticate the identity of the requester.

Ensure that the AWS CLI is configured with a valid access key and secret key.

Check AWS CLI Configuration:

Use the aws configure command to set up the AWS CLI with the necessary credentials.

Verify that the ~/.aws/credentials file contains the correct access key and secret key.

AWS CLI Configuration

Managing Access Keys

AWS CloudFormation StackSets allows you to deploy a single CloudFormation template across multiple AWS accounts and Regions. By using automatic deployments with StackSets:

New Accounts: When a new account is added to the organization or a specific organizational unit (OU), the StackSet automatically deploys the specified resources.

Consistency: Ensures that all accounts have a consistent base configuration.

Operational Efficiency: Reduces manual intervention, as deployments are handled automatically.

This method provides a scalable and efficient way to enforce baseline configurations across an organization.

To meet the requirement of consistent performance of 10,000 IOPS with the least cost, the SysOps administrator should use a General Purpose SSD (gp3) Amazon EBS volume:

General Purpose SSD (gp3) EBS Volume:

The gp3 volume type can be provisioned with the required IOPS without the need for additional capacity, making it a cost-effective solution compared to Provisioned IOPS SSD (io1) volumes.

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

Enforce a policy that requires all AWS resources to be tagged according to company policy.

Continuously identify non-compliant resources.

Analyze the Requirements:

Implement a solution to monitor and enforce resource tagging compliance.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: AWS CloudTrail.

Provides logging and monitoring of API calls but does not enforce tagging policies.

Option B: Amazon Inspector.

Primarily used for security assessments, not resource tagging compliance.

Option C: AWS Config.

Monitors and evaluates the configurations of AWS resources.

Can enforce compliance by using AWS Config rules to check resource tags.

Option D: AWS Systems Manager.

Provides operational insights and management but is not specifically designed for compliance enforcement.

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.

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.

To automatically remediate security groups that allow unrestricted SSH access, the following configuration is recommended:

AWS Config Managed Rule (restricted-ssh):This rule checks whether security groups disallow unrestricted incoming SSH traffic. If a security group allows SSH access from 0.0.0.0/0 or ::/0, it is considered noncompliant.

AWS Systems Manager Automation Runbook (AWS-DisableIncomingSSHOnPort22):This runbook removes rules that allow unrestricted incoming SSH traffic on TCP port 22 for specified security groups. By associating this runbook with the AWS Config rule, noncompliant security groups can be automatically remediated without manual intervention.

This setup ensures that any security group violating the SSH access policy is promptly corrected, enhancing the security posture of the EC2 instances.

"In EventBridge, you can create an archive of events so that you can easily replay them at a later time. For example, you might want to replay events to recover from errors or to validate new functionality in your application." https://docs.aws.amazon.com/eventbridge/latest/userguide/eb-archive.html

Objective:

Address high and unpredictable CPU usage by automating the scaling of resources.

Using Auto Scaling Policies:

Scaling policies can dynamically adjust the number of instances in an Auto Scaling group based on metrics like CPU utilization.

Steps to Implement:

Step 1: Increase the maximum capacity of the Auto Scaling group (e.g., from 2 to a higher value like 5).

Step 2: Create a scaling policy:

Use a target tracking scaling policy with a threshold of 80% CPU utilization.

When the CPU usage exceeds 80%, additional instances will be launched automatically.

Step 3: Monitor scaling behavior and adjust thresholds or capacities if necessary.

AWS References:

Target Tracking Scaling Policies:Scaling Policies for Auto Scaling Groups

Dynamic Scaling Best Practices:Dynamic Scaling in Auto Scaling

Why Other Options Are Incorrect:

Option A: Deploying additional instances outside the Auto Scaling group is not scalable and defeats the purpose of automation.

Option B: Switching to burstable instances does not resolve the issue since the workload is CPU-bound and consistently high.

Option D: Increasing desired capacity does not account for the unpredictability of peak periods, as it sets a static scaling behavior rather than dynamic.

The requirement is to implement a failover mechanism that minimizes downtime for an Amazon RDS for MySQL Single-AZ instance that handles read and write traffic.

From the RDS User Guide – Multi-AZ Deployments:

Multi-AZ deployments provide high availability and durability for Database (DB) instances, making them a natural fit for production database workloads.

