7.6 Introduction to Requester Pays in AWS S3

What is Requester Pays in AWS S3?

Requester Pays is a feature in Amazon S3 that allows the bucket owner to shift the cost of data transfer and request charges to the user accessing the data. This is particularly useful in scenarios where buckets contain large datasets that are accessed by multiple users, and the owner doesn’t wish to bear the cost of data transfer.

How Does Requester Pays Work?

When Requester Pays is enabled on an S3 bucket, any data requests or data transfers are charged to the requester’s AWS account instead of the bucket owner’s account. This includes operations like GET, PUT, and LIST requests.

Enabling Requester Pays on S3 via AWS Management Console

1. Log in to AWS Management Console:
   • Navigate to the Amazon S3 dashboard.
2. Select the Bucket:
   • Choose the bucket you want to enable Requester Pays on.
3. Access Bucket Properties:
   • In the bucket settings, find and click on the “Properties” tab.
4. Enable Requester Pays:
   • Locate the “Requester Pays” setting.
   • 
   • Check the box to enable Requester Pays.
   • Save the changes.

Enabling Requester Pays on S3 via AWS CLI

1. Install and Configure AWS CLI:
   • Ensure AWS CLI is installed and configured with the necessary permissions.
2. Enable Requester Pays:
   • Use the following command to enable Requester Pays on a specific bucket:

aws s3api put-bucket-request-payment --bucket YOUR_BUCKET_NAME --request-payment-configuration Payer=Requester

Verify Configuration:

• To verify if Requester Pays is enabled, use the get-bucket-request-payment command:

aws s3api get-bucket-request-payment --bucket YOUR_BUCKET_NAME

Accessing a Requester Pays Bucket

Via AWS Management Console:

• When accessing data in a Requester Pays bucket through the Management Console, AWS automatically charges the request costs to your account. No special action is needed other than acknowledging that charges apply.

Via AWS CLI:

• When accessing data through the CLI, you must specify that you agree to pay for the requests. Use the --request-payer parameter:

aws s3 cp s3://YOUR_BUCKET_NAME/YOUR_OBJECT_KEY YOUR_LOCAL_PATH --request-payer

Considerations for Using Requester Pays

• Billing Awareness: Users accessing the data should be aware that they will incur charges.
• Monitoring Usage: It’s important to monitor access patterns to understand costs.
• Access Permissions: Proper IAM permissions are required to enable Requester Pays.
• Testing (Optional): If you want to test the functionality, you can try accessing the bucket or its objects from another AWS account. If “Requester Pays” is enabled, the accessing account will incur the charges for the requests.
• Remember that when “Requester Pays” is enabled, the requester (not the bucket owner) will bear the cost of the data transfer and request charges associated with accessing the data in the S3 bucket. This setting is often used when the bucket owner wants to share large amounts of data without incurring data transfer costs for access from outside their AWS account.

Reference the Offical document :

Configuring Requester Pays on a bucket – Amazon Simple Storage Service

Conclusion

The Requester Pays feature in AWS S3 is a valuable tool for managing data transfer costs, especially for large datasets shared across multiple users. Whether through the AWS Management Console or the CLI, enabling and using this feature is straightforward. It offers a fair approach to cost management, ensuring that those who use the data bear the cost of its transfer.