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Secret Manager Secrets Rotation Enabled

More Info:​

Ensure that AWS Secrets Manager service is configured to automatically rotate your service or database secrets (i.e. enable automatic rotation feature for your secrets). Secrets Manager rotation is the automatic process that periodically change your secrets data to make it more difficult for an attacker to access the services and resources secured with these secrets. With Amazon Secrets Manager you dont have to manually change the secret and update it on all of your clients. Instead, the Secrets Manager service uses an AWS Lambda function to perform for you all of the steps required for rotation, on a regular schedule (predefined or custom).

Risk Level​

Medium

Address​

Security

Compliance Standards​

  • APRA CPS 234 (Australia)
  • AWS Well Architected Framework
  • BSI C5 (Germany)
  • Brazil LGPD
  • CCPA / CPRA (California)
  • CIS Critical Security Controls v8
  • CMMC 2.0
  • CSA Cloud Controls Matrix v4
  • DPDPA
  • Digital Operational Resilience Act (EU)
  • Essential 8
  • ISO 27001
  • ISO/IEC 27017
  • ISO/IEC 27018
  • ISO/IEC 27701
  • KSA PDPL
  • MAS Technology Risk Management (Singapore)
  • MITRE ATT&CK (Cloud)
  • NIS2 Directive
  • NIST CSF
  • NIST SP 800-171
  • NYDFS 23 NYCRR 500
  • Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Master Direction – Information Technology Framework
  • SOC2
  • SWIFT Customer Security Controls Framework
  • Sarbanes-Oxley IT General Controls
  • UK NCSC Cyber Assessment Framework

Triage and Remediation​

Remediation​

Using Console

To remediate the "Secret Manager Secrets Rotation Enabled" misconfiguration for AWS using the AWS console, please follow these steps:

  1. Log in to the AWS Management Console.
  2. Navigate to the AWS Secrets Manager service from the Services menu.
  3. Select the secret for which you want to disable rotation.
  4. Click on the "Disable rotation" button in the "Rotation configuration" section.
  5. In the confirmation dialog box, click on the "Disable rotation" button to confirm the action.

Once you have completed these steps, the secret will no longer be set to rotate automatically, and you will need to manually rotate the secret when necessary.

Using CLI

The AWS Secret Manager is a service that enables you to store and manage secrets such as database credentials, API keys, and other sensitive data. One of the key features of Secret Manager is the ability to rotate secrets automatically, which helps to prevent unauthorized access to sensitive data.

If the misconfiguration is "Secret Manager Secrets Rotation Enabled", it means that secrets rotation is not enabled for the AWS Secret Manager. To remediate this misconfiguration, you can follow these steps using the AWS CLI:

Step 1: List all the secrets in the Secret Manager

aws secretsmanager list-secrets

Step 2: Enable rotation for each secret

aws secretsmanager rotate-secret --secret-id <SECRET_ID> --rotation-rules '{"AutomaticallyAfterDays": 30}'

Note: Replace <SECRET_ID> with the actual ID of the secret.

Step 3: Verify that rotation is enabled for the secret

aws secretsmanager describe-secret --secret-id <SECRET_ID>

This command should return the details of the secret, including the rotation configuration.

Step 4: Repeat steps 2 and 3 for all the secrets in the Secret Manager

Enabling secret rotation is an important security best practice, and it helps to ensure that sensitive data is protected from unauthorized access.

Using Python

To remediate the "Secrets Manager Secrets Rotation Enabled" misconfiguration in AWS using Python, follow these steps:

  1. Open the AWS Management Console and navigate to the AWS Secrets Manager service.

  2. Identify the secret(s) that have rotation enabled and note their ARN(s).

  3. Use the AWS SDK for Python (Boto3) to disable rotation for each identified secret. Here's an example code snippet:

import boto3

# Replace <SECRET_ARN> with the ARN of the secret to remediate
secret_arn = '<SECRET_ARN>'

# Create a Secrets Manager client
client = boto3.client('secretsmanager')

# Disable rotation for the secret
response = client.update_secret(
    SecretId=secret_arn,
    RotationLambdaARN='',
    RotationRules={
        'AutomaticallyAfterDays': None
    }
)

print(response)

  1. Repeat step 3 for each identified secret with rotation enabled.

  2. Verify that rotation is now disabled for each secret by checking their configuration in the AWS Management Console or using the Boto3 SDK.

Note: Disabling rotation for a secret means that it will no longer automatically rotate its credentials. You may need to manually rotate the credentials periodically to maintain security.

Using Terraform
# Existing secret (example)
resource "aws_secretsmanager_secret" "MY_SECRET" {
  name = "MY_SECRET_NAME" # replace with your secret name
}

# Rotation Lambda (you must implement the actual rotation logic)
resource "aws_lambda_function" "MY_SECRET_ROTATION_FN" {
  function_name = "MY_SECRET_ROTATION_FUNCTION_NAME" # replace with your function name
  role          = aws_iam_role.MY_SECRET_ROTATION_ROLE.arn
  handler       = "index.lambda_handler"
  runtime       = "python3.12"

  filename         = "PATH_TO_ZIPPED_ROTATION_FUNCTION_CODE.zip" # replace
  source_code_hash = filebase64sha256("PATH_TO_ZIPPED_ROTATION_FUNCTION_CODE.zip")
}

# IAM role for the rotation Lambda (must allow access to the secret and target service)
resource "aws_iam_role" "MY_SECRET_ROTATION_ROLE" {
  name = "MY_SECRET_ROTATION_ROLE_NAME" # replace

  assume_role_policy = data.aws_iam_policy_document.lambda_assume_role_policy.json
}

data "aws_iam_policy_document" "lambda_assume_role_policy" {
  statement {
    actions = ["sts:AssumeRole"]

    principals {
      type        = "Service"
      identifiers = ["lambda.amazonaws.com"]
    }
  }
}

# Attach policy granting the Lambda permissions it needs (simplified; tighten for production)
resource "aws_iam_role_policy" "MY_SECRET_ROTATION_POLICY" {
  name = "MY_SECRET_ROTATION_POLICY_NAME" # replace
  role = aws_iam_role.MY_SECRET_ROTATION_ROLE.id

  policy = jsonencode({
    Version = "2012-10-17"
    Statement = [
      {
        Effect   = "Allow"
        Action   = ["secretsmanager:GetSecretValue", "secretsmanager:PutSecretValue", "secretsmanager:UpdateSecretVersionStage"]
        Resource = aws_secretsmanager_secret.MY_SECRET.arn
      },
      # add actions/resources for the target service, e.g. RDS credentials update
    ]
  })
}

# Enable automatic rotation for the secret
resource "aws_secretsmanager_secret_rotation" "MY_SECRET_ROTATION" {
  secret_id           = aws_secretsmanager_secret.MY_SECRET.id
  rotation_lambda_arn = aws_lambda_function.MY_SECRET_ROTATION_FN.arn

  rotation_rules {
    automatically_after_days = 90 # adjust as required by your policy
  }
}

This enables automatic rotation for the Secrets Manager secret via a Lambda function, matching the CLI rotate-secret behavior (rotation Lambda ARN plus AutomaticallyAfterDays = 90). No existing resources are force-replaced; Terraform should show a new aws_secretsmanager_secret_rotation (and any new Lambda/IAM resources you add) in the terraform plan as + create.

Additional Reading:​