When you create or modify your DB instance to run as a Multi-AZ deployment, Amazon RDS automatically provisions and maintains a synchronous standby replica in a different Availability Zone (AZ).

Failover is automatic and requires no manual intervention.

✅ Why A is correct:

Multi-AZ offers automated failover in case of instance failure, with minimal application downtime.

RDS automatically redirects traffic to the standby, which is promoted as the new primary.

❌ Why other options are incorrect:

B. Read replica is for read-only scaling. It does not support writes and is not a failover solution.

C. Auto Scaling Group cannot be applied to RDS instances, which are managed services.

D. RDS Proxy improves connection management, but does not provide failover capability for the RDS instance itself.

The problem requires modifying the inbound SSH rule to restrict access to a list of trusted IPs instead of deleting it entirely. AWS Config rules can be configured with automatic remediation actions using either Systems Manager Automation runbooks or Lambda functions. However, AWS Systems Manager Automation runbooks are often more appropriate for managing infrastructure changes like security group modifications because they are reusable, parameterized, and easier to audit.

Create a Systems Manager Automation runbook: This runbook will contain steps to add or modify the existing security group rule, allowing SSH access only from the specified IP addresses.

Update the AWS Config rule: Modify the Config rule to call this new runbook for its automatic remediation. This will prevent deletion of the SSH rule and instead update it based on the IP list.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/awscloudtrail/latest/userguide/cloudtrail-log-file-validation-intro.html

"When you enable log file integrity validation, CloudTrail creates a hash for every log file that it delivers. Every hour, CloudTrail also creates and delivers a file that references the log files for the last hour and contains a hash of each. This file is called a digest file. Validated log files are invaluable in security and forensic investigations"

To transition the Amazon Elasticsearch Service (Amazon ES) domain to a highly available, production-grade deployment:

Cluster Configuration:

Use a cluster of six data nodes to handle data ingestion and querying.

Distribute these nodes across three Availability Zones (AZs) for high availability and fault tolerance.

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

Manage a database password securely and rotate it every 90 days.

Analyze the Requirements:

Ensure secure management and automatic rotation of the database password.

Minimize manual intervention and risk of exposing the password.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Use the AWS SecretsManager Secret resource with the GenerateSecretString property.

Secrets Manager can automatically generate a strong password.

The RotationSchedule resource defines a rotation schedule to rotate the password every 90 days.

Option B: Use the AWS SecretsManager Secret resource with the SecretString property.

Requires accepting a password as a CloudFormation parameter and does not automate password generation.

Option C: Use the AWS SSM Parameter resource.

AWS Systems Manager Parameter Store can store secure strings, but it does not support automatic rotation.

Option D: Use the AWS SSM Parameter resource without secure string.

This option does not offer the security of Secrets Manager and does not support automatic rotation.

Select the Best Solution:

Option A: Using AWS Secrets Manager with the GenerateSecretString property and RotationSchedule resource ensures secure management and automatic rotation of the database password.

AWS Secrets Manager

Rotate AWS Secrets Manager Secrets

AWS Secrets Manager provides secure storage, automatic rotation, and seamless integration with applications for accessing secrets.

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

Each Lambda function generates 1 GB of log data daily in its own CloudWatch Logs log group.

The security team needs a count of application errors, grouped by type, across all log groups.

Analyze the Requirements:

Aggregate and analyze log data across multiple log groups.

Count and group errors by type.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Perform a CloudWatch Logs Insights query.

CloudWatch Logs Insights allows querying and analyzing log data.

The stats command and count function can aggregate and count errors across log groups.

Option B: Perform a CloudWatch Logs search with groupby and count.

CloudWatch Logs search does not support these functions; Logs Insights is needed for advanced queries.

Option C: Perform an Amazon Athena query.

Athena can query data in S3 but is not directly applicable to CloudWatch Logs.

Option D: Perform an Amazon RDS query.

RDS queries are for database data, not applicable to log data in CloudWatch.

Select the Best Solution:

Option A: CloudWatch Logs Insights is designed for querying and analyzing log data, making it the appropriate choice for counting and grouping errors.

Amazon CloudWatch Logs Insights

CloudWatch Logs Insights provides powerful querying capabilities to aggregate and analyze log data, including counting and grouping errors.

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.

