EKS Pod Identity vs IRSA | Securely Connect Kubernetes Pods to AWS Services
Summary
TLDRThis video introduces EKS Pod Identity, a feature that simplifies connecting Amazon EKS workloads to AWS services like S3 using IAM roles. The speaker explains how Kubernetes manages user authorization through service accounts and RBAC, and compares EKS Pod Identity to IAM Roles for Service Accounts (IRSA). EKS Pod Identity reduces operational overhead by removing the need for OIDC providers for each cluster, and supports attribute-based access control. The video also outlines the steps required to configure Pod Identity, emphasizing its advantages in securely accessing external services from Kubernetes workloads.
Takeaways
- 🔒 EKS Pod Identity allows secure connection between Amazon EKS clusters and AWS services like S3.
- 🆔 EKS Pod Identity simplifies the use of IAM roles with Kubernetes pods, reducing operational overhead compared to IRSA.
- 🔄 Pod Identity is backward compatible with IAM Roles for Service Accounts (IRSA).
- 🔑 Kubernetes authorizes users using RBAC with cluster roles and namespace roles.
- ⚙️ Service accounts within Kubernetes are used to authorize workloads accessing the Kubernetes API.
- 📦 Pod Identity allows Kubernetes workloads to access AWS services by associating IAM roles with pods.
- 🛠️ With EKS Pod Identity, there's no need to create OIDC providers for each cluster, unlike IRSA.
- 🔧 Pod Identity uses attribute-based access control (ABAC) for more flexible role management.
- 🧩 The Pod Identity agent, deployable as an EKS add-on, handles pod identity management with minimal operational overhead.
- 🛡️ Pod Identity ensures that Kubernetes workloads running in EKS securely access external AWS services like S3 using the right IAM roles.
Q & A
What is Amazon EKS Pod Identity?
-Amazon EKS Pod Identity is a feature that allows you to connect IAM roles to pods and workloads running in Amazon EKS clusters, enabling secure access to other AWS services like S3.
How does EKS Pod Identity differ from IAM Roles for Service Accounts (IRSA)?
-EKS Pod Identity streamlines the operational overhead associated with IRSA, eliminates the need to create an OIDC provider for each cluster, and is backwards compatible with IRSA.
How is authorization typically handled in Kubernetes for users?
-Kubernetes authorizes users using RBAC (Role-Based Access Control), with permissions granted through roles. These can be cluster roles (scoped to the cluster) or roles scoped to a namespace.
What are service accounts in Kubernetes, and how do they interact with workloads?
-Service accounts in Kubernetes are used to grant permissions to workloads within the cluster. They are bound to roles (cluster roles or namespace-specific roles) via role bindings, allowing the workload to interact with the Kubernetes API.
How does EKS Pod Identity allow workloads to access services like S3?
-EKS Pod Identity allows workloads in EKS to securely access services like S3 by associating IAM roles with pods. When a pod tries to access S3, the Pod Identity Agent ensures it has the correct IAM role credentials for authentication.
What is the role of the Pod Identity Agent in EKS Pod Identity?
-The Pod Identity Agent manages the association between the pod, the IAM role, and the namespace. It ensures that the pod’s credentials are updated so the AWS SDK can access the appropriate services securely.
Why is it beneficial that EKS Pod Identity doesn’t require an OIDC provider for every cluster?
-By not requiring an OIDC provider for each cluster, EKS Pod Identity simplifies setup and allows roles to be scoped across multiple clusters, reducing operational complexity.
What is attribute-based access control (ABAC) in the context of EKS Pod Identity?
-Attribute-Based Access Control (ABAC) in EKS Pod Identity allows more granular permissions management, enabling roles to be scoped more effectively based on attributes such as namespaces and service accounts.
What steps are required to configure EKS Pod Identity for accessing an AWS service like S3?
-To configure EKS Pod Identity, you need to create an IAM role with the required permissions, deploy the Pod Identity Agent in the cluster, and then associate the IAM role with the pod’s namespace and service account.
Is EKS Pod Identity compatible with existing IAM Roles for Service Accounts (IRSA)?
-Yes, EKS Pod Identity is fully backwards compatible with IAM Roles for Service Accounts (IRSA), meaning both can coexist, and existing IRSA configurations will continue to work.
