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Description

This policy checks whether an AWS EC2 Auto Scaling Group is configured to use no longer supported Launch Configurations. AWS does not release new EC2 features to Launch Configurations and strongly recommends migrating to Launch Templates.

Launch Templates are a newer mechanism for EC2 instance provisioning, providing support for all current and future EC2 features, as well as integrated version control and heterogeneous instance type support.

Rationale​

AWS is phasing out support for Launch Configurations. They no longer receive updates for new EC2 instance types or platform enhancements. Using Launch Templates provides several key benefits:

  • Launch Templates unlock new EC2 capabilities, including: Systems Manager parameters, the current generation of EBS Provisioned IOPS volumes (io2), EBS volume tagging, T2 Unlimited instances, Capacity Reservations, Capacity Blocks, Dedicated Hosts, etc.
  • Version management, which simplifies testing of new configurations and rollbacks to previous versions.
  • Launch Templates allow you to provision both On-Demand and Spot Instances within the same Auto Scaling group and define multiple instance types.

Audit​

This policy flags an AWS EC2 Auto Scaling Group as INCOMPLIANT if the Launch Configuration Name field is not empty, indicating that the ASG uses a launch configuration instead of a launch template.