SAA-C03 Design Secure Architectures Practice Question
A claims portal uses Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL. Application credentials must not be stored on the EC2 instances, and authentication should use short-lived credentials. What should the architect recommend?
⚠ Common exam trap
It's easy for candidates to confuse network-level controls (security groups) with authentication mechanisms, or assume that storing credentials in user data or AMIs is acceptable because they are 'hidden' from the application code, but AWS explicitly considers these insecure practices for production workloads.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
IAM database authentication for RDS with an EC2 instance role
IAM database authentication for RDS with an EC2 instance role allows the application to obtain a short-lived authentication token (valid for 15 minutes) using the AWS CLI or SDK, without storing any credentials on the instance. The EC2 instance role provides the necessary permissions to generate the token, which is then used instead of a static password, meeting both security requirements.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Store the database password in user data
Why it's wrong here
User data is readable from instance metadata and persists in launch templates, so the password remains stored on the instance and is long-lived. It tempts because user data is a convenient bootstrap mechanism, and would suit non-secret configuration such as the database endpoint.
- ✗
Embed the database password in the AMI
Why it's wrong here
Embedding the password in the AMI hard-codes a static credential into every launched instance, directly violating both the no-storage and short-lived requirements. It tempts because baking configuration into images is legitimate for non-secret settings like agent versions or endpoint hostnames.
- ✓
IAM database authentication for RDS with an EC2 instance role
Why this is correct
IAM database authentication generates short-lived tokens from the EC2 instance role, so no database password is stored on the instance. This directly satisfies the requirement that credentials never reside on EC2 and that authentication uses temporary tokens.
- ✗
Use a security group rule that allows only application instances
Why it's wrong here
A security group rule restricts network reachability, not identity; it neither removes credentials from instances nor issues short-lived tokens. It tempts because security groups are the correct control when the requirement is limiting which hosts may reach the database port.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This SAA-C03 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the SAA-C03 exam.