More Info:

MFA must be enabled on user accounts. AWS recommends that you configure multi-factor authentication (MFA) to help protect your AWS resources.

Risk Level

Critical

Address

Security

Compliance Standards

HIPAA, PCIDSS, GDPR, CISAWS, CBP, NIST, SOC2, ISO27001, AWSWAF

Triage and Remediation

How to Prevent

To prevent the misconfiguration of not having Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) enabled on user accounts in AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) using the AWS Management Console, follow these steps:

  1. Navigate to IAM Dashboard:

    • Sign in to the AWS Management Console.
    • In the top navigation bar, select “Services” and then choose “IAM” under the “Security, Identity, & Compliance” section.
  2. Select Users:

    • In the IAM dashboard, click on “Users” in the left-hand navigation pane.
    • This will display a list of all IAM users in your AWS account.
  3. Enable MFA for Each User:

    • Click on the username of the user for whom you want to enable MFA.
    • In the user details page, select the “Security credentials” tab.
    • Under the “Multi-factor authentication (MFA)” section, click on the “Manage” button.
    • Follow the on-screen instructions to assign and activate an MFA device for the user. This typically involves scanning a QR code with an MFA app (like Google Authenticator) and entering the generated code to verify.
  4. Enforce MFA Policy:

    • To ensure that all users have MFA enabled, you can create an IAM policy that requires MFA for specific actions.
    • Go to the “Policies” section in the IAM dashboard.
    • Click on “Create policy” and use the JSON editor to define a policy that requires MFA. For example:
      {
        "Version": "2012-10-17",
        "Statement": [
          {
            "Effect": "Deny",
            "Action": "*",
            "Resource": "*",
            "Condition": {
              "BoolIfExists": {
                "aws:MultiFactorAuthPresent": "false"
              }
            }
          }
        ]
      }
      
    • Attach this policy to all IAM users or groups to enforce MFA.

By following these steps, you can ensure that MFA is enabled for all IAM user accounts, thereby enhancing the security of your AWS environment.

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