Outlines
🔒 Introduction to Secure Connections in EKS
The first paragraph introduces the concept of securely connecting workloads in an Amazon EKS (Elastic Kubernetes Service) cluster to other AWS services, such as S3. The focus is on the EKS Pod Identity feature, which simplifies the process of linking AWS IAM roles to pods running in the cluster. This is positioned as an improvement over the traditional IAM Roles for Service Accounts (IRSA), reducing operational complexity while maintaining backward compatibility with IRSA.
🔑 Understanding Authorization in Kubernetes
This paragraph shifts focus to how authorization works for users in Kubernetes. It explains that when users use tools like kubectl to interact with the Kubernetes API, Kubernetes first authenticates the user and then uses Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) to authorize their actions. Two types of roles are highlighted: Cluster Roles (permissions for the entire cluster) and Namespace Roles (permissions within a specific namespace). The paragraph also briefly touches on the role of service accounts in allowing workloads to access the Kubernetes API, explaining how these accounts are tied to roles through role bindings.
🛠️ Service Accounts and Workload Access
This section explains how workloads within Kubernetes access the API using service accounts. Service accounts are bound to roles and enable the workloads (pods) to make requests to the Kubernetes API, similar to how users interact with the system. The explanation simplifies the process by omitting some technical details but emphasizes the importance of service accounts in enabling workload access to necessary resources.
📦 EKS Pod Identity and External Access to AWS Services
This paragraph introduces EKS Pod Identity and explains how it enables Kubernetes pods to securely access AWS services like S3. The concept of IAM roles is reintroduced, with the example of creating an IAM role that grants the pod permissions to list items in an S3 bucket. This role allows the pod to authenticate and access external AWS services, eliminating the need to set up separate OIDC providers for each cluster, which is a major improvement over IRSA. Additionally, the flexibility of attribute-based access control is mentioned as a powerful feature.
🚀 Simplified Pod Identity Management
Here, the focus is on the operational aspects of EKS Pod Identity. It explains how users can deploy a Pod Identity agent in their cluster using an EKS add-on, reducing the overhead of managing this process manually. Once the agent is in place, it handles the process of associating the pod with the correct IAM role and namespace, ensuring that the pod has the necessary credentials to access AWS services like S3 securely.
🔄 Conclusion and Backward Compatibility
The final paragraph wraps up the discussion by reiterating that EKS Pod Identity offers several improvements over the traditional IRSA system. It is backward-compatible with IRSA, meaning users can continue using their existing setups while benefiting from the enhanced features of EKS Pod Identity. The paragraph ends with a prompt for viewers to check out more resources linked in the video description and a call to action for likes and subscriptions.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Amazon EKS
💡EKS Pod Identity
💡IAM (Identity and Access Management)
💡Kubernetes RBAC
💡Service Account
💡IAM Roles for Service Accounts (IRSA)
💡OIDC (OpenID Connect)
💡Pod Identity Agent
💡SDK (Software Development Kit)
💡S3 Bucket
Highlights
Introduction of EKS pod identity as a feature to securely connect Amazon EKS workloads to AWS services like S3.
EKS pod identity reduces operational overhead compared to IAM roles for service accounts (IRSA) while maintaining backward compatibility with IRSA.
Overview of Kubernetes authorization with a focus on how users and workloads access the Kubernetes API.
Explanation of Kubernetes RBAC roles: cluster roles scoped to the entire cluster and roles scoped to a specific namespace.
Workloads in Kubernetes use service accounts that are bound to roles, which determine their permissions.
Introduction of EKS pod identity as a solution for accessing AWS services like S3 from Kubernetes workloads without manually creating OIDC providers.
Key benefit of EKS pod identity: it allows roles to be scoped to multiple clusters, making role management more efficient.
Attribute-based access control (ABAC) with EKS pod identity enhances role flexibility and security in AWS environments.
Description of the Pod Identity Agent (PIA), which manages credentials and automates operational tasks within the cluster.
EKS pod identity is integrated via an EKS add-on, simplifying the installation and management of the Pod Identity Agent.
To access AWS services like S3 from Kubernetes pods, IAM roles must be created and associated with the relevant namespace and service account.
Pod Identity Agent automatically mutates the pod spec to provide the necessary credentials for secure service access.
EKS pod identity enhances authentication and authorization for Kubernetes workloads accessing AWS services like S3.
EKS pod identity's ability to streamline permissions and credential management across clusters offers a more efficient and scalable solution than IRSA.
IRSA remains supported and EKS pod identity is fully backward compatible, offering flexibility for teams using both.
