Tutorial / Cram Notes
AWS Organizations is a service that enables you to consolidate and centrally manage multiple AWS accounts. It allows you to create a hierarchy of accounts within a parent organization. Each AWS account can remain an independent entity with its own resources, but they can all be managed together under the umbrella of the organization.
Features of AWS Organizations:
- Consolidated Billing: Groups all the AWS account bills, allowing you to take advantage of combined usage for volume pricing discounts.
- Hierarchical Structure: Create Organizational Units (OUs) to group accounts into structures that mirror your business.
- Policies for Control: Apply Service Control Policies (SCPs) to centrally control AWS service use across multiple AWS accounts.
- API Support: Automate account management and integrate with other AWS services through Organization’s API.
Example Scenario:
Imagine a company with separate AWS accounts for development, testing, and production environments. With AWS Organizations, the company can:
- Create an organization to manage these accounts.
- Create OUs for better resource organization, e.g.,
DevOps,HR,Finance. - Apply SCPs to restrict or enable particular services within OUs.
Creating an Organization:
To create an organization, you would usually log into the AWS Management Console, navigate to the AWS Organizations console, and choose ‘Create organization’. You’d then follow the steps to set up an organization and invite existing AWS accounts or create new ones.
AWS Control Tower
AWS Control Tower offers the easiest way to set up and govern a new, secure, multi-account AWS environment. It’s an automated service that builds upon the capabilities of AWS Organizations. It provides a dashboard for monitoring the compliance of your accounts against best practices.
Features of AWS Control Tower:
- Landing Zone: Sets up a multi-account environment with a pre-configured baseline of security and management policies.
- Account Factory: Automate the provisioning of new accounts in your organization with pre-set configurations.
- Guardrails: Implement preventive and detective guardrails to ensure your accounts stay within compliance.
- Dashboard: A central place to view the status of your environment and check for policy violations.
Example Scenario:
A company starting its cloud journey can use AWS Control Tower to:
- Set up a landing zone with an initial set of OUs such as
Core,Custom. - Utilize Account Factory to create and configure new accounts with pre-defined templates.
- Enforce policies using guardrails to ensure all accounts follow the company’s security standards.
Setting Up the Landing Zone:
Setting up a landing zone involves navigating to the AWS Control Tower dashboard and selecting “Set up a landing zone”. You then define your OUs, the shared accounts (like Log Archive and Audit), and any additional configurations. Once initiated, AWS Control Tower automates the creation and configuration of these accounts.
Comparison Table
| Feature | AWS Organizations | AWS Control Tower |
|---|---|---|
| Account Management | Directly manage AWS accounts | Uses organizations under the hood |
| Policy Management | SCPs to manage permissions | Offers SCP & Guardrails for compliance |
| Automation | Via AWS APIs | Automated setup and guardrails |
| Governance | Manual configuration of governance | Pre-set governance rules and dashboard |
| Billing | Consolidated billing dashboard | Uses Organizations’ consolidated billing |
| Complexity | Requires more manual setup | Simplified setup with guided experience |
AWS Organizations is more suited for companies that already have a multi-account strategy and need to consolidate billing and access controls. It allows for complex structuring and policy management but requires more manual setup.
AWS Control Tower is tailored for easier setup and management of new multi-account environments, focusing on governance and compliance. It offers a guided experience to establish and maintain a secure and efficient AWS environment.
In conclusion, AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – Professional (DOP-C02) exam candidates should be familiar with both of these services. Understanding when to use AWS Organizations for account organization and policy control, as well as when to leverage AWS Control Tower for launching a fully governed multi-account environment, is crucial. The exam may test your ability to design and manage accounts using these services in a cloud architecture that is secure, efficient, and compliant.
Practice Test with Explanation
True or False: AWS Organizations allows you to centrally manage billing; control access, compliance, and security; and share resources across your AWS accounts.
- (A) True
- (B) False
Answer: (A) True
Explanation: AWS Organizations does indeed help in centrally managing billing, access controls, compliance and security policies, and resource sharing across multiple AWS accounts.