To record all S3 API activity, the SysOps administrator should create an AWS CloudTrail trail to log data events for all S3 objects. This solution provides comprehensive logging of all API activities at the object level within S3 buckets.

AWS CloudTrail:

CloudTrail allows you to log, continuously monitor, and retain account activity related to actions across your AWS infrastructure.

It records all API calls for Amazon S3 objects, providing a detailed history of changes made to S3 resources.

Configuration Steps:

Go to the CloudTrail console and create a new trail.

Enable data events and specify the S3 buckets to monitor.

CloudTrail will then record S3 object-level API operations such as GetObject, DeleteObject, and PutObject.

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.

To automate the creation and management of IAM roles for multiple AWS accounts in an AWS Organization, using AWS CloudFormation StackSets is the most operationally efficient solution.

AWS CloudFormation StackSets:

AWS CloudFormation StackSets extends the functionality of stacks by enabling you to create, update, or delete stacks across multiple AWS accounts and regions with a single operation.

Using StackSets with AWS Organizations:

Create a CloudFormation template that defines the necessary IAM roles.

Use StackSets to deploy the template across multiple AWS accounts in your organization.

AWS CloudFormation StackSets

Creating IAM Roles with CloudFormation

To efficiently find out how often the AWS Lambda function has failed in the last 7 days, use Amazon CloudWatch Logs Insights.

Access CloudWatch Logs Insights:

Navigate to the CloudWatch console.

Select "Logs Insights" from the navigation pane.

VPC peering allows two VPCs to communicate with each other securely. By configuring VPC peering between the two VPCs, the SysOps administrator will be able to give the EC2 instance in VPC1 the ability to connect to the database in VPC2. Once the VPC peering is configured, the EC2 instance will be able to communicate with the database using the private IP address of the DB instance in the private subnet.

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/

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.

Step Scaling Policy:

Step scaling policies allow you to define scaling actions based on different levels of CloudWatch alarms.

Steps:

Go to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to EC2 Auto Scaling.

Select your Auto Scaling group.

Create or edit a scaling policy and choose "Step scaling."

Define different steps based on CloudWatch alarm thresholds (e.g., CPU usage or request count).

Configure larger adjustments for higher thresholds and smaller adjustments for lower thresholds.

Example Configuration:

For CPU > 80%, increase capacity by 4 instances.

For CPU > 60%, increase capacity by 2 instances.

For CPU > 40%, increase capacity by 1 instance.

Step Scaling for Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling

 AWS Config Managed Rule for S3 Logging:

The s3-bucket-logging-enabled AWS Config rule checks whether S3 buckets have logging enabled.

Steps:

Go to the AWS Management Console.

Navigate to AWS Config.

Create a rule using s3-bucket-logging-enabled.

Add a remediation action using an AWS Lambda function or Systems Manager Automation runbook.

AWS Config Managed Rules

 Using AWS Lambda for Remediation:

Create a Lambda function that enables logging on S3 buckets.

Steps:

Write a Lambda function in Python or Node.js to enable logging.

Configure the function to trigger on non-compliant buckets.

AWS CloudFormation StackSets Overview:

StackSets allows for deployment of CloudFormation stacks across multiple AWS accounts and Regions.

A stack instance in the "OUTDATED" status indicates that the stack template or parameters differ between the StackSet and the stack instance.

Why the Stack Instance Fails:

The "OUTDATED" status occurs when the stack operation (creation or update) was not successfully completed in a specific Region.

In this case, the most likely reason is that the stack has not yet been deployed in the specified Region.

Steps to Resolve:

Check the deployment status in the CloudFormation StackSets Console.

Identify the Region where the stack is in the "OUTDATED" status.

Retry the stack deployment for that Region by running a stack set update or stack instance operation.

Why Other Options Are Incorrect:

A: Local template changes do not impact CloudFormation unless submitted to AWS. This is unrelated to StackSets.

B: While creating a global resource might fail, it would result in an error status (e.g., "FAILED"), not "OUTDATED."

D: Using an old API version would cause errors in the API request, not affect the stack instance status.

When setting up an AWS managed VPN connection and creating a customer gateway resource, if the customer gateway device resides behind a NAT device, you should use the public IP address of the NAT device. This is because the VPN connection from AWS will be established to the public IP address that AWS can reach.

