Keeping Amazon EC2 instances secure and up to date can be challenging, especially when managing multiple instances across different environments. Manually tracking and applying security patches increases the risk of inconsistencies, vulnerabilities, and operational overhead. Organizations may struggle to maintain compliance and system stability without a centralized patch management strategy. AWS Systems Manager Patch Manager simplifies this process by automating patch deployment, ensuring instances remain secure and compliant with minimal manual effort.
You’ll automate patch management for EC2 instances using Patch Manager in this Cloud Lab. You’ll begin by setting up the necessary IAM roles, using the AWS Lambda function to fetch an older Amazon Linux 2 AMI and launching an EC2 instance with it. After configuring a patch baseline and a patch group, you’ll use them to check the available upgrades. You’ll then install those upgrades using the Patch Manager. Finally, you’ll schedule patching using maintenance windows for automated patching.
By completing this Cloud Lab, you’ll gain hands-on experience automating patch management with AWS Systems Manager. You’ll understand how to configure patch baselines, automate deployments, and monitor compliance effectively. This will enable you to maintain a secure and well-managed EC2 environment while reducing operational complexity.
Here’s a high-level architecture diagram of the infrastructure that you’ll create in this Cloud Lab:
