Overview
This is a repackaged software product wherein additional charges apply for hardening, security configuration, and support.
WHAT IS APACHE CASSANDRA
Apache Cassandra is an open-source, distributed NoSQL wide-column database built for high availability and linear scalability with no single point of failure. It runs as a JVM service (Eclipse Temurin 17) and is queried with CQL (Cassandra Query Language) over a native binary protocol on port 9042. Cassandra offers tunable consistency, a masterless peer-to-peer architecture, partitioned wide-column data model with clustering keys, secondary indexes, materialized views, lightweight transactions (Paxos), TTL on data, and time-to-live driven compaction. Data is durably persisted to local disk as SSTables with a commit log, hints, and saved caches. CQL drivers exist for Java, Python, Node.js, Go, C#, and many more. This image ships a single-node deployment, ready to scale into a cluster. Apache-2.0 license - the vendor-neutral upstream distribution, distinct from any commercial Cassandra product.
WHAT THIS AMI ADDS
Security hardening:
- Default cassandra/cassandra superuser password rotated to a strong random value at first boot
- PasswordAuthenticator and CassandraAuthorizer enabled - no anonymous access
- Native TLS (client encryption) required on port 9042; self-signed certificate generated per instance at first boot
- CQL (9042) and JMX (7199) bind to 127.0.0.1 only - not exposed to the network by default
- UFW firewall - only SSH (22) open; 9042 blocked externally
- fail2ban, AppArmor
- CVE scan - every image is scanned for vulnerabilities before release
OS hardening (CIS Level 1):
- CIS Ubuntu 24.04 LTS Level 1 benchmark applied via ansible-lockdown
- auditd, SSH hardening, Kernel hardening, IMDSv2 enforced
Compliance artifacts:
- SBOM - CycloneDX 1.6 at /etc/lynxroute/sbom.json
- CIS Conformance Report at /etc/lynxroute/cis-report.html
- CIS Tailored Profile at /usr/share/doc/lynxroute/CIS_TAILORED_PROFILE.md
Highlights
- Cassandra security baked in: default superuser password rotated at first boot, password auth + authorization enabled, native TLS required on 9042, CQL and JMX bound to localhost.
- CIS Level 1 hardened Ubuntu 24.04 LTS: auditd, fail2ban, AppArmor, SSH key-only, IMDSv2 enforced. CVE-scanned before every release. SBOM (CycloneDX) and CIS Conformance Report included.
- Distributed NoSQL wide-column database: CQL, tunable consistency, masterless scale-out, single-node ready to cluster. Apache-2.0 license - fully auditable, no vendor lock-in.
Details
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Pricing
Free trial
Dimension | Cost/hour |
|---|---|
t3.medium Recommended | $0.02 |
t3.large | $0.03 |
t3.small | $0.02 |
m6i.xlarge | $0.05 |
m6i.large | $0.03 |
Vendor refund policy
We do not offer refunds for this product. AWS infrastructure charges (EC2, EBS, data transfer) are billed separately by AWS and are not refundable by us.
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Delivery details
64-bit (x86) Amazon Machine Image (AMI)
Amazon Machine Image (AMI)
An AMI is a virtual image that provides the information required to launch an instance. Amazon EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) instances are virtual servers on which you can run your applications and workloads, offering varying combinations of CPU, memory, storage, and networking resources. You can launch as many instances from as many different AMIs as you need.
Version release notes
Apache Cassandra 5.0.8 - Initial release (June 2026)
- Apache Cassandra 5.0.8 on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS (Eclipse Temurin 17)
- CIS Level 1 hardening applied (ansible-lockdown/UBUNTU24-CIS)
- CVE-scanned before every release
- Default cassandra superuser password rotated to a strong random value at first boot
- PasswordAuthenticator + CassandraAuthorizer enabled
- Native TLS (client encryption) required on 9042; self-signed certificate per instance
- CQL (9042) and JMX (7199) bound to localhost only
- UFW firewall pre-configured (SSH 22 only)
- fail2ban, auditd, AppArmor pre-configured
- SBOM (CycloneDX 1.6) at /etc/lynxroute/sbom.json
- CIS Conformance Report (OpenSCAP) at /etc/lynxroute/cis-report.html
- IMDSv2 enforced
Additional details
Usage instructions
- Launch instance (t3.medium recommended; t3.small minimum)
- SSH: ssh -i key.pem ubuntu@<PUBLIC_IP>
- Read credentials: sudo cat /root/cassandra-credentials.txt
- Connect with cqlsh over TLS using the generated superuser password: cqlsh --ssl -u cassandra -p '<password>' (a system /etc/cassandra/cqlshrc is preconfigured for TLS, so cqlsh --ssl works as-is)
- Run CQL, e.g.: CREATE KEYSPACE demo WITH replication = {'class':'SimpleStrategy','replication_factor':1};
- Cluster admin: nodetool status
The default cassandra superuser password is rotated to a strong random value at first boot and written to /root/cassandra-credentials.txt. Native TLS (client encryption) is required on port 9042; a self-signed certificate is generated per instance.
CQL (9042) and JMX (7199) bind to 127.0.0.1 only. To allow remote clients, set rpc_address/broadcast_rpc_address in /opt/cassandra/conf/cassandra.yaml, open TCP 9042 in the Security Group to your client CIDR, and restart: sudo systemctl restart cassandra.
For production, replace the self-signed keystore with your own CA-signed certificate (update client_encryption_options in cassandra.yaml) and restart the service.
Resources
Vendor resources
Support
Vendor support
Lynxroute is not affiliated with the Apache Software Foundation - this AMI packages the Apache-2.0 open-source Apache Cassandra distribution as a self-hosted EC2 service (distinct from Amazon Keyspaces, which is a managed offering, and from any commercial Cassandra distribution). "Apache Cassandra" is a trademark of the Apache Software Foundation.
Visit us online: https://lynxroute.com/#contact
For Apache Cassandra documentation:
AWS infrastructure support
AWS Support is a one-on-one, fast-response support channel that is staffed 24x7x365 with experienced and technical support engineers. The service helps customers of all sizes and technical abilities to successfully utilize the products and features provided by Amazon Web Services.
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