Use GetPasswordData with an AWS SDK or CLI

The following code examples show how to use GetPasswordData.

CLI

AWS CLI

To get the encrypted password

This example gets the encrypted password.

Command:

aws ec2 get-password-data --instance-id i-1234567890abcdef0

Output:

{
    "InstanceId": "i-1234567890abcdef0",
    "Timestamp": "2013-08-07T22:18:38.000Z",
    "PasswordData": "gSlJFq+VpcZXqy+iktxMF6NyxQ4qCrT4+gaOuNOenX1MmgXPTj7XEXAMPLE
UQ+YeFfb+L1U4C4AKv652Ux1iRB3CPTYP7WmU3TUnhsuBd+p6LVk7T2lKUml6OXbk6WPW1VYYm/TRPB1
e1DQ7PY4an/DgZT4mwcpRFigzhniQgDDeO1InvSDcwoUTwNs0Y1S8ouri2W4n5GNlriM3Q0AnNVelVz/
53TkDtxbNoU606M1gK9zUWSxqEgwvbV2j8c5rP0WCuaMWSFl4ziDu4bd7q+4RSyi8NUsVWnKZ4aEZffu
DPGzKrF5yLlf3etP2L4ZR6CvG7K1hx7VKOQVN32Dajw=="
}

To get the decrypted password

This example gets the decrypted password.

Command:

aws ec2 get-password-data --instance-id  i-1234567890abcdef0 --priv-launch-key C:\Keys\MyKeyPair.pem

Output:

{
    "InstanceId": "i-1234567890abcdef0",
    "Timestamp": "2013-08-30T23:18:05.000Z",
    "PasswordData": "&ViJ652e*u"
}

• For API details, see GetPasswordData in AWS CLI Command Reference.

Java

SDK for Java 2.x

Note

There's more on GitHub. Find the complete example and learn how to set up and run in the AWS Code Examples Repository.

import software.amazon.awssdk.core.exception.SdkClientException;
import software.amazon.awssdk.core.exception.SdkServiceException;
import software.amazon.awssdk.regions.Region;
import software.amazon.awssdk.services.ec2.Ec2Client;
import software.amazon.awssdk.services.ec2.model.Ec2Exception;
import software.amazon.awssdk.services.ec2.model.GetPasswordDataRequest;
import software.amazon.awssdk.services.ec2.model.GetPasswordDataResponse;
import software.amazon.awssdk.services.secretsmanager.model.ResourceNotFoundException;

/**
 * Before running this Java V2 code example, set up your development
 * environment, including your credentials.
 *
 * For more information, see the following documentation topic:
 *
 * https://docs.aws.amazon.com/sdk-for-java/latest/developer-guide/get-started.html
 */
public class GetPasswordData {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        final String usage = """

                Usage:
                   <instanceId> 

                Where:
                   instanceId - An instance id from which the password is obtained.\s
             """;

        if (args.length != 1) {
            System.out.println(usage);
            return;
        }

        Region region = Region.US_EAST_1;
        Ec2Client ec2 = Ec2Client.builder()
            .region(region)
            .build();

        String instanceId = args[0];
        getPasswordData(ec2,instanceId);
    }

    /**
     * Retrieves and prints the encrypted administrator password data for a specified EC2 instance.
     *
     * <p>The password data is encrypted using the key pair that was specified when the instance was launched.
     * To decrypt the password data, you can use the private key of the key pair.</p>
     *
     * @param ec2       The {@link Ec2Client} to use for making the request.
     * @param instanceId The ID of the instance for which to get the encrypted password data.
     */
     public static void getPasswordData(Ec2Client ec2,String instanceId) {
        GetPasswordDataRequest getPasswordDataRequest = GetPasswordDataRequest.builder()
            .instanceId(instanceId)
            .build();

        try {
            GetPasswordDataResponse getPasswordDataResponse = ec2.getPasswordData(getPasswordDataRequest);
            String encryptedPasswordData = getPasswordDataResponse.passwordData();
            System.out.println("Encrypted Password Data: " + encryptedPasswordData);

        } catch (Ec2Exception e) {
        String errorCode  = e.awsErrorDetails().errorCode();
        if (errorCode.matches("InvalidInstanceID.NotFound")) {
            System.err.println("Instance ID not found, unable to retrieve password data.");
        } else {
            System.err.println("There was a problem retrieving password data. Details:");
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }
    }
 }

• For API details, see GetPasswordData in AWS SDK for Java 2.x API Reference.

PowerShell

Tools for PowerShell

Example 1: This example decrypts the password that Amazon EC2 assigned to the Administrator account for the specified Windows instance. As a pem file was specified, the setting of the -Decrypt switch is automatically assumed.

Get-EC2PasswordData -InstanceId i-12345678 -PemFile C:\path\my-key-pair.pem

Output:

mYZ(PA9?C)Q

Example 2: (Windows PowerShell only) Inspects the instance to determine the name of the keypair used to launch the instance and then attempts to find the corresponding keypair data in the configuration store of the AWS Toolkit for Visual Studio. If the keypair data is found the password is decrypted.

Get-EC2PasswordData -InstanceId i-12345678 -Decrypt

Output:

mYZ(PA9?C)Q

Example 3: Returns the encrypted password data for the instance.

Get-EC2PasswordData -InstanceId i-12345678

Output:

iVz3BAK/WAXV.....dqt8WeMA==

• For API details, see GetPasswordData in AWS Tools for PowerShell Cmdlet Reference.

For a complete list of AWS SDK developer guides and code examples, see Create Amazon EC2 resources using an AWS SDK. This topic also includes information about getting started and details about previous SDK versions.