AWS & GCP Account Setup¶

1. AWS Account Creation¶

1.1 Account Creation Steps¶

Access AWS Sign-up Page
Click "Create an AWS Account" at https://aws.amazon.com/
Enter Account Information
Email address (for Root account)
AWS account name
Password
Contact Information
Account type: Personal or Business
Name, address, phone number
Billing Information
Credit card registration (required even for free tier)
$1 verification charge (refunded)
Identity Verification
PIN verification via SMS or voice call
Select Support Plan
Recommended: Basic Support (free)

1.2 Root Account Security¶

The Root account has full permissions, so security hardening is essential.

⚠️ Root Account Security Checklist
□ Set strong password (16+ characters with special characters)
□ Enable MFA (Multi-Factor Authentication)
□ Do not create access keys
□ Do not use Root account for daily tasks
□ Create and use IAM users instead

1.3 MFA Setup (AWS)¶

Activate MFA from Console:

AWS Console → Top-right account name → "Security credentials"
"Multi-factor authentication (MFA)" section
Click "Activate MFA"
Select MFA device type:
Virtual MFA device: Use Google Authenticator, Authy app
Hardware TOTP token: Physical token
Security key: FIDO security key

Virtual MFA Setup:

1. Install app: Google Authenticator or Authy
2. Scan QR code in app
3. Enter two consecutive MFA codes
4. Click "Assign MFA"

2. GCP Account Creation¶

2.1 Account Creation Steps¶

Access GCP Console
https://console.cloud.google.com/
Google Account Login
Use existing Google account or create new one
Accept GCP Terms
Select country
Agree to terms of service
Set Up Billing Account (for free trial)
Enter credit card information
Activate $300 free credit (90 days)
Create First Project
Specify project name
Select organization (select "No organization" for personal use)

2.2 GCP Security Settings¶

Strengthen Google Account Security:

⚠️ GCP Account Security Checklist
□ Enable 2-Step Verification for Google account
□ Strengthen password security
□ Set up recovery email/phone number
□ Review organization policies (for business)
□ Use service accounts (recommended)

2.3 2-Step Verification Setup (GCP)¶

Google Account Settings → "Security"
Enable "2-Step Verification"
Select authentication method:
Google prompts
Authenticator app (Google Authenticator)
Security key
Backup codes

3.1 AWS Management Console¶

Main UI Components:

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  [AWS Logo]  Service Search Bar        Region ▼  Account ▼  │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                                                             │
│  [Services Menu]                                            │
│   ├── Compute (EC2, Lambda, ECS...)                         │
│   ├── Storage (S3, EBS, EFS...)                             │
│   ├── Database (RDS, DynamoDB...)                           │
│   ├── Networking (VPC, Route 53...)                         │
│   ├── Security (IAM, KMS...)                                │
│   └── Management (CloudWatch, CloudFormation...)            │
│                                                             │
│  [Recently Visited Services]                                │
│  [Favorite Services]                                        │
│                                                             │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Useful Features: - Service Search: Enter service name in top search bar - Region Selection: Select working region from top-right - CloudShell: Browser-based terminal (AWS CLI pre-installed) - Resource Groups: Group resources and manage tags

3.2 GCP Console¶

Main UI Components:

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  [GCP Logo]  [Project Select ▼]  Search Bar    [Account Icon]│
├──────────────┬──────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│  [Navigation]│                                              │
│   │          │  [Dashboard]                                 │
│   ├─ Compute │   ├── Project info                           │
│   ├─ Storage │   ├── Resource summary                       │
│   ├─ Networking│  ├── API activity                          │
│   ├─ Database│   └── Billing summary                        │
│   ├─ Security│                                              │
│   ├─ Tools   │                                              │
│   └─ Billing │                                              │
│              │                                              │
└──────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Useful Features: - Project Selection: Switch projects from top-left - Cloud Shell: Terminal icon at top-right (gcloud pre-installed) - Pin Services: Pin frequently used services to menu - APIs & Services: Manage API activation

4. First Project/Resource Group¶

4.1 AWS: Resource Management with Tags¶

AWS manages resources with tags instead of a project concept.

# Example of tagging resources during creation
aws ec2 run-instances \
    --image-id ami-12345678 \
    --instance-type t2.micro \
    --tag-specifications 'ResourceType=instance,Tags=[{Key=Project,Value=MyApp},{Key=Environment,Value=dev}]'

Tag Best Practices:

Tag Key	Example Value	Purpose
Project	MyApp	Track costs by project
Environment	dev, staging, prod	Distinguish environments
Owner	john@example.com	Identify owner
CostCenter	IT-001	Assign cost center

4.2 GCP: Project Creation¶

GCP isolates resources and billing by project.

