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العربيةEscalate Identity Center permission set
Can rewrite an Identity Center permission set to grant its provisioned role full admin.
Grants escalation only in combination. All of these are needed together:
sso:PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSetsso:ProvisionPermissionSetsso:PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSet can rewrite an Identity Center permission set to grant its provisioned role full admin, but only when it is held together with sso:ProvisionPermissionSet. Held together they reach administrator access.
Why it is dangerous
A principal can call sso:PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSet to attach an inline *:* policy to the IAM Identity Center permission set provisioned as the role, then sso:ProvisionPermissionSet to push it. AWS rewrites the AWSReservedSSO_* role's policy in EVERY account that permission set is assigned to, so a single API call turns a scoped federated role into an administrator org-wide, and the grant persists until the permission set is repaired.
In MITRE ATT&CK terms this maps to T1098.003, Account Manipulation: Additional Cloud Roles, under the privilege escalation tactic. AWS records it in CloudTrail as PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSet, ProvisionPermissionSet, AttachManagedPolicyToPermissionSet. The call shows up in CloudTrail but blends into normal administration, so it needs a rule to stand out. It also gives an attacker a way to keep access after the first foothold is closed, so it is worth watching even when it looks like routine administration.
Detection
PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSetProvisionPermissionSetAttachManagedPolicyToPermissionSetPrerequisites
The permission set is provisioned into this account (ASSIGNED_TO_ROLE), the caller is in the Org management or a delegated-admin account, and there is a way to assume the role afterwards.
Tactic
Privilege Escalation
A control that would remove it: Remove sso:PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSet / ProvisionPermissionSet from the principal; restrict Identity Center administration to a break-glass role.
Whether to apply it depends on how the permission is used in your environment, so it is a business decision rather than an automatic fix. The same permission can be load-bearing in one account and pure risk in another.
Pathbreak confirms whether this path resolves in your account, ranks it against the others by how much it opens up, and uses your threat model and business context to show which paths are worth cutting.
Questions
What does sso:PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSet allow?
Can rewrite an Identity Center permission set to grant its provisioned role full admin.
What else is needed for sso:PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSet to be dangerous?
It becomes an escalation only when held together with sso:ProvisionPermissionSet. On its own it is not enough, which is what makes the combination easy to miss.
How is escalate Identity Center permission set detected?
Watch for PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSet, ProvisionPermissionSet, AttachManagedPolicyToPermissionSet in CloudTrail. The call shows up in CloudTrail but blends into normal administration, so it needs a rule to stand out.
How do you break this path?
A control that would remove it is: Remove sso:PutInlinePolicyToPermissionSet / ProvisionPermissionSet from the principal; restrict Identity Center administration to a break-glass role. Whether to apply it depends on how the permission is used in your account, so it is a business decision rather than an automatic fix.
Which MITRE ATT&CK technique is this?
T1098.003, Account Manipulation: Additional Cloud Roles, under the privilege escalation tactic.
Related paths
References
Find this in your own account
We run a read-only scan of one AWS account and show you which of these paths exist, ranked by blast radius, with the change that breaks each one. First validated paths within the hour.