Resource Access Management (RAM) allows you to manage the permissions of your Alibaba Cloud account and its RAM users separately, and grant different permissions to the RAM users. Only RAM users that are granted the required permissions can manage resources in the Function Compute console. This prevents security risks that are caused if the AccessKey pair of your Alibaba Cloud account is disclosed. This topic describes how to create a RAM user and grant permissions to the RAM user by using an Alibaba Cloud account.

Scenarios

Enterprise A has activated Function Compute and requires employees to manage Function Compute resources, such as creating and deleting services and functions. Employees that assume different roles require different permissions. Enterprise A has the following requirements:
  • For security purposes, Enterprise A does not want to disclose the AccessKey pair of the Alibaba Cloud account to the employees. Enterprise A prefers to create different RAM users for the employees and grant different permissions to the RAM users.
  • Only RAM users who are granted permissions can manage resources. Resource usage and costs are not calculated separately for each RAM user. All expenses are billed to the Alibaba Cloud account of Enterprise A.
  • Enterprise A can revoke the permissions granted to RAM users and delete RAM users at any time.

Step 1: Use the Alibaba Cloud account of Enterprise A to create RAM users for employees

  1. Log on to the RAM console by using your Alibaba Cloud account.
  2. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Identities > Users.
  3. On the Users page, click Create User.
  4. In the User Account Information section of the Create User page, configure the Logon Name and Display Name parameters.
    Note You can click Add User to create multiple RAM users at a time.
  5. In the Access Mode section, select an access mode.
    • Console Access: If you select this option, you must complete the logon security settings. These settings specify whether to use a system-generated or custom logon password, whether the password must be reset upon the next logon, and whether to enable multi-factor authentication (MFA).
      Note If you select Custom Logon Password in the Console Password section, you must specify a password. The password must meet the complexity requirements. For more information about the complexity requirements, see Configure a password policy for RAM users.
    • OpenAPI Access: If you select this option, an AccessKey pair is automatically created for the RAM user. The RAM user can call API operations or use other development tools to access Alibaba Cloud resources.
    Note To ensure the security of the Alibaba Cloud account, we recommend that you select only one access mode for the RAM user. This prevents the RAM user from using an AccessKey pair to access Alibaba Cloud resources after the RAM user leaves the organization.
  6. Click OK.

Step 2: Grant permissions to the RAM users

  1. Log on to the RAM console by using your Alibaba Cloud account.
  2. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Identities > Users.
  3. On the Users page, find the RAM user to which you want to grant permissions and click Add Permissions in the Actions column.
  4. In the Add Permissions panel, grant permissions to the RAM user.
    1. Select the authorization scope.
      • Alibaba Cloud Account: The authorization takes effect on the current Alibaba Cloud account.
      • Specific Resource Group: The authorization takes effect on a specific resource group.
        Note If you select Specific Resource Group for Authorized Scope, make sure that the required cloud service supports resource groups. For more information, see Services that work with Resource Group.
    2. Specify the principal.
      The principal is the RAM user to which permissions are to be granted. By default, the current RAM user is specified. You can also specify another RAM user.
    3. Select policies.
      Note You can attach a maximum of five policies to a RAM user at a time. If you need to attach more than five policies to a RAM user, perform the operation multiple times.
  5. Click OK.
  6. Click Complete.
Note The preceding policy can be a system policy or a custom policy. For more information, see Policies and sample custom policies. You can create, update, and delete custom policies. For more information, see Create a custom policy.

What to do next

After the RAM user is created by using the Alibaba Cloud account, Enterprise A can allocate the username and password or AccessKey pair of the RAM user to an employee. The employee can use the RAM user to log on to the console or call API operations by performing the following steps:

  • Console
    1. Open the RAM Account Login page in a browser.
    2. On the RAM Account Login page, enter the name of the RAM user, click Next, enter the password, and then click Log On.
    Note The name of the RAM user is in the <$username>@<$AccountAlias> format or the <$username>@<$AccountAlias>.onaliyun.com format. <$AccountAlias> is the alias of the RAM user. If no alias is set, use the ID of the Alibaba Cloud account.
  • API

    Use the AccessKey ID and AccessKey secret of the RAM user in the code to make an API request to access Function Compute.