Database Access with AWS RDS Proxy

Teleport can provide secure access to AWS RDS proxy via the Teleport Database Service. This allows for fine-grained access control through Teleport's RBAC.

In this guide, you will:

1. Configure an AWS RDS proxy with IAM authentication.
2. Join the AWS RDS proxy database to your Teleport cluster.
3. Connect to the AWS RDS proxy database via the Teleport Database Service.

• Self-Hosted
• Teleport Enterprise Cloud

Cloud is not available for Teleport v.
Please use the latest version of Teleport Enterprise documentation.

Prerequisites

To check version information, run the tctl version and tsh version commands. For example:

tctl version
Teleport Enterprise v13.3.9 git:api/14.0.0-gd1e081e go1.21

tsh version
Teleport v13.3.9 go1.21
Proxy version: 13.3.9Proxy: teleport.example.com

• AWS account with RDS Proxy instances and permissions to create and attach IAM policies.
• Any RDS Proxy instances intended for connection through Teleport must have TLS enabled.
• A host, e.g., an EC2 instance, where you will run the Teleport Database Service.
• A running Teleport Discovery Service if you plan to use Database Auto-Discovery.
• To check that you can connect to your Teleport cluster, sign in with tsh login, then verify that you can run tctl commands on your administrative workstation using your current credentials. For example:

  tsh login --proxy=teleport.example.com --user=[email protected]
  tctl status
  Cluster  teleport.example.com
  Version  14.0.0
  CA pin   sha256:abdc1245efgh5678abdc1245efgh5678abdc1245efgh5678abdc1245efgh5678

  If you can connect to the cluster and run the tctl status command, you can use your current credentials to run subsequent tctl commands from your workstation. If you host your own Teleport cluster, you can also run tctl commands on the computer that hosts the Teleport Auth Service for full permissions.

Step 1/5. Create a Database Service configuration

The Database Service requires a valid auth token to connect to the cluster. Generate one by running the following command against your Teleport Auth Service and save it in /tmp/token on the node that will run the Database Service:

tctl tokens add --type=db

Install Teleport on the host where you will run the Teleport Database Service:

Select an edition, then follow the instructions for that edition to install Teleport.

curl https://goteleport.com/static/install.sh | bash -s 13.3.9

curl https://goteleport.com/static/install.sh | bash -s 14.0.0

Download Teleport's PGP public key
sudo curl https://apt.releases.teleport.dev/gpg \-o /usr/share/keyrings/teleport-archive-keyring.asc
Source variables about OS version
source /etc/os-release
Add the Teleport APT repository for v14. You'll need to update this
file for each major release of Teleport.
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/teleport-archive-keyring.asc] \https://apt.releases.teleport.dev/${ID?} ${VERSION_CODENAME?} stable/v14" \| sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/teleport.list > /dev/null

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install teleport-ent

sudo apt-get install teleport-ent-fips

Source variables about OS version
source /etc/os-release
Add the Teleport YUM repository for v14. You'll need to update this
file for each major release of Teleport.
First, get the major version from $VERSION_ID so this fetches the correct
package version.
VERSION_ID=$(echo $VERSION_ID | grep -Eo "^[0-9]+")
sudo yum-config-manager --add-repo "$(rpm --eval "https://yum.releases.teleport.dev/$ID/$VERSION_ID/Teleport/%{_arch}/stable/v14/teleport.repo")"
sudo yum install teleport-ent
Tip: Add /usr/local/bin to path used by sudo (so 'sudo tctl users add' will work as per the docs)
echo "Defaults    secure_path = /sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin" > /etc/sudoers.d/secure_path

sudo yum install teleport-ent-fips

Source variables about OS version
source /etc/os-release
Add the Teleport Zypper repository for v14. You'll need to update this
file for each major release of Teleport.
First, get the OS major version from $VERSION_ID so this fetches the correct
package version.
VERSION_ID=$(echo $VERSION_ID | grep -Eo "^[0-9]+")
Use zypper to add the teleport RPM repo
sudo zypper addrepo --refresh --repo $(rpm --eval "https://zypper.releases.teleport.dev/$ID/$VERSION_ID/Teleport/%{_arch}/stable/cloud/teleport-zypper.repo")
sudo yum install teleport-ent
Tip: Add /usr/local/bin to path used by sudo (so 'sudo tctl users add' will work as per the docs)
echo "Defaults    secure_path = /sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin" > /etc/sudoers.d/secure_path

