# GetFederationToken Returns a set of temporary security credentials (consisting of an access key ID, a secret access key, and a security token) for a user. A typical use is in a proxy application that gets temporary security credentials on behalf of distributed applications inside a corporate network. You must call the `GetFederationToken` operation using the long-term security credentials of an IAM user. As a result, this call is appropriate in contexts where those credentials can be safeguarded, usually in a server-based application. For a comparison of `GetFederationToken` with the other API operations that produce temporary credentials, see [Requesting Temporary Security Credentials](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_credentials_temp_request.html) and [Compare AWS STS credentials](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_credentials_sts-comparison.html) in the *IAM User Guide*. Although it is possible to call `GetFederationToken` using the security credentials of an AWS account root user rather than an IAM user that you create for the purpose of a proxy application, we do not recommend it. For more information, see [Safeguard your root user credentials and don't use them for everyday tasks](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/best-practices.html#lock-away-credentials) in the *IAM User Guide*. **Note** You can create a mobile-based or browser-based app that can authenticate users using a web identity provider like Login with Amazon, Facebook, Google, or an OpenID Connect-compatible identity provider. In this case, we recommend that you use [Amazon Cognito](http://aws.amazon.com/cognito/) or `AssumeRoleWithWebIdentity`. For more information, see [Federation Through a Web-based Identity Provider](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_credentials_temp_request.html#api_assumerolewithwebidentity) in the *IAM User Guide*. **Session duration** The temporary credentials are valid for the specified duration, from 900 seconds (15 minutes) up to a maximum of 129,600 seconds (36 hours). The default session duration is 43,200 seconds (12 hours). Temporary credentials obtained by using the root user credentials have a maximum duration of 3,600 seconds (1 hour). **Permissions** You can use the temporary credentials created by `GetFederationToken` in any AWS service with the following exceptions: + You cannot call any IAM operations using the AWS CLI or the AWS API. This limitation does not apply to console sessions. + You cannot call any AWS STS operations except `GetCallerIdentity`. You can use temporary credentials for single sign-on (SSO) to the console. You must pass an inline or managed [session policy](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/access_policies.html#policies_session) to this operation. You can pass a single JSON policy document to use as an inline session policy. You can also specify up to 10 managed policy Amazon Resource Names (ARNs) to use as managed session policies. The plaintext that you use for both inline and managed session policies can't exceed 2,048 characters. Though the session policy parameters are optional, if you do not pass a policy, then the resulting federated user session has no permissions. When you pass session policies, the session permissions are the intersection of the IAM user policies and the session policies that you pass. This gives you a way to further restrict the permissions for a federated user. You cannot use session policies to grant more permissions than those that are defined in the permissions policy of the IAM user. For more information, see [Session Policies](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/access_policies.html#policies_session) in the *IAM User Guide*. For information about using `GetFederationToken` to create temporary security credentials, see [GetFederationToken—Federation Through a Custom Identity Broker](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_credentials_temp_request.html#api_getfederationtoken). You can use the credentials to access a resource that has a resource-based policy. If that policy specifically references the federated user session in the `Principal` element of the policy, the session has the permissions allowed by the policy. These permissions are granted in addition to the permissions granted by the session policies. **Tags** (Optional) You can pass tag key-value pairs to your session. These are called session tags. For more information about session tags, see [Passing Session Tags in AWS STS](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_session-tags.html) in the *IAM User Guide*. **Note** You can create a mobile-based or browser-based app that can authenticate users using a web identity provider like Login with Amazon, Facebook, Google, or an OpenID Connect-compatible identity provider. In this case, we recommend that you use [Amazon Cognito](http://aws.amazon.com/cognito/) or `AssumeRoleWithWebIdentity`. For more information, see [Federation Through a Web-based Identity Provider](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_credentials_temp_request.html#api_assumerolewithwebidentity) in the *IAM User Guide*. An administrator must grant you the permissions necessary to pass session tags. The administrator can also create granular permissions to allow you to pass only specific session tags. For more information, see [Tutorial: Using Tags for Attribute-Based Access Control](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/tutorial_attribute-based-access-control.html) in the *IAM User Guide*. Tag key–value pairs are not case sensitive, but case is preserved. This means that you cannot have separate `Department` and `department` tag keys. Assume that the user that you are federating has the `Department`=`Marketing` tag and you pass the `department`=`engineering` session tag. `Department` and `department` are not saved as separate tags, and the session tag passed in the request takes precedence over the user tag. ## Request Parameters For information about the parameters that are common to all actions, see [Common Parameters](CommonParameters.md). ** DurationSeconds ** The duration, in seconds, that the session should last. Acceptable durations for federation sessions range from 900 seconds (15 minutes) to 129,600 seconds (36 hours), with 43,200 seconds (12 hours) as the default. Sessions obtained using root user credentials are restricted to a maximum of 3,600 seconds (one hour). If the specified duration is longer than one hour, the session obtained by using root user credentials defaults to one hour. Type: Integer Valid Range: Minimum value of 900. Maximum value of 129600. Required: No ** Name ** The name of the federated user. The name is used as an identifier for the temporary security credentials (such as `Bob`). For example, you can reference the federated user name in a resource-based policy, such as in an Amazon S3 bucket policy. The regex used to validate this parameter is a string of characters consisting of upper- and lower-case alphanumeric characters with no spaces. You can also include underscores or any of the following characters: =,.