Title: AWS re:Inforce 2024 - Scaling incident response with AWS developer tools (TDR321)

Insights:

Automation in Incident Response: Automating incident response processes using AWS Developer Tools can significantly reduce the time and effort required to manage incidents, especially in large-scale environments.
Command Line and Scripting: Utilizing AWS CLI and shell scripting can streamline tasks such as updating contact information across multiple AWS accounts, ensuring consistency and reducing human error.
Python and Boto3 SDK: Python scripts using the Boto3 SDK can automate complex tasks like generating and analyzing IAM credential reports, which are crucial for security monitoring and incident response.
Consistency and Efficiency: Automating incident response ensures that the same processes are followed during drills and actual incidents, improving efficiency and reducing the likelihood of mistakes.
Portability and Flexibility: Scripts can be made portable across different environments by programmatically detecting the current account ID, making them adaptable without manual updates.
Error Handling and Logging: Including error handling and logging in scripts can help operators verify actions before execution and maintain records for post-incident analysis or rollback if necessary.
Security and Compliance: Regularly updating and verifying contact information and using automated scripts to check for security compliance (e.g., IAM credential reports) can help maintain a secure and compliant AWS environment.

"If you try and do it with the console, you're likely to click your mouse enough to avoid its warranty."
"By having this ready to go, you can help your operators avoid mistakes caused by transposing commands from one screen to another or clicking the wrong thing in the console."
"The AWS CLI has a built-in query language that lets you select and filter elements like this without using any external tooling."
"You can programmatically get the current account ID that you're working in with this command, aws sts get caller identity."
"If you were using this as part of an automated pipeline, then maybe instead you would sort of sleep for a few seconds and then have the script retry automatically."
"You can also use other APIs like list attached role policies and list attached user policies to make sure that the users and the roles in your environment don't have any unexpected policies attached."
"You can take the CLIs and the SDKs to create scripts to go in your runbooks and playbooks to enable your operators to respond faster and hopefully more efficiently across multiple resources and potentially multiple AWS accounts."
"What actions in your incident plan can you script automatically?"