Which feature of AWS Organizations helps in applying service control policies (SCPs)?
- (A) Account Consolidation
- (B) Organizational Units
- (C) Service Control Policies
- (D) All of the above
Answer: (C) Service Control Policies
Explanation: Service Control Policies (SCPs) are a feature of AWS Organizations that can be applied to OUs or accounts to manage permissions and control access to AWS services.
What is the main purpose of AWS Control Tower?
- (A) To manage your television’s remote controls
- (B) To build a custom visual display tower
- (C) To set up and govern a secure and compliant multi-account AWS environment
- (D) To overlook AWS data centers physically
Answer: (C) To set up and govern a secure and compliant multi-account AWS environment
Explanation: AWS Control Tower is designed to set up and govern a secure, compliant, and multi-account environment through blueprints and policies.
True or False: It is necessary to have an AWS Organization set up before you can begin using AWS Control Tower.
- (A) True
- (B) False
Answer: (A) True
Explanation: AWS Control Tower requires an AWS Organization to be set up first, as it leverages AWS Organizations for environment setup and governance.
Which AWS service enables you to automate the creation of multi-account environments using Infrastructure as Code (IaC)?
- (A) AWS CodeCommit
- (B) AWS CloudFormation
- (C) AWS Config
- (D) AWS CodePipeline
Answer: (B) AWS CloudFormation
Explanation: AWS CloudFormation allows automated setup of infrastructure, including multi-account environments, using Infrastructure as Code.
True or False: Once a Service Control Policy (SCP) is attached to an AWS account within an organization, it cannot be removed or modified.
- (A) True
- (B) False
Answer: (B) False
Explanation: SCPS can be edited or removed after they are attached to accounts or organizational units within AWS Organizations as necessary.
What is the primary benefit of centralizing account management with AWS Organizations?
- (A) Reducing infrastructure costs
- (B) Enhancing game development capabilities
- (C) Simplifying operational overhead and managing permissions
- (D) Implementing hybrid cloud architectures
Answer: (C) Simplifying operational overhead and managing permissions
Explanation: Centralizing account management with AWS Organizations simplifies the operational overhead, such as billing and permissions management.
True or False: AWS Control Tower can be used to enforce compliance requirements such as HIPAA.
- (A) True
- (B) False
Answer: (A) True
Explanation: AWS Control Tower can help enforce compliance with various standards, including HIPAA, by using managed guardrails.
AWS Control Tower’s guardrails are classified into which types?
- (A) Preventive and Detective
- (B) Monitoring and Logging
- (C) Encryption and Protection
- (D) Compliance and Governance
Answer: (A) Preventive and Detective
Explanation: AWS Control Tower guardrails come in two types: preventive guardrails, which prevent policy violations, and detective guardrails, which detect when accounts have violated policies.
True or False: AWS Organizations supports the use of APIs to automate account creation and management tasks.
- (A) True
- (B) False
Answer: (A) True
Explanation: AWS Organizations provides APIs which can be used to automate various account management tasks, including account creation, within the organization.
In AWS Organizations, what does the term ‘Organizational Unit’ (OU) refer to?
- (A) A single AWS account
- (B) A collection of AWS accounts within the organization
- (C) A third-party service integrated with AWS
- (D) A physical AWS location
Answer: (B) A collection of AWS accounts within the organization
Explanation: An Organizational Unit (OU) in AWS Organizations refers to a group of AWS accounts that can be used to manage policies and organize accounts into a hierarchy within the organization.
True or False: AWS Control Tower requires manual setup and configuration for new accounts once an organization has been set up.
- (A) True
- (B) False
Answer: (B) False
Explanation: AWS Control Tower automates the setup and configuration for new accounts once the organization has been established, using account factory and other managed features.
Interview Questions
What is AWS Organizations and how does it help in managing multiple AWS accounts?
AWS Organizations is a service that allows you to manage and govern your environment as you scale with multiple AWS accounts. It helps by enabling you to consolidate billing, apply policies for compliance centrally, and simplify account management through organizational units.