@- Type: String Length Constraints: Minimum length of 2. Maximum length of 32. Pattern: `[\w+=,.@-]*` Required: Yes ** Policy ** An IAM policy in JSON format that you want to use as an inline session policy. You must pass an inline or managed [session policy](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/access_policies.html#policies_session) to this operation. You can pass a single JSON policy document to use as an inline session policy. You can also specify up to 10 managed policy Amazon Resource Names (ARNs) to use as managed session policies. This parameter is optional. However, if you do not pass any session policies, then the resulting federated user session has no permissions. When you pass session policies, the session permissions are the intersection of the IAM user policies and the session policies that you pass. This gives you a way to further restrict the permissions for a federated user. You cannot use session policies to grant more permissions than those that are defined in the permissions policy of the IAM user. For more information, see [Session Policies](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/access_policies.html#policies_session) in the *IAM User Guide*. The resulting credentials can be used to access a resource that has a resource-based policy. If that policy specifically references the federated user session in the `Principal` element of the policy, the session has the permissions allowed by the policy. These permissions are granted in addition to the permissions that are granted by the session policies. The plaintext that you use for both inline and managed session policies can't exceed 2,048 characters. The JSON policy characters can be any ASCII character from the space character to the end of the valid character list (\$1u0020 through \$1u00FF). It can also include the tab (\$1u0009), linefeed (\$1u000A), and carriage return (\$1u000D) characters. An AWS conversion compresses the passed inline session policy, managed policy ARNs, and session tags into a packed binary format that has a separate limit. Your request can fail for this limit even if your plaintext meets the other requirements. The `PackedPolicySize` response element indicates by percentage how close the policies and tags for your request are to the upper size limit. Type: String Length Constraints: Minimum length of 1. Maximum length of 2048. Pattern: `[\u0009\u000A\u000D\u0020-\u00FF]+` Required: No **PolicyArns.member.N** The Amazon Resource Names (ARNs) of the IAM managed policies that you want to use as a managed session policy. The policies must exist in the same account as the IAM user that is requesting federated access. You must pass an inline or managed [session policy](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/access_policies.html#policies_session) to this operation. You can pass a single JSON policy document to use as an inline session policy. You can also specify up to 10 managed policy Amazon Resource Names (ARNs) to use as managed session policies. The plaintext that you use for both inline and managed session policies can't exceed 2,048 characters. You can provide up to 10 managed policy ARNs. For more information about ARNs, see [Amazon Resource Names (ARNs) and AWS Service Namespaces](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/general/latest/gr/aws-arns-and-namespaces.html) in the AWS General Reference. This parameter is optional. However, if you do not pass any session policies, then the resulting federated user session has no permissions. When you pass session policies, the session permissions are the intersection of the IAM user policies and the session policies that you pass. This gives you a way to further restrict the permissions for a federated user. You cannot use session policies to grant more permissions than those that are defined in the permissions policy of the IAM user. For more information, see [Session Policies](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/access_policies.html#policies_session) in the *IAM User Guide*. The resulting credentials can be used to access a resource that has a resource-based policy. If that policy specifically references the federated user session in the `Principal` element of the policy, the session has the permissions allowed by the policy. These permissions are granted in addition to the permissions that are granted by the session policies. An AWS conversion compresses the passed inline session policy, managed policy ARNs, and session tags into a packed binary format that has a separate limit. Your request can fail for this limit even if your plaintext meets the other requirements. The `PackedPolicySize` response element indicates by percentage how close the policies and tags for your request are to the upper size limit. Type: Array of [PolicyDescriptorType](API_PolicyDescriptorType.md) objects Required: No **Tags.member.N** A list of session tags. Each session tag consists of a key name and an associated value. For more information about session tags, see [Passing Session Tags in AWS STS](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_session-tags.html) in the *IAM User Guide*. This parameter is optional. You can pass up to 50 session tags. The plaintext session tag keys can’t exceed 128 characters and the values can’t exceed 256 characters. For these and additional limits, see [IAM and AWS STS Character Limits](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/reference_iam-limits.html#reference_iam-limits-entity-length) in the *IAM