AWS pre:Invent 2022

My third annual pre:Invent roundup is posted over on Steampipe’s blog. You can also check out 2021 and 2020 if you’re so inclined.

Back in 2018, I wrote a semi-serious post on what you as a security practitioner should be looking for as it relates to re:Invent announcements.

There were a few hot-takes that didn’t warrant mention on my work post, so I’ll include them here for your general amusement.


Organizations CloudFormation

It’s pre:Invent 2022, the time of year AWS releases a bunch of new products and features that aren’t big enough to make it on the keynote state of re:Invent. One of my long-awaited features was released last night: CloudFormation support for AWS Organizations! Before this release, the management of Service Control Policies, Organizational Units, and AWS Accounts was either artisanal or via third-party tools like org-formation. I can finally manage my AWS Organization using the same IaC as I manage the accounts in that organization.

Mastodon

Like much of InfoSec Twitter, I’ve gone and created a profile on Jerry Bell’s Infosec.exchange. I’m not sure about this whole Mastodon thing. But then again, I created my Twitter account in 2009, and didn’t really start using it till 2017 or so. Anyway, I’m officially @jcfarris@infosec.exchange. I hope Twitter doesn’t implode. I got a lot of value out of it.

Adventures in post-pandemic Asian travel.

I found myself taking a new job this fall. One surprising aspect of that job was they had scheduled a company all-hands in Kuala Lumpur (KL) in mid-September. So after our family trip to Amsterdam, Finland, Sweden, and Estonia, I now had a trip to South East Asia on my calendar. This post is mainly intended as random travel advice for visiting Malaysia, flying SkyTeam, dealing with internet access, etc. There will be minimal if any, cloud security content.