Explain the process of setting up a new account within AWS Organizations.
To set up a new account within AWS Organizations, you first need to create an organization from the master account, then, from the AWS Organizations console, you can invite existing accounts or create new ones directly by providing the required details such as email address, account name, and role.
How does AWS Control Tower fit into the management of multiple AWS accounts?
AWS Control Tower automates the setup of a baseline environment, or landing zone, for new AWS accounts that is based on best practices. It defines a multi-account architecture, automates account provisioning, configures account environments with predefined security and compliance controls, and provides ongoing governance.
What can you do with Service Control Policies (SCPs) in AWS Organizations?
SCPs in AWS Organizations allow you to manage permissions in member accounts. You can use SCPs to whitelist or blacklist permission sets, ensuring members adhere to compliance requirements and cannot alter specific AWS resource configurations or service limitations.
What is the role of AWS Single Sign-On (SSO) in centrally managing access to multiple AWS accounts?
AWS Single Sign-On (SSO) allows you to centrally manage access to multiple AWS accounts and applications. It provides users with a single set of credentials to access all their assigned accounts and resources, streamlines user management, and helps in enforcing security policies like multi-factor authentication (MFA).
Can you describe how AWS Organizations supports consolidated billing?
Consolidated billing in AWS Organizations allows you to receive a single bill for all of the AWS accounts in your organization. It enables you to track charges and allocate costs across accounts, and can also help you take advantage of volume discounts when the usage of your accounts are aggregated.
What is a landing zone in the context of AWS Control Tower, and what are its key components?
A landing zone in AWS Control Tower is a well-architected, multi-account baseline that automates the setup of an AWS environment. Key components include a multi-account structure, centralized logging, federated access with AWS SSO, automated account provisioning, and pre-configured guardrails for security and compliance.
How do you enable cross-account access within AWS Organizations?
You can enable cross-account access within AWS Organizations by utilizing IAM roles with trust policies that allow users from one AWS account to assume roles in another AWS account. You need to edit the trust policies to recognize the member accounts or organizational units.
What are guardrails in AWS Control Tower and what is their purpose?
Guardrails in AWS Control Tower are high-level rules that provide governance for your AWS accounts. They come in two types: preventive guardrails that enforce specific policies and detective guardrails that monitor compliance with policies. Their purpose is to ensure consistent compliance and security posture.
Can you describe how you would automate account creation using AWS Control Tower?
To automate account creation using AWS Control Tower, you can utilize AWS Service Catalog to set up and preconfigure accounts that comply with your organization’s guardrails. By defining product configurations, Control Tower enables account creation that adheres to established blueprints, thereby reducing manual effort and the potential for error.
What are organizational units (OUs) in AWS Organizations, and how do they assist account management?
Organizational units (OUs) in AWS Organizations are groupings of AWS accounts within an organization that allow you to manage policies and resources at scale. OUs help by providing a way to organize accounts into hierarchical, nested structures and apply SCPs uniformly to each level, simplifying governance and compliance enforcement.
How does AWS Config work in conjunction with AWS Organizations to maintain compliance across multiple accounts?
AWS Config can be set up to work with AWS Organizations to monitor and record configurations of AWS resources across multiple accounts. It assesses resource configurations against desired configurations and enables rules for compliance checks. With integration, AWS Config can be used to provide a centralized view of compliance across the organization, helping to identify and remediate non-compliant resources more efficiently.
Great insights on AWS Organizations! This will definitely help in managing multiple accounts in my company.
How does AWS Control Tower simplify the setup of multi-account environments?
Thanks for the detailed explanation!
Our organization is currently using AWS Organizations, but we’re struggling with setting up Service Control Policies (SCPs). Any tips?
Fantastic post! Very helpful, especially for someone preparing for the DOP-C02 exam.
Can AWS Control Tower be used with existing AWS Organizations?
Appreciate the blog post. Good luck to everyone preparing for the exam!
Do you guys prefer AWS Control Tower over AWS Config for compliance?