Case studies/Center Parcs - AWS PrivateLink

Center Parcs - AWS PrivateLink

Nasstar designed and configured an AWS PrivateLink solution, which is a way of securely connecting AWS resources in two organisations’ AWS environments.

CLIENT

Center Parcs

INDUSTRY

Leisure & hospitality

SERVICE

Cloud

PARTNER

aws

The client

CenterParcsUKandIrelandoffersshortbreaksforfamiliesatsixforestlocations.

The company has been operating for over 30 years and currently has an online booking system for guests at all locations.

This case study can also be found over at Colibri Digital, part of The Nasstar Group.

The challenges

NasstarhasbeensupportingCenterParcswiththeirAWS-deployedEnterpriseServicesLayer(ESL)solutionforanumberofyears.

ESL supports online web sales, administration, and accommodation bookings, while also enabling Center Parcs to seamlessly connect to third parties.  

Thus far, one of these third parties – Adobe – has been using over-the-internet connections from resources within their own AWS environments to communicate with Center Parcs’ ESL.  

Center Parcs approached Nasstar and requested that these connections be established over a private network so that they no longer traverse the internet, thus improving security and simplifying network connectivity.  

Our goal

HelpCenterParcsadoptAWSPrivateLinkforsecure&privateconnectivity.

The outcome

Find out how our expertise could transform your organisation.

Security

AWS PrivateLink enables a secure and private network connection between specific resources deployed across the Center Parcs ESL and Adobe AWS accounts. The network traffic traverses AWS’s own private network infrastructure rather than the public internet, reducing its exposure to threats such as distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks. 

Performance

Using AWS PrivateLink for connectivity, instead of the internet, means that the private, highly scalable AWS-managed connection between Adobe and Center Parcs’ ESL is more performant and reliable. 

Reduced complexity

The AWS PrivateLink solution has enabled Adobe connectivity into Center Parcs’ ESL without the need for managing complex network connectivity infrastructure, such as route tables and firewall rules. 

Observability

CloudWatch, an AWS native tool for monitoring and observing customer solutions, provided metrics against each of the deployed resources. This enabled a high degree of end-to-end infrastructure observability, real-time alerting and feedback.

Our solution

Nasstar worked closely with Center Parcs and Adobe to ensure a smooth move to the new AWS PrivateLink service, setting up all needed resources and establishing seamless connectivity.

01

The work began as Nasstar deployed a REST API via a temporary Amazon API Gateway. This served as a secure bridge for transferring user data to Center Parcs' Auth0 account. Nasstar also developed and deployed a separate long-term solution to handle ongoing user events from Auth0.

02

Integration with Auth0's event stream was accomplished by connecting to a custom Amazon EventBridge event bus that captures specific activities. When one of these events meets the criteria, it is routed to a serverless Lambda function and subsequently stored in an Amazon S3 bucket. Center Parcs further processes these events before storing each in its data warehouse.

03

Nasstar used version-controlled Infrastructure as Code (IaC) and Terraform to provision the required cloud-native AWS services, supporting the new solution to ensure accuracy and repeatability during deployments.

04

Both the initial migration and ongoing event handling were successful, delivering tangible improvements to Center Parcs’ data integrity, operational efficiency, and scalability.

Center Parcs AWS PrivateLink | Nasstar | Nasstar