Identify the Public IP Address of the NAT Device:

Determine the public IP address assigned to the NAT device in front of the customer gateway.

Create Customer Gateway Resource:

Navigate to the VPC console in the AWS Management Console.

In the navigation pane, choose "Customer Gateways" and then click "Create Customer Gateway".

Enter a name for the customer gateway.

For the "IP Address", enter the public IP address of the NAT device.

Configure VPN Connection:

Create a VPN connection by navigating to the "VPN Connections" section and clicking "Create VPN Connection".

Select the created customer gateway and complete the VPN setup wizard.

Update Routing and Configuration:

Ensure that the routing configurations on both the AWS side and the on-premises side are updated to route traffic through the VPN connection.

Configure the customer gateway device (behind the NAT) to accept traffic from the NAT device and route it appropriately.

AWS Managed VPN Connections

Customer Gateway Resource

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonElastiCache/latest/red-ug/scaling-redis-cluster-mode-enabled.html As demand on your clusters changes, you might decide to improve performance or reduce costs by changing the number of shards in your Redis (cluster mode enabled) cluster. We recommend using online horizontal scaling to do so, because it allows your cluster to continue serving requests during the scaling process. https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonElastiCache/latest/red-ug/redis-cluster-vertical-scaling-scaling-down.html

For a Lambda function in Account A to access an S3 bucket in Account B, the correct IAM roles setup includes:

A: In Account A, create a Lambda execution role that has permissions to assume another role in Account B. In Account B, create a role with permissions to access the S3 bucket and trust the Lambda execution role from Account A to assume it. This configuration allows the Lambda function to assume the cross-account role and access the S3 bucket as needed, maintaining security and proper access control. AWS documentation provides more details on setting up cross-account roles for Lambda access AWS Lambda Permissions.

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 enforce MFA for API calls using the AWS CLI, the users must use temporary security credentials obtained through the get-session-token command. Here’s how to do it:

Enable MFA for IAM Users:

Ensure that MFA is enabled and properly configured for each IAM user.

Configure IAM Policy for MFA Enforcement:

Attach an IAM policy that denies API calls unless MFA is used. This policy should be attached to all users.

Obtain Temporary Security Credentials Using MFA:

Users need to use the aws sts get-session-token command to obtain temporary credentials. This command requires the MFA token.

sh

Copy code

aws sts get-session-token --serial-number arn:aws:iam::123456789012:mfa/user --token-code 123456

Use Temporary Credentials for API Calls:

After obtaining the temporary credentials, set them as environment variables or configure them in the AWS CLI profile to make API calls.

export AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=...

export AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=...

export AWS_SESSION_TOKEN=...

Enabling MFA for IAM Users

Using Temporary Security Credentials

AWS CLI get-session-token

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonCloudFront/latest/DeveloperGuide/Cookies.html

You can configure each cache behavior to do one of the following: Forward all cookies to your origin – CloudFront includes all cookies sent by the viewer when it forwards requests to the origin. https://docs.aws.amazon.com/elasticloadbalancing/latest/application/sticky-sessions.html

By default, an Application Load Balancer routes each request independently to a registered target based on the chosen load-balancing algorithm.

Step-by-Step Explanation:

Understand the Problem:

CloudTrail must be re-enabled immediately if it is disabled.

Analyze the Requirements:

Implement an automatic solution to monitor and re-enable CloudTrail.

Evaluate the Options:

Option A: Add the AWS account to AWS Organizations and enable CloudTrail in the management account.

This provides centralized management but does not ensure automatic re-enabling of CloudTrail.

Option B: Create an AWS Config rule with automatic remediation.

AWS Config can monitor changes and automatically remediate by re-enabling CloudTrail.

Option C: Create an AWS Config rule that invokes a Lambda function.

This requires custom code, which is not preferred.

Option D: Create an EventBridge rule with a Systems Manager Automation document.

This can re-enable CloudTrail but is more complex compared to AWS Config’s built-in remediation.

Select the Best Solution:

Option B: Using AWS Config with automatic remediation ensures CloudTrail is re-enabled without writing custom code.

AWS Config Rules

Automatic Remediation with AWS Config

Creating an AWS Config rule with automatic remediation ensures that CloudTrail is immediately re-enabled if it is disabled.

