Creating and Connecting to Windows Instances on AWS.
Hi Everyone,
This is the third blog in AWS PEN-TESTING series of Blogs. In my previous blog I have shown How to create Linux Instances on AWS and connect them.
In this Blog I will show How to create windows instance and connect to it on AWS. This blog is necessary to write because in my next blog I will show Environment Lab Set-up for AWS PEN-TESTING where we will create two instances i.e. Linux and Windows on AWS in the same region so they can be in the same network. Then on Linux Instance we will host some vulnerable services and on windows instance we will host some buggy apps to pentest.
Please follow below steps for Creating and Connecting to AWS Windows instance.
Step 1: Login to your AWS Account and navigate to Instances tab to create new Windows instance.
Step 2: Choose below Windows Server AMI(Amazon Machine Image) from instances list which is free tier.
Step 3: Keep the setting default for now and click on Review and Launch.
Step 4: When you click on Launch finally it will ask you to create or use previous key pair to Launch the instance. If you don’t have previously generated key-pair then click on “Create a new key -pair”.
when you follow above steps give the meaningful name to .pem file and download it and instance will Launch successfully. you can notice status that instance is running.
Now in my previous blog I have already given steps to generate Private Key (.ppk file from .pem file using Puttygen) So that’s I am not gonna repeat over here. Please refer to below blog to follow those steps,
Blog 2: https://medium.com/p/d3902bf4c248/edit?source=your_stories_page
As Windows server does not support certificate based authentication we need to use bit different method to establish connection with our windows server. follow steps 5 to step 9 for establishing RDP connection with windows server 2019.
Step 5: Right click on instance and navigate to Security-Get Windows Password.
Step 6: Select the .pem file which we have downloaded earlier and then click on Decrypt Password to get Windows RDP IP, Username and Password.
As shown in below screen you will get credentials for connecting windows RDP machine.
Step 7: Now, Right click on windows instance and click on Connect.
Step 8: Click on RDP Client and download remote desktop file.
Step 9: Go through following prompts and then you will be successfully able to connect AWS Windows instance.
Keep in mind, With Blog 2 and Blog 3 of AWS Pen-Testing Series I have covered Half of the Part of “Setting up Lab Environment for AWS Pen-testing”. Also I have fulfill requirement for establishing connection between this two machine by hosting them into same region.
In my next blog, I will install some vulnerable services on Linux instance and some buggy Web Apps on Windows instance for learning AWS-Pen-testing. So follow along and I will keep posting for you.
Thanks Readers!
Please provide your valuable feedback and suggestions.