sudo yum install teleport-ent-fips

Source variables about OS version
source /etc/os-release
Add the Teleport YUM repository for v14. You'll need to update this
file for each major release of Teleport.
First, get the major version from $VERSION_ID so this fetches the correct
package version.
VERSION_ID=$(echo $VERSION_ID | grep -Eo "^[0-9]+")
Use the dnf config manager plugin to add the teleport RPM repo
sudo dnf config-manager --add-repo "$(rpm --eval "https://yum.releases.teleport.dev/$ID/$VERSION_ID/Teleport/%{_arch}/stable/v14/teleport.repo")"

Install teleport
sudo dnf install teleport-ent

Tip: Add /usr/local/bin to path used by sudo (so 'sudo tctl users add' will work as per the docs)
echo "Defaults    secure_path = /sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin" > /etc/sudoers.d/secure_path

sudo dnf install teleport-ent-fips

Source variables about OS version
source /etc/os-release
Add the Teleport Zypper repository.
First, get the OS major version from $VERSION_ID so this fetches the correct
package version.
VERSION_ID=$(echo $VERSION_ID | grep -Eo "^[0-9]+")
Use Zypper to add the teleport RPM repo
sudo zypper addrepo --refresh --repo $(rpm --eval "https://zypper.releases.teleport.dev/$ID/$VERSION_ID/Teleport/%{_arch}/stable/v14/teleport-zypper.repo")

Install teleport
sudo zypper install teleport-ent

sudo zypper install teleport-ent-fips

curl https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-ent-v14.0.0-linux-$SYSTEM_ARCH-bin.tar.gz.sha256
<checksum> <filename>
curl -O https://cdn.teleport.dev/teleport-ent-v14.0.0-linux-$SYSTEM_ARCH-bin.tar.gz
shasum -a 256 teleport-ent-v14.0.0-linux-$SYSTEM_ARCH-bin.tar.gz
Verify that the checksums match
tar -xvf teleport-ent-v14.0.0-linux-$SYSTEM_ARCH-bin.tar.gz
cd teleport-ent
sudo ./install

curl https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-ent-v14.0.0-linux-$SYSTEM_ARCH-fips-bin.tar.gz.sha256
<checksum> <filename>
curl -O https://cdn.teleport.dev/teleport-ent-v14.0.0-linux-$SYSTEM_ARCH-fips-bin.tar.gz
shasum -a 256 teleport-ent-v14.0.0-linux-$SYSTEM_ARCH-fips-bin.tar.gz
Verify that the checksums match
tar -xvf teleport-ent-v14.0.0-linux-$SYSTEM_ARCH-fips-bin.tar.gz
cd teleport-ent
sudo ./install

Databases can be registered dynamically by Discovery Service, tctl, etc.

Generate a Database Service configuration that monitors the dynamic database resources:

sudo teleport db configure create \   -o file \   --proxy=mytenant.teleport.sh:443 \   --token=/tmp/token \   --dynamic-resources-labels env=prod

This command will place the Database Service configuration at the /etc/teleport.yaml location.

discovery_service:
  enabled: "yes"
  aws:
  - types: ["rdsproxy"]
    regions: ["us-west-1"]
    tags:
      "env": "prod" # Match database resource tags where tag:env=prod

Step 2/5. Create an IAM policy for Teleport

Teleport can bootstrap IAM permissions for the Database Service based on its configuration:

teleport discovery bootstrap \  --attach-to-role arn:aws:iam::aws-account-id:role/discovery-iam-role-name \  --policy-name TeleportDatabaseDiscovery \  --database-service-role arn:aws:iam::aws-account-id:role/database-iam-role-name \  --database-service-policy-name TeleportDatabaseAccess \  -c path to Discovery's teleport.yaml

teleport db configure bootstrap -c /etc/teleport.yaml --attach-to-user TeleportUser

teleport db configure bootstrap -c /etc/teleport.yaml --attach-to-role TeleportRole

teleport db configure bootstrap -c /etc/teleport.yaml --manual --attach-to-user arn:aws:iam::123456789012:user/TeleportUser

teleport db configure bootstrap -c /etc/teleport.yaml --manual --attach-to-role arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/TeleportRole

Alternatively, you can create or print the required IAM policies with the following commands and manually attach them to the IAM role:

• teleport db configure aws create-iam --types rdsproxy
• teleport db configure aws print-iam --types rdsproxy

Step 3/5. Start the Database Service

Configure the Teleport Database Service to start automatically when the host boots up by creating a systemd service for it. The instructions depend on how you installed the Teleport Database Service.

sudo systemctl enable teleport
sudo systemctl start teleport

sudo teleport install systemd -o /etc/systemd/system/teleport.service
sudo systemctl enable teleport
sudo systemctl start teleport

You can check the status of the Teleport Database Service with systemctl status teleport and view its logs with journalctl -fu teleport.