The MixedInstancesPolicy feature in Auto Scaling groups allows for the configuration of both On-Demand and Spot Instances within a single Auto Scaling group, balancing cost savings and high availability:

MixedInstancesPolicy: Enables configuration to maintain a minimum of three On-Demand Instances and add Spot Instances when prices drop, without the need to create separate launch templates.

Setting Maximum Spot Price: Ensures that additional Spot Instances are launched only when within the defined budget.

This solution offers the least management overhead, as it combines both On-Demand and Spot instances seamlessly in one configuration.

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.

Deleting a Stack

To ensure that EC2 instances in your VPC can send DNS queries for example.com to the DNS servers in your on-premises data center, follow these steps:

Create a Route 53 Resolver Outbound Endpoint:

Set up an outbound endpoint in Route 53 Resolver in your VPC to forward DNS queries to your on-premises DNS servers.

For EBS volumes restored from snapshots to immediately achieve the required IOPS performance, Fast Snapshot Restore (FSR) can be utilized:

Enable FSR: Fast Snapshot Restore can be enabled on specific snapshots. This feature pre-warms the EBS volume created from a snapshot to its full performance level immediately after it is provisioned.

Operational Impact: By enabling FSR, any EBS volume created from these enabled snapshots will provide the provisioned IOPS performance right from the start, eliminating the performance lag that typically occurs as the data is lazily loaded from S3.

Cost Considerations: While FSR increases costs due to the pre-warming of data, it is justified by the need for immediate high performance, especially in environments where EBS volume responsiveness is critical to application performance.

This solution directly addresses the challenge of initial performance degradation and ensures that the EBS volumes can handle the required workload immediately upon restoration from a snapshot.

Aurora Global Databases are designed for cross-Region disaster recovery with very low RPO, meeting the 20-second requirement. Setting up Aurora as a global database with the correct configuration ensures low-latency replication and rapid failover, making it ideal for compliance with strict disaster recovery requirements.

To enable on-premises resources to resolve DNS queries for records in a Route 53 private hosted zone, you can set up a Route 53 Resolver inbound endpoint. This allows DNS resolvers on your on-premises network to forward DNS queries to Route 53 Resolver via the inbound endpoint over the AWS Direct Connect connection.

By configuring your on-premises DNS resolvers to forward queries to the IP addresses of the inbound endpoint, your on-premises VMs can resolve DNS records in the private hosted zone efficiently and securely.

To set up a notification for failed health checks of targets in the ALB, follow these steps:

Create a CloudWatch Alarm:

Navigate to CloudWatch and create a new alarm based on the UnHealthyHostCount metric of the target group.

In this scenario, the issue is that the EC2 instances are marked healthy by status checks, but the website is still intermittently failing, returning HTTP 500 errors.

This indicates that the OS-level checks are passing, but the application is not behaving properly. To resolve this, the Auto Scaling group must use ALB (ELB) health checks which verify application-level health, not just EC2 status.

From the Auto Scaling User Guide:

By default, an Auto Scaling group uses EC2 instance status checks to determine the health state of an instance. You can optionally configure the Auto Scaling group to use Elastic Load Balancing health checks in combination with EC2 status checks.

These health checks allow Auto Scaling to detect application failures and replace unhealthy instances automatically.

❌ Why the other options are incorrect:

A. Network Load Balancer is for TCP-level traffic and does not solve HTTP 500 errors.

C. Sticky sessions are used for session persistence and don’t solve server errors.

D. Installing CloudWatch agents and rebooting is reactive and not an automated health check replacement system.

To allow AWS Systems Manager Patch Manager to access your EC2 instances, you need to attach an IAM instance profile with the necessary permissions to the instances.

Create IAM Role for Systems Manager:

Open the IAM console at IAM Console.

Create a new role and choose EC2 as the trusted entity.

Attach the AmazonEC2RoleforSSM managed policy to the role.

Attach IAM Role to Instances:

Open the Amazon EC2 console at Amazon EC2 Console.

Select the instances that you want to manage with Systems Manager.

Choose Actions, then Instance Settings, and select Attach/Replace IAM Role.

Attach the IAM role you created.

This setup ensures that Systems Manager has the necessary permissions to manage the instances.

