This guide assumes that you already signed up for Amazon Glacier. If you haven't, please go to the Amazon AWS Getting Started Guide) and click the "Create an AWS Account" button.

To connect to Amazon Glacier, you need a credentials key pair (Access Key and Secret Key). The first time you launch Freeze, you will be asked for your key pair to create a new account. You can either create a root key pair or an IAM user with restricted permissions (recommended).

It's highly recommended that you create an IAM user to access Glacier instead of using a root key pair.

Create an IAM user

To create a key pair restricted to Amazon Glacier:

Create IAM user screenshot step 1

Create IAM user screenshot step 2

Create IAM user screenshot last step

'Access key best practices & alternatives' screen

'Access key best practices & alternatives' screen

Add an account in Freeze

Now that you have your credentials key pair, launch Freeze and enter Access Key and Secret Key within the "Add new account" window. You may also choose an account name to help you differentiate it from other accounts.

Restrict regions

If you are using a key pair restricted to certain regions or if you simply want to prevent yourself from uploading data to the wrong regions, you can disable regions for a specific account. To do so, select "Regions" -> "Select regions..." within the account window to open the regions selector. Deactivate any regions you don't plan to use.

Choose regions geographically near you for the fastest possible transfer rates. Also keep in mind that regions have different prices. For example, Frankfurt is more expensive than Ireland.

Not all regions are enabled by default in your AWS account. You might need to visit the AWS Regions page and enable regions before they can be accessed.

Some regions like "GovCloud (US)" are disabled by default because you need a special AWS account to be able to connect to those regions.

Next: Retrieve inventory of vaults