Role-Based Access Control (RBAC)

AWS Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) and Temporary Credentials are key components of designing secure, scalable, and manageable access control for AWS resources. They focus on secure access design, least privilege principles, and temporary access best practices.

Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) in AWS

Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) assigns permissions based on roles rather than individual users. This ensures that users, applications, and AWS services have only the access they need for their job functions.

RBAC in AWS is implemented using

• IAM Roles → Used to define permissions that can be assumed by users, AWS services, or external accounts. IAM Roles are fundamental to RBAC in AWS because they allow temporary access with appropriate permissions.

• IAM Policies → Define what actions are allowed or denied. IAM Policies can be attached to IAM Roles, IAM Users, or IAM Groups (though AWS best practices recommend using IAM Roles or IAM Identity Center Groups instead of IAM Users).

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RBAC Use Case: Assigning Roles to SecureCart Teams

SecureCart follows Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) by assigning specific IAM Roles to different user groups.

RBAC Implementation for SecureCart Teams

Team	IAM Role	Permissions	AWS Access Method
Developers	DevRole	Read/write to dev resources, No production access	IAM Identity Center (AWS SSO)
Operations	psRole	Manage EC2, RDS, and monitoring tools	IAM Identity Center (AWS SSO)
Support Team	SecureCart-SupportRole	Read-only access to logs and dashboards	IAM Identity Center (AWS SSO)
Third-Party Auditors	SecureCart-AuditRole	Temporary access to logs & security reports	AWS STS AssumeRole
EC2 Instances	SecureCart-EC2Role	Read/Write S3, Access Secrets Manager	IAM Role with temporary credentials
Lambda Functions	SecureCart-LambdaRole	Invoke APIs, Write logs to CloudWatch	IAM Role with temporary credentials

Impact

• Users assume IAM Roles dynamically based on their job functions.

• No need for static IAM credentials, reducing security risks.

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SecureCart Use Case: Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) and Temporary Credentials

Business Context

SecureCart is an e-commerce platform that requires secure access control to AWS resources for developers, operations teams, and applications. Instead of using IAM Users with long-term credentials, SecureCart implements Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) using IAM Roles and temporary credentials.

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Security Challenges for SecureCart

🔹 Ensure least privilege access for different teams and services. 🔹 Avoid hardcoded credentials in applications. 🔹 Prevent unauthorized access to production environments. 🔹 Implement temporary access for automation and external integrations.

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How SecureCart Uses RBAC & Temporary Credentials

SecureCart assigns roles based on job functions and grants temporary credentials using AWS Security Token Service (STS) and IAM Identity Center (AWS SSO).

Requirement	Solution	SecureCart Implementation
Grant access based on job functions	IAM Roles	Developers, Ops, and Support Teams assume specific IAM Roles.
Prevent credential leakage in applications	IAM Roles + Temporary Credentials	SecureCart's EC2 instances and Lambda functions use IAM Roles instead of static credentials.
Limit developer access to production resources	IAM Identity Center + RBAC	Developers assume roles only in development and staging environments.
Grant external partners temporary access	AWS STS AssumeRole	SecureCart grants third-party vendors short-lived credentials using STS.
Control access across multiple AWS accounts	IAM Identity Center (AWS SSO)	SecureCart teams access AWS accounts using IAM Identity Center Groups and Permission Sets.

Impact

• Users assume IAM Roles dynamically based on their job functions.

• No need for static IAM credentials, reducing security risks.