Setting Up AWS Systems Manager

Create an IAM Instance Profile for Systems Manager

https://d1.awsstatic.com/training-and-certification/docs-sysops-associate/AWS-Certified-SysOps-Administrator-Associate_Sample-Questions_C02.pdf

Evictions in Amazon ElastiCache for Memcached occur when the cache runs out of available memory and needs to remove existing data to store new data. To reduce evictions, you can either add more nodes to the cluster or increase the size of the individual nodes.

Add an Additional Node:

Open the Amazon ElastiCache console at Amazon ElastiCache Console.

Select your Memcached cluster and choose Modify.

Increase the number of nodes in the cluster to add more memory capacity.

Apply the changes to scale out the cluster.

Increase the Individual Node Size:

Open the Amazon ElastiCache console and select your Memcached cluster.

Choose Modify and change the node type to a larger instance size with more memory.

Apply the changes to scale up the cluster.

Both actions will provide additional memory capacity, reducing the likelihood of evictions due to insufficient memory.

Scaling ElastiCache for Memcached

Amazon ElastiCache for Memcached User Guide

Because the instance is:

In an isolated subnet (no internet or VPN access)

And you're not using Systems Manager

The best option is to use EC2 Instance Connect Endpoint, which allows SSH access to EC2 instances in private subnets without NAT or VPN.

From EC2 Instance Connect Endpoint documentation:

EC2 Instance Connect Endpoint enables secure connectivity to EC2 instances in private subnets without needing a public IP, bastion host, or VPN.

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.

Scaling Policies for Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling

Generate a policy by using AWS Identity and Access Management Access Analyzer. AWS CloudTrail is a service that records all API calls made on your account. You can use this data to generate a policy with AWS Identity and Access Management Access Analyzer that only allows the permissions that the application requires. This will ensure that the application only has the necessary permissions and will protect the company from any unauthorized access.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/what-is-access-analyzer.html#what-is-access-analyzer-policy-generation

To monitor free space on Amazon EBS volumes attached to Microsoft Windows-based Amazon EC2 instances and receive email alerts before low storage space affects performance, follow these steps:

Install the Amazon CloudWatch Agent:

Download and install the CloudWatch agent on your Windows EC2 instances.

To retain application logs after instances are terminated, configure the EC2 instances to send logs to Amazon CloudWatch Logs.

Steps:

Create a New AMI:

Create a new AMI that includes the Amazon CloudWatch agent.

Install and configure the CloudWatch agent to send logs to CloudWatch Logs.

To meet regulatory and compliance requirements for archiving sensitive data on Amazon S3 Glacier with no modifications allowed by any account, attaching a vault lock policy to an S3 Glacier vault and validating the vault lock policy after 24 hours is the most appropriate solution.

Vault Lock Policy:

Amazon S3 Glacier Vault Lock allows you to easily deploy and enforce compliance controls for individual S3 Glacier vaults via a lockable policy.

You can specify controls such as Write Once Read Many (WORM) in a vault lock policy and lock the policy from future edits.

Implementing Vault Lock:

Attach a vault lock policy to the S3 Glacier vault that contains the archived data.

Initiate the vault lock process, which involves providing a policy and locking it after a validation period of 24 hours.

Steps:

Open the S3 Glacier console.

Select the vault and configure a vault lock policy with the required compliance controls.

Use the InitiateVaultLock API to set the policy and start the lock process.

Validate and complete the lock process after 24 hours using the lock ID.

Amazon S3 Glacier Vault Lock

Managing S3 Glacier Vault Lock Policies

C: Ensures logs are ingested into CloudWatch from EC2 via the CloudWatch agent.

E: Allows creation of metric filters and alarms based on log patterns (e.g., "rejected web requests").

From CloudWatch Logs & Alarms documentation:

You can extract metric data from log events using metric filters and then create CloudWatch alarms based on these filters.

This is the most efficient and least operational overhead solution.

To prevent all teams within an AWS Organizations structure from using Amazon DynamoDB while allowing access to other AWS services, the most effective solution is to use a Service Control Policy (SCP). SCPs apply at the organization, organizational unit (OU), or account level and can override individual IAM policies, including the root user's permissions:

B: Create a service control policy (SCP) in the management account to deny all DynamoDB actions. Apply the SCP to the root of the organization. This policy will effectively block DynamoDB actions across all member accounts without affecting the ability to access other AWS services. SCPs are powerful tools for centrally managing permissions in AWS Organizations and can enforce policy compliance across all accounts. Further information on SCPs and their usage can be found in the AWS documentation on Service Control Policies AWS Service Control Policies.

