Identity-based policy examples for Amazon WAF Classic
Warning
Amazon WAF Classic support will end on September 30, 2025.
Note
This is Amazon WAF Classic documentation. You should only use this version if you created Amazon WAF resources, like rules and web ACLs, in Amazon WAF prior to November 2019, and you have not migrated them over to the latest version yet. To migrate your web ACLs, see Migrating your Amazon WAF Classic resources to Amazon WAF.
For the latest version of Amazon WAF, see Amazon WAF.
By default, users and roles don't have permission to create or modify Amazon WAF Classic resources. They also can't perform tasks by using the Amazon Web Services Management Console, Amazon Command Line Interface (Amazon CLI), or Amazon API. To grant users permission to perform actions on the resources that they need, an IAM administrator can create IAM policies. The administrator can then add the IAM policies to roles, and users can assume the roles.
To learn how to create an IAM identity-based policy by using these example JSON policy documents, see Create IAM policies (console) in the IAM User Guide.
For details about actions and resource types defined by Amazon WAF Classic, including the format of the ARNs for each of the resource types, see Actions, resources, and condition keys for Amazon WAF and Actions, resources, and condition keys for Amazon WAF Regional in the Service Authorization Reference.
Topics
Policy best practices
Identity-based policies determine whether someone can create, access, or delete Amazon WAF Classic resources in your account. These actions can incur costs for your Amazon Web Services account. When you create or edit identity-based policies, follow these guidelines and recommendations:
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Get started with Amazon managed policies and move toward least-privilege permissions – To get started granting permissions to your users and workloads, use the Amazon managed policies that grant permissions for many common use cases. They are available in your Amazon Web Services account. We recommend that you reduce permissions further by defining Amazon customer managed policies that are specific to your use cases. For more information, see Amazon managed policies or Amazon managed policies for job functions in the IAM User Guide.
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Apply least-privilege permissions – When you set permissions with IAM policies, grant only the permissions required to perform a task. You do this by defining the actions that can be taken on specific resources under specific conditions, also known as least-privilege permissions. For more information about using IAM to apply permissions, see Policies and permissions in IAM in the IAM User Guide.
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Use conditions in IAM policies to further restrict access – You can add a condition to your policies to limit access to actions and resources. For example, you can write a policy condition to specify that all requests must be sent using SSL. You can also use conditions to grant access to service actions if they are used through a specific Amazon Web Services service, such as Amazon CloudFormation. For more information, see IAM JSON policy elements: Condition in the IAM User Guide.
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Use IAM Access Analyzer to validate your IAM policies to ensure secure and functional permissions – IAM Access Analyzer validates new and existing policies so that the policies adhere to the IAM policy language (JSON) and IAM best practices. IAM Access Analyzer provides more than 100 policy checks and actionable recommendations to help you author secure and functional policies. For more information, see Validate policies with IAM Access Analyzer in the IAM User Guide.
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Require multi-factor authentication (MFA) – If you have a scenario that requires IAM users or a root user in your Amazon Web Services account, turn on MFA for additional security. To require MFA when API operations are called, add MFA conditions to your policies. For more information, see Secure API access with MFA in the IAM User Guide.
For more information about best practices in IAM, see Security best practices in IAM in the IAM User Guide.
Using the Amazon WAF Classic console
To access the Amazon WAF Classic console, you must have a minimum set of permissions. These permissions must allow you to list and view details about the Amazon WAF Classic resources in your Amazon Web Services account. If you create an identity-based policy that is more restrictive than the minimum required permissions, the console won't function as intended for entities (users or roles) with that policy.
You don't need to allow minimum console permissions for users that are making calls only to the Amazon CLI or the Amazon API. Instead, allow access to only the actions that match the API operation that they're trying to perform.
Users who can access and use the Amazon console can also access the Amazon WAF Classic console. No additional permissions are required.
Allow users to view their own permissions
This example shows how you might create a policy that allows IAM users to view the inline and managed policies that are attached to their user identity. This policy includes permissions to complete this action on the console or programmatically using the Amazon CLI or Amazon API.
{ "Version": "2012-10-17", "Statement": [ { "Sid": "ViewOwnUserInfo", "Effect": "Allow", "Action": [ "iam:GetUserPolicy", "iam:ListGroupsForUser", "iam:ListAttachedUserPolicies", "iam:ListUserPolicies", "iam:GetUser" ], "Resource": ["arn:aws-cn:iam::*:user/${aws:username}"] }, { "Sid": "NavigateInConsole", "Effect": "Allow", "Action": [ "iam:GetGroupPolicy", "iam:GetPolicyVersion", "iam:GetPolicy", "iam:ListAttachedGroupPolicies", "iam:ListGroupPolicies", "iam:ListPolicyVersions", "iam:ListPolicies", "iam:ListUsers" ], "Resource": "*" } ] }