Transcripts
how do you securely connect workloads
running in an Amazon eks cluster to
other services in AWS like S3 well today
we're going to be talking about eks pod
identity which is a relatively new
feature which enables you to connect up
IM am identity and access management
roles to pods um and workloads running
in your Amazon ekas clusters now I know
this sounds a whole lot like Ursa I
roles for service accounts but E's pod
identity streamlines a lot of the
operational overhead associated with
using Ursa while being backwards
compatible with Ursa but before we get
into all of it I think first let's start
from a point of understanding how
authorization Works in kubernetes uh for
users so let's say that as a user you're
trying to use something like Cube cuddle
to request from the kubernetes API um
information about some of the pods
running in kubernetes well the first
thing kubernetes is going to do is
authenticate your request now let's take
this part for granted because it's not
super critical to understanding how po
identity works but essentially what
happens here is kubernetes figures out
who you are uh next we'll need to do
authorization using kubernetes rbac and
this is typically done through uh two
types of roles um so first we'll talk
about cluster roles which are roles a
set of permissions scoped to the cluster
um then we've also got rols uh which are
scoped to
a namespace uh now this is what grants
our user permissions so again we wanted
to get some information about a pod so
let's say that uh we have a pod running
in
kubernetes right here and so once
kubernetes has approved this request
authenticated and authorized um go back
to the API server and our user gets his
or her response okay uh we're able to
retrieve information about pods as users
but what about when workloads Within
kubernetes want to access the kubernetes
API here's where service accounts come
in so um within our cluster here within
this namespace we'll have a service
account which I'll mark As sa these
service accounts can be bound to roles
in cluster rols as well um by the way
these bindings are done using cluster
roll bindings and Ro bindings for both
service accounts and users I've just
kind of simplified it here just a little
bit okay um so that's how workloads are
able to access the kubernetes API so now
now that uh the Pod references the
service account which is bound to these
roles it has permissions that are
defined in these roles so it can also
let's say access the kubernetes API now
we can talk about how eks pod identity
fits into the puzzle uh let's say that
in AWS we have an S3
bucket um and we want to access that S3
bucket using an approved AWS
SDK um so we'll draw that out here we'll
say it's using an SDK well this request
is going to fail because uh we haven't
created an IM rooll and connected up to
this pod just yet so an IM IM rooll uh
essentially gives us um permissions to
access this S3 bucket so that's what
we'll have to create first uh with pod
identity so um in am identity and access
management we create this role and let's
say we give it something very simple
like S3 list
bucket uh this uh IM roll has to set a
principle of this right here this is one
of the big improvements over IM rolles
for service accounts eks pod identity uh
allows you to not have to create an oidc
provider for every cluster and so these
roles can really be scoped to multiple
clusters you also have attribute based
access control which makes these roles
that much more powerful but okay this is
the first step for working with pod
identity uh the next thing we'll need to
do is deploy the Pod identity agent um
I'm just going to simplify that here and
just say Pia the Pod identity agent this
can be installed using an eks add-on
which makes that operational overhead
really negligible um it'll kind of help
you manage that agent running in your
cluster the last thing you need to do is
create an association now this
essentially you're telling eks that uh
for this role where you pass in the Arn
um in this namespace and for this
service account we're associating those
three um and now now when our pod tries
to access the S3 bucket the Pod identity
agent here is going to mutate the Pod
spec to make sure it has the right
credentials the SDK knows to look for
those credentials and allows us to
authenticate and authorize that request
to S3 enabling our kubernetes workloads
running an eks to securely access
Services outside of the cluster okay so
today we've talked a little bit about
eks po identity um and how it presents a
few improvements over the previous
experience with irsa irsa continues to
be supported and eks pod identity is
backwards compatible with it if you want
to learn more about eks po identity
check out the links in the description
below and be sure to like And subscribe
thanks for watching
Ver Más Videos Relacionados
Containers on AWS Overview: ECS | EKS | Fargate | ECR
AWS Batch on EKS
Day-32 | How to Manage Hundreds of Kubernetes clusters ??? | KOPS | #k8s #kubernetes #devops
Chapter #8 - Cloud IAM Basics | identity & access management on google cloud platform (gcp)
Kubernetes Explained in 6 Minutes | k8s Architecture
Amazon Redshift Tutorial | Amazon Redshift Architecture | AWS Tutorial For Beginners | Simplilearn
5.0 / 5 (0 votes)