Create Project: 1. Console top → Project selection dropdown 2. Click "New Project" 3. Enter project name (unique ID auto-generated) 4. Link billing account 5. Click "Create"

# Create project with gcloud
gcloud projects create my-project-id \
    --name="My Project" \
    --labels=env=dev

# Switch project
gcloud config set project my-project-id

Recommended Project Structure:

Organization (optional)
├── Folder: Development
│   ├── Project: dev-frontend
│   └── Project: dev-backend
├── Folder: Production
│   ├── Project: prod-frontend
│   └── Project: prod-backend
└── Folder: Shared
    └── Project: shared-services

5. Cost Alerting Setup¶

5.1 AWS Budget Alerts¶

Set Up AWS Budgets:

AWS Console → "Billing and Cost Management" → "Budgets"
Click "Create budget"
Select budget type: "Cost budget"
Configure budget:
Name: "Monthly Budget"
Amount: Desired limit (e.g., $50)
Period: Monthly
Alert conditions:
Alert when actual cost reaches 80% of budget
Alert when forecasted cost exceeds 100%
Alert recipients:
Enter email addresses
Link SNS topic (optional)

# Create budget with AWS CLI
aws budgets create-budget \
    --account-id 123456789012 \
    --budget '{
        "BudgetName": "Monthly-50USD",
        "BudgetLimit": {"Amount": "50", "Unit": "USD"},
        "TimeUnit": "MONTHLY",
        "BudgetType": "COST"
    }' \
    --notifications-with-subscribers '[{
        "Notification": {
            "NotificationType": "ACTUAL",
            "ComparisonOperator": "GREATER_THAN",
            "Threshold": 80
        },
        "Subscribers": [{
            "SubscriptionType": "EMAIL",
            "Address": "your@email.com"
        }]
    }]'

5.2 GCP Budget Alerts¶

Set Up GCP Billing Budget:

Console → "Billing" → "Budgets & alerts"
Click "Create budget"
Configure budget:
Name: "Monthly Budget"
Projects: All or specific projects
Amount: Specified amount (e.g., $50)
Alert thresholds:
Set alerts at 50%, 90%, 100%
Alert channels:
Email recipients
Cloud Monitoring (optional)
Pub/Sub topic (for automation)

# Create budget with gcloud
gcloud billing budgets create \
    --billing-account=BILLING_ACCOUNT_ID \
    --display-name="Monthly Budget" \
    --budget-amount=50USD \
    --threshold-rule=percent=0.5 \
    --threshold-rule=percent=0.9 \
    --threshold-rule=percent=1.0

6. Free Tier Utilization¶

6.1 AWS Free Tier¶

Type	Service	Free Limit
12 Months Free	EC2	t2.micro 750 hours/month
	S3	5GB storage
	RDS	db.t2.micro 750 hours/month
	CloudFront	50GB data transfer
Always Free	Lambda	1M requests/month
	DynamoDB	25GB storage, 25 WCU/RCU
	SNS	1M requests/month
	CloudWatch	Basic monitoring

Monitor Free Tier: - Console → "Billing" → "Free Tier" tab to check usage

6.2 GCP Free Tier¶

Type	Service	Free Limit
$300 Credit	All services	90 days (new accounts)
Always Free	Compute Engine	1 e2-micro (specific regions)
	Cloud Storage	5GB (US region)
	Cloud Functions	2M invocations/month
	BigQuery	1TB queries/month, 10GB storage
	Cloud Run	2M requests/month
	Firestore	1GB storage, 50K reads/day

Always Free Region Restrictions: - Compute Engine e2-micro: Only us-west1, us-central1, us-east1

7. Initial Security Setup Summary¶

7.1 AWS Initial Security Checklist¶

□ Enable Root account MFA
□ Verify Root access keys are deleted
□ Create IAM users and enable MFA
□ Strengthen IAM password policy
□ Enable CloudTrail (audit logs)
□ Set up budget alerts
□ Verify S3 public access block settings

7.2 GCP Initial Security Checklist¶

□ Enable 2-Step Verification for Google account
□ Review organization policies (if applicable)
□ Create service accounts (for applications)
□ Grant least privilege IAM roles
□ Enable Cloud Audit Logs
□ Set up budget alerts
□ Review VPC firewall rules

8. Next Steps¶

03_Regions_Availability_Zones.md - Understanding regions and availability zones
13_Identity_Access_Management.md - Detailed IAM setup

AWS & GCP Account Setup