To resolve the issue of an AWS Lambda function unable to connect to a database that has been moved to a private subnet, the Lambda function needs to be connected to the same VPC as the database. This is done by configuring the Lambda function with VPC access. This involves specifying the VPC, subnets, and security groups for the Lambda function so that it can communicate with the database using its private endpoint. Option B is correct as it directly addresses the issue without compromising security. AWS documentation on configuring VPC access for Lambda provides guidance on this setup Configuring VPC Access for Lambda.

To monitor the p90 (90th percentile) statistic of a specific field in log data over time, the appropriate approach is to create a metric filter on the log data. Metric filters in Amazon CloudWatch Logs allow you to extract metric data from log events and transform them into CloudWatch metrics. These metrics can then be visualized and analyzed over time.

Starting from May 23, 2019, CloudWatch Logs introduced support for percentiles in metric filters. This enhancement enables users to specify percentile statistics, such as p90, p95, p99, etc., when defining metric filters. By doing so, you can gain insights into the distribution of your metric data, which is particularly useful for understanding outliers or unusual behaviors in metrics like application latency.

Once the metric filter is set up to extract the desired field (e.g., application latency) and compute the p90 statistic, you can visualize this metric in CloudWatch Dashboards or set up alarms based on threshold values.

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.

Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling

Target Tracking Scaling Policies

The best combination of steps to meet this requirement is to sign in to the new account by using root user credentials and change the support plan, and to create an IAM user that has administrator privileges in the new account.

Signing in to the new account by using root user credentials will allow the SysOps administrator to access the account and change the support plan to AWS Business Support. Additionally, creating an IAM user that has administrator privileges in the new account will ensure that the SysOps administrator has the necessary access to manage the account and make changes to the support plan if necessary.

Based on the attached policy, the following actions are allowed for the IAM user:

Allow Amazon RDS DescribeDBInstances Action:

The policy allows rds:Describe* actions on all resources without any condition, so the user can describe RDS instances in any region.

Example action:

rds:DescribeDBInstances

To stop EC2 instances in a development environment when they are not in use, you can create a CloudWatch alarm based on CPU utilization.

Create CloudWatch Alarm:

Navigate to the CloudWatch console.

Select "Alarms" and click on "Create Alarm".

Choose the EC2 instance metric for CPU utilization.

Set the condition to trigger the alarm when the average CPU utilization is less than 5% for a continuous 30-minute period.

Amazon RDS does not support enabling encryption for an existing unencrypted DB instance directly. However, you can achieve encryption by following these steps:

Take a Snapshot of the RDS Instance:

Open the Amazon RDS console at Amazon RDS Console.

Select the DB instance, then choose Actions and Take snapshot.

Enter a name for the snapshot and take the snapshot.

Copy and Encrypt the Snapshot:

After the snapshot is complete, select the snapshot, choose Actions, and then Copy snapshot.

In the copy snapshot dialog, select the Enable encryption checkbox and choose a customer-managed CMK (Customer Master Key) or the default AWS managed key.

Restore the Encrypted Snapshot to a New RDS Instance:

Once the snapshot copy is complete, select the copied (encrypted) snapshot.

Choose Actions and Restore snapshot.

Provide the required details to launch a new DB instance from the encrypted snapshot.

Update Connections:

Update your application or endpoints to point to the new encrypted RDS instance.

Encrypting Amazon RDS Resources

Copying an Amazon RDS DB Snapshot

# Enable instance scale-in protection for specific instance.

aws autoscaling set-instance-protection --instance-ids i-5f2e8a0d --auto-scaling-group-name my-asg --protected-from-scale-in

# Disable instance scale-in protection for the specified instance.

aws autoscaling set-instance-protection --instance-ids i-5f2e8a0d --auto-scaling-group-name my-asg --no-protected-from-scale-in

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/autoscaling/ec2/userguide/ec2-auto-scaling-instance-protection.html

To ensure that EC2 instances in an Auto Scaling group are not interrupted during message processing, the most effective method is to implement scale-in protection for the instances while they are actively processing messages. This can be done programmatically by modifying the Auto Scaling group's settings using the Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling API.

