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Enable AWS RDS Transport Encryption
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Start a Free TrialEnsure that Microsoft SQL Server instances provisioned with Amazon RDS have Transport Encryption feature enabled in order to meet security and compliance requirements. Transport Encryption is the AWS RDS feature that forces all connections to your SQL Server database instances to use SSL. Once enabled, the data transport encryption and decryption is handled transparently and does not require any additional action from you or your application.
According to HIPAA Compliance, all connections made to Amazon RDS SQL Server instances that process, store and transmit PHI (Protected Health Information) must use encryption provided by the RDS Transport Encryption feature which basically enables the SQL Server force SSL parameter.
Note: The instructions outlined in this conformity rule can be applied only to Microsoft SQL Server database instances.
To determine if your SQL Server instances have the RDS Transport Encryption feature enabled, perform the following:
01 Sign in to AWS Management Console.
02 Navigate to RDS dashboard at https://console.aws.amazon.com/rds/.
03 In the left navigation panel, under Amazon RDS, click Instances.
04 Select the RDS SQL Server instance that you want to examine. The type of the database engine used by each provisioned instance should be available in the Engine column.
05 Click Instance Actions button from the dashboard top menu and select See Details.
06 On the Details section, within category, locate the Parameter group attribute and copy its value (i.e. parameter group name).
07 Go back to the left navigation panel and select Parameter groups.
08 On the Parameter groups listing page, paste the value copied at step no. 6 in the Filter parameter groups search box and press Enter.
09 Click on the name (link) of the parameter group returned at the previous step to access its parameters.
10 On the Parameter listing page, enter rds.force_ssl parameter name in the Filter parameters search box and press Enter.
11 Check the rds.force_ssl parameter value returned as result at the previous step. If the parameter value is set to 0, the client connections made to SQL Server instance do not use SSL, therefore the Transport Encryption feature is not enabled for the selected AWS RDS database instance.
12 Repeat steps no. 4 - 11 to verify the Transport Encryption feature status for other SQL Server instances provisioned in the current region.
13 Change the AWS region from the navigation bar and repeat the process for other regions.
01 Run describe-db-instances command (OSX/Linux/UNIX) using custom query filters to list the names (identifiers) of all SQL Server database instances available in the selected AWS region:
aws rds describe-db-instances --region us-east-1 --output table --query 'DBInstances[?Engine==`sqlserver-ex`].DBInstanceIdentifier'
02 The command output should return a table with the requested identifiers:
------------------------ | DescribeDBInstances | +----------------------+ | cc-slq-db-instance | | cc-ms-db-instance | +----------------------+
03 Execute again describe-db-instances command (OSX/Linux/UNIX) using the SQL Server instance name returned at the previous step as identifier and custom query filters to get the name of the parameter group used by the selected database instance:
aws rds describe-db-instances --region us-east-1 --db-instance-identifier cc-slq-db-instance --query 'DBInstances[*].DBParameterGroups[*].DBParameterGroupName[]'
04 The command output should return the name of the parameter group:
[
"custom.sqlserver-ex-13.0"
]
05 Run describe-db-parameters command (OSX/Linux/UNIX) using custom query filters to return the rds.force_ssl parameter value available within the parameter group used by the SQL Server instance:
aws rds describe-db-parameters --region us-east-1 --db-parameter-group-name custom.sqlserver-ex-13.0 --query 'Parameters[?ParameterName==`rds.force_ssl`].ParameterValue'
06 The command output should return the requested parameter value:
[
"0"
]
07 Repeat steps no. 3 – 6 to verify the rds.force_ssl parameter value via AWS CLI for other SQL Server instances provisioned in the current region.
08 Change the AWS region by updating the --region command parameter value and repeat steps no. 1 - 7 to perform the audit process for other regions.
To enable the Transport Encryption feature for your Microsoft SQL Server database instances, you need to update the necessary RDS parameter group and change the rds.force_ssl parameter value to 1. To update the RDS parameter group and reboot the required SQL Server instances, perform the following steps:
01 Sign in to AWS Management Console.
02 Navigate to RDS dashboard at https://console.aws.amazon.com/rds/.
03 In the left navigation panel, under Amazon RDS, click Parameter groups.
04 Select the RDS parameter group that you want to update (see Audit section part I to identify the right resource).
05 On the Parameter listing page, enter rds.force_ssl parameter name in the Filter parameters search box and press Enter.
06 Select the returned parameter then click the Edit parameters button from the dashboard top-right menu.
07 Select 1 from the Value dropdown list available next to the parameter name, then click Save changes to apply the changes.
08 Once the required parameter group is successfully updated and the rds.force_ssl parameter value is set to 1, go back to the left navigation panel and select Instances.
09 Select the SQL Server database instance that you want to reboot., then click Instance Actions button from the dashboard top menu and select Reboot.
10 Inside Reboot DB instance confirmation box, click Reboot to confirm the action. The RDS instance status should change to Rebooting, then back to Available.
11 Repeat steps no. 4 – 10 for each SQL Server database instance that doesn't have Transport Encryption feature enabled, available in the current region.
12 Change the AWS region from the navigation bar and repeat the process for other regions.
01 Run modify-db-parameter-group command (OSX/Linux/UNIX) to update the required AWS RDS parameter group (see Audit section part II to identify the right RDS resource) and set the rds.force_ssl parameter value to 1. To update this parameter, submit a list of the following command parameters: ParameterName, ParameterValue and ApplyMethod, as shown in the example below:
aws rds modify-db-parameter-group --region us-east-1 --db-parameter-group-name custom.sqlserver-ex-13.0 --parameters ParameterName="rds.force_ssl",ParameterValue="1",ApplyMethod="pending-reboot"
02 The command output should return the name of the modified RDS parameter group:
{
"DBParameterGroupName": "custom.sqlserver-ex-13.0"
}
03 In order the parameter group change to take effect, you need to reboot the associated database instance. Execute reboot-db-instance command (OSX/Linux/UNIX) to reboot the necessary SQL Server database instance:
aws rds reboot-db-instance --region us-east-1 --db-instance-identifier cc-slq-db-instance
04 The command output should return the rebooted RDS database instance metadata:
{
"DBInstance": {
"PubliclyAccessible": true,
"LicenseModel": "license-included",
"Engine": "sqlserver-ex",
"MultiAZ": false,
"AutoMinorVersionUpgrade": false,
"PreferredBackupWindow": "08:01-08:31",
"ReadReplicaDBInstanceIdentifiers": [],
"AllocatedStorage": 85,
"DBInstanceStatus": "rebooting",
...
"IAMDatabaseAuthenticationEnabled": false,
"EngineVersion": "13.00.4422.0.v1",
"AvailabilityZone": "us-east-1a",
"DomainMemberships": [],
"StorageType": "gp2",
"CACertificateIdentifier": "rds-ca-2015",
"StorageEncrypted": false,
"DBInstanceClass": "db.t2.medium",
"DBInstanceIdentifier": "cc-slq-db-instance"
}
}
05 Repeat steps no. 1 – 4 for each SQL Server database instance that doesn't have Transport Encryption feature enabled, available in the current region.
06 Change the AWS region by updating the --region command parameter value and repeat steps no. 1 - 5 to perform the entire process for other regions.
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