Server Side vs Client Side Encryption - KMS-S3 - AWS Certification Cheat Sheet


Let’s get a quick overview of Server Side vs Client Side Encryption for Amazon S3 using KMS.

You will learn

  • What is Server Side Encryption?
  • What is Client Side Encryption?
  • How can you implement Encryption for S3 using KMS?
  • When do we use Server Side vs Client Side Encryption?

KMS and Cloud HSM

  • How do you generate, store, use and replace your keys?
  • AWS provides two important services - KMS and Cloud HSM
    • Manage your keys
    • Perform encryption and decryption

AWS KMS

  • Create and manage cryptographic keys (symmetric and asymmetric)
  • Control their use in your applications and AWS Services
  • Define key usage permissions (including cross account access)
  • Track key usage in AWS CloudTrail (regulations & compliance)
  • Integrates with almost all AWS services that need data encryption
  • Automatically rotate master keys once a year
    • No need to re-encrypt previously encrypted data (versions of master key are maintained)
  • Schedule key deletion to verify if the key is used
    • Mandatory minimum wait period of 7 days (max-30 days)

Server Side Encryption

  • Client sends data (as is) to AWS service
  • AWS service interacts with KMS to perform encryption on the server side
  • Recommended to use HTTPS endpoints to ensure encryption of data in transit
    • All AWS services (including S3) provides HTTPS endpoints
    • Encryption is optional with S3 but highly recommended in flight and at rest

Server Side Encryption - S3

  • SSE-S3:
    • AWS S3 manages its own keys
    • Keys are rotated every month
    • Request Header - x-amz-server-side-encryption(AES256)
  • SSE-KMS:
    • Customer manages keys in KMS
    • Request Headers - x-amz-server-side-encryption(aws:kms) and x-amz-server-side-encryption-aws-kms-key-id(ARN for key in KMS)
  • SSE-C:
    • Customer sends the key with every request
    • S3 performs encryption and decryption without storing the key
    • HTTPS is mandatory

Client Side Encryption

  • Client manages encryption process and sends encrypted data to AWS service
    • AWS will not be aware of master key or data key
  • AWS service stores data as is
  • For Amazon S3, you can use a client library (Amazon S3 Encryption Client)

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