Secure Storage of API Keys for AI Services with SSM

Question

Pulumi · Accepted Answer

To securely store API keys for AI services, you can use the AWS Systems Manager Parameter Store, which provides a centralized store to manage your configuration data, whether plain-text data such as database strings or secrets such as passwords.

AWS Systems Manager Parameter Store provides secure, hierarchical storage for configuration data management and secrets management. You can store data such as passwords, database strings, and license codes as parameter values. Parameter Store offers the following benefits:

- **Secure Storage**: You can use a KMS key to encrypt data. You can also set fine-grained access control to individual parameters using IAM roles.
- **Hierarchical Storage**: You can organize parameters into hierarchical structures to manage them more easily.
- **Change Management**: You can version your data and view a history of changes to parameters.
  
Below is a Pulumi program written in Python that demonstrates how to create a secure string parameter in AWS Systems Manager Parameter Store:

```python
import pulumi
import pulumi_aws as aws

# Create a KMS key to encrypt the parameter
kms_key = aws.kms.Key("my-key", 
    description="KMS key for SSM Parameter encryption")

# Securely store an API key in the Systems Manager Parameter Store.
api_key_parameter = aws.ssm.Parameter("my-api-key",
    name="MyAPIKey",  # The name of the parameter, must be unique.
    type="SecureString",  # The type of parameter. 'SecureString' is for sensitive information.
    value="your_api_key_here",  # The value of the API key, which is encrypted by KMS.
    key_id=kms_key.id,  # Reference to ID of the KMS key.
    tags={
        "Environment": "Production",
        "Purpose": "AI_Service"
    }
)

pulumi.export('api_key_parameter_id', api_key_parameter.id)
```

Here's a rundown of the program:

- A KMS (Key Management Service) key is created using `aws.kms.Key`. This key is used to encrypt the parameters we store in the Systems Manager Parameter Store.
- We use `aws.ssm.Parameter` to create a new secure string parameter. This is where the sensitive information, such as your API key, is stored securely. The `type` argument is set to `SecureString`, indicating that the string will be encrypted.
- The `value` should be the actual API key you want to store. For security reasons, you do not want to hardcode this in your Pulumi program; instead, use Pulumi's config to pass in this value at runtime securely.
- Once the parameter is created, we output the `id` of the parameter, which can be used to reference it programmatically in other parts of your infrastructure or in your applications.

To use this program, save the code in a file (e.g., `main.py`), then execute it using the Pulumi CLI. Make sure you have the necessary AWS credentials configured, and then run `pulumi up` to deploy the configuration to your AWS account.