Step 4/5. Configure database user credentials

The Database Service connects to an RDS Proxy instance using IAM authentication. In addition, the RDS Proxy instance must also be able to connect to the RDS DB instance or Aurora DB cluster using pre-configured database user credentials.

First, use Secrets Manager to store sets of user name and password credentials. You create a separate Secrets Manager secret for each database user account that RDS Proxy connects to on the RDS DB instance or Aurora DB cluster. The password associated with the secret must match the database password for that user in the target database.

For example, the following AWS CLI command creates a Secrets Manager secret for database user alice:

aws secretsmanager create-secret \  --name rdsproxy_alice --description "database user alice" \  --secret-string '{"username":"alice","password":"password_for_alice"}'

Next, create an IAM role with a policy that can access these secrets, for example:

{
    "Version": "2012-10-17",
    "Statement": [
        {
            "Effect": "Allow",
            "Action": "secretsmanager:GetSecretValue",
            "Resource": [
                "arn:aws:secretsmanager:us-west-1:account_id:secret:rdsproxy_alice",
                "arn:aws:secretsmanager:us-west-1:account_id:secret:rdsproxy_anotheruser"
            ]
        },
        {   
            "Effect": "Allow",
            "Action": "kms:Decrypt",
            "Resource": "arn:aws:kms:us-west-1:account_id:key/key_id",
            "Condition": {
                "StringEquals": {
                    "kms:ViaService": "secretsmanager.us-east-2.amazonaws.com"
                }
            }
        }
    ]
}

The IAM role should have the following trust policy:

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Sid": "",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Principal": {
        "Service": "rds.amazonaws.com"
      },
      "Action": "sts:AssumeRole"
    }
  ]
}

Lastly, modify the RDS Proxy authentication settings to use the created IAM role and Secrets Manager secrets. Make sure IAM authentication is set to Required:

aws rds modify-db-proxy --db-proxy-name my-rds-proxy --auth AuthScheme=SECRETS,SecretArn=arn-of-teleport-access-user,\IAMAuth=REQUIRED AuthScheme=SECRETS,SecretArn=arn-of-non-teleport-user,IAMAuth=DISABLED ...

Step 5/5. Connect

Once the Database Service has started and joined the cluster, log in to see the registered databases:

tsh login --proxy=teleport.example.com --user=alice
tsh db ls
Name                         Description                     Labels---------------------------- ------------------------------- -------rds-proxy                    RDS Proxy in us-west-1          ...rds-proxy-my-reader-endpoint RDS Proxy endpoint in us-west-1 ...

To retrieve credentials for a database and connect to it:

tsh db connect --db-user=alice --db-name=dev rds-proxy

To log out of the database and remove credentials:

tsh db logout rds-proxy

Troubleshooting

Certificate error

If your tsh db connect error includes the following text, you likely have an RDS database created before July 28, 2020, which presents an X.509 certificate that is incompatible with Teleport:

x509: certificate relies on legacy Common Name field, use SANs instead

AWS provides instructions to rotate your SSL/TLS certificate.

No credential providers error

If you see the error NoCredentialProviders: no valid providers in chain in Database Service logs then Teleport is not detecting the required credentials to connect via AWS IAM permissions. Check whether the credentials or security role has been applied in the machine running the Teleport Database Service.

Timeout errors

The Teleport Database Service needs connectivity to your database endpoints. That may require enabling inbound traffic on the database from the Database Service on the same VPC or routing rules from another VPC. Using the nc program you can verify connections to databases:

nc -zv postgres-instance-1.sadas.us-east-1.rds.amazonaws.com 5432
Connection to postgres-instance-1.sadas.us-east-1.rds.amazonaws.com (172.31.24.172) 5432 port [tcp/postgresql] succeeded!