User Guide*. An AWS conversion compresses the passed inline session policy, managed policy ARNs, and session tags into a packed binary format that has a separate limit. Your request can fail for this limit even if your plaintext meets the other requirements. The `PackedPolicySize` response element indicates by percentage how close the policies and tags for your request are to the upper size limit. You can pass a session tag with the same key as a tag that is already attached to the user you are federating. When you do, session tags override a user tag with the same key. Tag key–value pairs are not case sensitive, but case is preserved. This means that you cannot have separate `Department` and `department` tag keys. Assume that the role has the `Department`=`Marketing` tag and you pass the `department`=`engineering` session tag. `Department` and `department` are not saved as separate tags, and the session tag passed in the request takes precedence over the role tag. Type: Array of [Tag](API_Tag.md) objects Array Members: Maximum number of 50 items. Required: No ## Response Elements The following elements are returned by the service. ** Credentials ** The temporary security credentials, which include an access key ID, a secret access key, and a security (or session) token. The size of the security token that AWS STS API operations return is not fixed. We strongly recommend that you make no assumptions about the maximum size. Type: [Credentials](API_Credentials.md) object ** FederatedUser ** Identifiers for the federated user associated with the credentials (such as `arn:aws:sts::123456789012:federated-user/Bob` or `123456789012:Bob`). You can use the federated user's ARN in your resource-based policies, such as an Amazon S3 bucket policy. Type: [FederatedUser](API_FederatedUser.md) object ** PackedPolicySize ** A percentage value that indicates the packed size of the session policies and session tags combined passed in the request. The request fails if the packed size is greater than 100 percent, which means the policies and tags exceeded the allowed space. Type: Integer Valid Range: Minimum value of 0. ## Errors For information about the errors that are common to all actions, see [Common Error Types](CommonErrors.md). ** MalformedPolicyDocument ** The request was rejected because the policy document was malformed. The error message describes the specific error. HTTP Status Code: 400 ** PackedPolicyTooLarge ** The request was rejected because the total packed size of the session policies and session tags combined was too large. An AWS conversion compresses the session policy document, session policy ARNs, and session tags into a packed binary format that has a separate limit. The error message indicates by percentage how close the policies and tags are to the upper size limit. For more information, see [Passing Session Tags in AWS STS](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_session-tags.html) in the *IAM User Guide*. You could receive this error even though you meet other defined session policy and session tag limits. For more information, see [IAM and AWS STS Entity Character Limits](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/reference_iam-quotas.html#reference_iam-limits-entity-length) in the *IAM User Guide*. HTTP Status Code: 400 ** RegionDisabled ** AWS STS is not activated in the requested region for the account that is being asked to generate credentials. The account administrator must use the IAM console to activate AWS STS in that region. For more information, see [Activating and Deactivating AWS STS in an AWS Region](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/IAM/latest/UserGuide/id_credentials_temp_enable-regions.html#sts-regions-activate-deactivate) in the *IAM User Guide*. HTTP Status Code: 403 ## Examples ### Example This example illustrates one usage of GetFederationToken. #### Sample Request ``` https://sts.amazonaws.com/ ?Version=2011-06-15 &Action=GetFederationToken &Name=Bob &PolicyArns.member.1.arn=arn:aws:iam::123456789012:policy/federateduserdemopolicy1 &PolicyArns.member.2.arn=arn:aws:iam::123456789012:policy/federateduserdemopolicy2 &Policy=URL-encoded-JSON-IAM-POLICY &DurationSeconds=3600 &Tags.member.1.Key=Dept&Tags.member.1.Value=Accounting &Tags.member.2.Key=Cost-Center&Tags.member.2.Value=12345 &AUTHPARAMS ``` #### Sample Response ``` AQoDYXdzEPT//////////wEXAMPLEtc764bNrC9SAPBSM22wDOk4x4HIZ8j4FZTwdQW LWsKWHGBuFqwAeMicRXmxfpSPfIeoIYRqTflfKD8YUuwthAx7mSEI/qkPpKPi/kMcGd QrmGdeehM4IC1NtBmUpp2wUE8phUZampKsburEDy0KPkyQDYwT7WZ0wq5VSXDvp75YU 9HFvlRd8Tx6q6fE8YQcHNVXAkiY9q6d+xo0rKwT38xVqr7ZD0u0iPPkUL64lIZbqBAz +scqKmlzm8FDrypNC9Yjc8fPOLn9FX9KSYvKTr4rvx3iSIlTJabIQwj2ICCR/oLxBA== wJalrXUtnFEMI/K7MDENG/bPxRfiCYzEXAMPLEKEY 2011-07-15T23:28:33.359Z ASIAIOSFODNN7EXAMPLE arn:aws:sts::123456789012:federated-user/Bob 123456789012:Bob 6 c6104cbe-af31-11e0-8154-cbc7ccf896c7 ``` ## See Also For more information about using this API in one of the language-specific AWS SDKs, see the following: + [AWS Command Line Interface V2](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/cli2/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for .NET V4](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/DotNetSDKV4/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for C\$1\$1](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/SdkForCpp/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for Go v2](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/SdkForGoV2/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for Java V2](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/SdkForJavaV2/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for JavaScript V3](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/SdkForJavaScriptV3/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for Kotlin](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/SdkForKotlin/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for PHP V3](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/SdkForPHPV3/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for Python](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/boto3/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken) + [AWS SDK for Ruby V3](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/goto/SdkForRubyV3/sts-2011-06-15/GetFederationToken)