Introduction
This is a review of the AWS Certified AI Practitioner Certification and Exam from Amazon Web Services(AWS).
I wanted to expand my familiarity with Amazon AI services by going through the coursework and acquiring this new AWS AI certification. I was fortunate to be able to pass this exam after 2 weeks of studying and was able to get the “Early Adopter” badge as well.
I paid around $99 for this certification as well as an additional $19 by taking a Udemy course here: https://www.udemy.com/course/aws-ai-practitioner-certified/
Course Syllabus and Preparation
I went through the course syllabus and exam guide directly from the AWS site here:
https://aws.amazon.com/certification/certified-ai-practitioner/
The exam requires you to have a high-level knowledge and hands-on application on several AWS services, namely Amazon Bedrock, Amazon Sagemaker and other tools such as Textract, Transcribe and Polly but there are more that I’d rather not list here – it’s a lot. Highly recommend looking at the course syllabus and exam guide for a complete list.
I tried learning from the AWS skillbuilder platform but the training was too “dry” and heavy with theory. Although it’s free, I don’t recommend this as the optimal way to prepare.
If you want to sufficiently prepare, with the highest chance of passing, I’d recommend taking Stephane Maarek’s course here:
https://www.udemy.com/course/aws-ai-practitioner-certified/
It’s a 10 hour training that has ALOT of hands-on learning and labs. You’ll be required to create an AWS account, but don’t worry, I spent roughly .27 cents doing the labs. You will need to spend some $$$ to do the labs, but to be honest it is worth it if you are not familiar with AWS web services, this will teach you the fundamentals on how to do cost-optimization on your AWS account, which is what you will be doing anyways at your job.
I did alot of hands-on training with some standard AWS services like S3, EC2 and Lambda but alot of the focus is on Amazon Bedrock and Sagemaker – plus the other AI services on AWS.
This course really expanded my knowledge and I was able to get a good grasp of Amazon Bedrock and Sagemaker.
The Exam
The exam is multiple choice with mostly knowledge checks on terms as well as scenario based questions which will force you to decide on the best approach for certain AI services that will accomplish business tasks.
The exam was 90 minutes and required you to schedule a date with a proctor using Pearson VUE. These exams are quite standard, you will be watched by a proctor through the webcam throughout the duration of the exam.
Alot of what I learned in the Udemy course including the terms discussed helped me out on majority of the questions. And I was able to make some key decisions on the scenarios presented. If you understand the services well, and do the hands-on labs, you will easily get through the exam.
I completed my exam in less than 30 minutes.
This exam was actually quite easy in terms of difficulty.
Conclusion
From a cybersecurity perspective, these AI tools can definitely help you develop unique projects as well as streamline certain tasks with AI – there is a section on using AI agents, and if you are doing offensive security work, you can definitely see the applications and usefulness of this. If you are just starting out in your career or if you are already working in another sector but want to augment your current skills with AI, I’d recommend getting this certification and the training. AI has alot of practical applications to all areas of Cybersecurity and InfoSec, so if you are wanting to make your first steps you should definitely try this.
If you are interested in some of the other AI certs/exams I’ve taken, check out my review of the AI/ML Pentester Certification and Exam from The SecOps group here:
https://hiddendoorsecurity.com/2024/11/10/c-ai-mlpen-certification-and-exam-review/
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