Maximum policy size exceeded errors

Due to IAM and STS character limits, you may encounter one of the following errors in the Database Service logs when large numbers of databases are registered:

• LimitExceeded: Maximum policy size of 2048 bytes exceeded for user <iam-user>
• LimitExceeded: Maximum policy size of 10240 bytes exceeded for role <iam-role>

For reference, a user policy can maintain permissions for approximately 6 Redshift databases, or 20 RDS databases due to the IAM policy character limits. A role policy can maintain permissions for approximately 30 Redshift databases, or 100 RDS databases.

To get around this limit, try using one or a combination of the following methods:

discovery_service:
  enabled: "yes"
  aws:
    - types: ["rds"]
      regions: ["us-west-1", "us-west-2"]
      assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-role-rds-env-prod-discovery"
      tags:
        "env": "prod"

    - types: ["redshift", "redshift-serverless"]
      regions: ["us-west-2"]
      assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-role-redshift-env-dev"
      tags:
        "env": "dev"

db_service:
  enabled: "yes"
  resources:
    # Matches us-west-1 env=prod RDS databases from Discovery Service, and
    # overwrites assume_role_arn.
    - labels:
        "env": "prod"
        "region": "us-west-1"
      aws:
        assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-role-rds-env-prod-us-west-1-access"

    # Matches us-west-2 env=prod RDS databases from Discovery Service, and
    # overwrites assume_role_arn.
    - labels:
        "env": "prod"
        "region": "us-west-2"
      aws:
        assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-role-rds-env-prod-us-west-2-access"

    # Matches env=dev Redshift databases from Discovery Service and inherits
    # "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-role-redshift-env-dev"
    - labels:
        "env": "dev"

teleport db configure aws create-iam --types redshift,redshift-serverless --name teleport-redshift-access
teleport db configure aws print-iam --types redshift,redshift-serverless

db_service:
  enabled: "yes"
  aws:
    - types: ["rds"]
      regions: ["us-west-1", "us-west-2"]
      assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-role-rds-env-prod"
      tags:
        "env": "prod"

    - types: ["redshift", "redshift-serverless"]
      regions: ["us-west-2"]
      assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-role-redshift-env-dev"
      tags:
        "env": "dev"

teleport db configure bootstrap \    -c /etc/teleport.yaml \    --policy-name teleport-policy-rds-env-prod \    --attach-to-role "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-role-rds-env-prod"

db_service:
  enabled: "yes"
  databases:
  - name: "rds-postgres"
    protocol: "postgres"
    uri: "rds-postgres.abcdef012345.us-west-1.rds.amazonaws.com:5432"
    aws:
        assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-rds-access-role"

teleport db configure bootstrap \    -c /etc/teleport.yaml \    --policy-name teleport-policy-rds-access \    --attach-to-role "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-rds-access-role"

kind: db
version: v3
metadata:
  name: "rds-postgres"
  labels:
    env: "dev"
spec:
  protocol: "postgres"
  uri: "rds-postgres.abcdef012345.us-west-1.rds.amazonaws.com:5432"
  aws:
    assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-rds-access-role"

db_service:
  enabled: "yes"
  resources:
    # Matches env=dev databases and overwrites assume_role_arn.
    - labels:
        "env": "dev"
      aws:
        assume_role_arn: "arn:aws:iam::123456789012:role/example-env-dev-access"

    # Matches env=prod database, and use the assume_role_arn in the database's
    # definition or use the host IAM identity if assume_role_arn is empty.
    - labels:
        "env": "prod"

teleport db configure aws create-iam --types rds --name teleport-rds-access
teleport db configure aws print-iam --types rds

{
    "Version": "2012-10-17",
    "Statement": [
        {
            "Effect": "Allow",
            "Action": "rds-db:connect",
            "Resource": "*"
        }
    ]
}

{
    "Version": "2012-10-17",
    "Statement": [
        {
            "Effect": "Allow",
            "Action": "redshift:GetClusterCredentials",
            "Resource": "*"
        }
    ]
}

Next steps

• Learn how to restrict access to certain users and databases.

• Learn more about dynamic database registration.

• View the High Availability (HA) guide.

• See the YAML configuration reference for updating dynamic resource matchers or static database definitions.

• Take a look at the full CLI reference.

• Learn more on Setting up database credentials in AWS Secrets Manager and Setting up AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) policies for RDS Proxy