Starting Message Processing: When an instance begins processing a message, your application should make an API call to enable scale-in protection. This is done using the SetInstanceProtection action, setting the ProtectedFromScaleIn parameter to true for that specific instance.

Completing Message Processing: Once the message has been processed, another API call should be made to disable scale-in protection. This is done by calling the SetInstanceProtection action again, but this time setting the ProtectedFromScaleIn parameter to false.

This method ensures that while messages are being processed, the instances are not terminated by the Auto Scaling group regardless of any scale-in activities that might be triggered by other parameters like CPU utilization or a decrease in the number of messages in the queue.

AWS Documentation Reference:

You can refer to the AWS documentation on managing instance scale-in protection in Auto Scaling groups for more details: Instance Scale-In Protection.

Aurora supports Auto Scaling of Aurora Replicas based on metrics like CPU utilization, which helps scale read capacity in read-heavy workloads.

From Aurora Auto Scaling documentation:

Aurora Auto Scaling automatically adds or removes Aurora Replicas based on CloudWatch metrics, such as CPU utilization.

Given that 95% of the workload is read, this is an ideal use case.

The S3 bucket is being used as the origin for a CloudFront distribution. To serve content via CloudFront:

You must point the DNS record to the CloudFront domain name (e.g., d11111abcdef8.cloudfront.net)

Not directly to the S3 bucket, even if that's the origin

From CloudFront with S3 static website hosting:

To use CloudFront to serve your content, update your DNS settings so your domain name (CNAME) points to your CloudFront distribution.

To monitor and receive alerts when the EC2 instance service quota usage reaches 70% or more:

Service Quotas Console: Navigate to the Service Quotas console within AWS and identify the specific quota for EC2 instances.

Create a CloudWatch Alarm: Directly from the Service Quotas console, set up a CloudWatch alarm for the EC2 instance quota metric. Configure the alarm to trigger when the quota utilization reaches or exceeds 70%.

Notification Setup: Link this alarm to an Amazon SNS topic that will send a notification to relevant stakeholders or systems when the quota usage threshold is breached.

This method provides an automated, straightforward way to monitor resource limits and ensures that stakeholders are promptly notified, enabling them to take proactive measures to manage the quota and prevent service disruption.

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

Elastic Load Balancing provides access logs that capture detailed information about requests sent to your load balancer. Each log contains information such as the time the request was received, the client's IP address, latencies, request paths, and server responses. You can use these access logs to analyze traffic patterns and troubleshoot issues.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/elasticloadbalancing/latest/application/load-balancer-access-logs.html

The AWS Personal Health Dashboard provides a personalized view into the performance and availability of the AWS services underlying your AWS resources. It can alert you about upcoming hardware maintenance that could affect your EC2 instances.

Access AWS Personal Health Dashboard:

Open the AWS Personal Health Dashboard at AWS Personal Health Dashboard.

View Service Health:

The dashboard shows a list of recent events, including upcoming scheduled maintenance that might impact your EC2 instances.

You can filter events to view those that specifically affect your EC2 instances.

Set Up Notifications:

You can configure AWS CloudWatch Events or Amazon SNS to send notifications based on Personal Health Dashboard events.

AWS Personal Health Dashboard

Monitoring AWS Health Events with Amazon CloudWatch Events

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/health/latest/ug/cloudwatch-events-health.html

To host a web application in an S3 bucket while adhering to the policy that prohibits public S3 buckets:

Amazon CloudFront: Set up a CloudFront distribution and designate the S3 bucket as its origin. This allows the web application to be served via CloudFront, which can handle web traffic at scale and provide additional features such as HTTPS delivery.

Origin Access Identity (OAI): Create an OAI for the CloudFront distribution and configure the S3 bucket policy to grant the s3:GetObject permission to the OAI. This allows only CloudFront to access the content in the S3 bucket, keeping the bucket private from direct public access.

Security and Performance: This configuration ensures that the web application is only accessible through CloudFront, enhancing security and performance. It also complies with the company's policy against public S3 buckets by controlling access strictly through CloudFront.

This method leverages CloudFront's capabilities to securely serve web applications from S3, maintaining privacy and compliance with organizational policies.