diff --git a/.env.example b/.env.example
index c0ee816e..aa7c82a1 100644
--- a/.env.example
+++ b/.env.example
@@ -2,4 +2,10 @@ DATABASE_HOST=localhost
 DATABASE_PORT=5432
 DATABASE_NAME=securing-safe-food
 DATABASE_USERNAME=postgres
-DATABASE_PASSWORD=PLACEHOLDER_PASSWORD
\ No newline at end of file
+DATABASE_PASSWORD=PLACEHOLDER_PASSWORD
+
+AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID = PLACEHOLDER_AWS_ACCESS_KEY
+AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY = PLACEHOLDER_AWS_SECRET_KEY
+AWS_REGION = PLACEHOLDER_AWS_REGION
+
+AWS_BUCKET_NAME = 'confirm-delivery-photos'
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/apps/backend/README.md b/apps/backend/README.md
index 8e4e513c..0e02cf64 100644
--- a/apps/backend/README.md
+++ b/apps/backend/README.md
@@ -25,4 +25,21 @@ You can check that your database connection details are correct by running `nx s
 "LOG 🚀 Application is running on: http://localhost:3000/api"
 ```
 
-Finally, run `yarn run typeorm:migrate` to load all the tables into your database. If everything is set up correctly, you should see "Migration ... has been  executed successfully." in the terminal.
\ No newline at end of file
+Finally, run `yarn run typeorm:migrate` to load all the tables into your database. If everything is set up correctly, you should see "Migration ... has been  executed successfully." in the terminal.
+
+# AWS Setup
+
+We have a few environment variables that we utilize to access several AWS services throughout the application. Below is a list of each of them and how to access each after logging in to AWS
+
+1. `AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID` and `AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY`:
+   - Click on your username in the top right corner, and navigate to Security Credentials
+   - Scroll down to access keys, and create a new key
+   - Select CLI as the purpose for the key, and add an optional description
+   - Replace both the public and secret keys in the .env file to those values. Note that the secret key will not be accessible after you leave this page
+   - Click done
+
+2. `AWS_REGION`:
+This can be found next to your profile name when you login to the main page. Some accounts may be different, but we generally use us-east-1 or us-east-2
+
+3. `AWS_BUCKET_NAME`:
+This one is already given to you. As of right now, we only use one bucket, confirm-delivery-photos to store photos in a public S3 Bucket. This may be subject to change as we use S3 more in the project.
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/apps/backend/src/auth/auth.service.ts b/apps/backend/src/auth/auth.service.ts
index e88d532e..173fa8ea 100644
--- a/apps/backend/src/auth/auth.service.ts
+++ b/apps/backend/src/auth/auth.service.ts
@@ -28,12 +28,10 @@ export class AuthService {
     this.providerClient = new CognitoIdentityProviderClient({
       region: CognitoAuthConfig.region,
       credentials: {
-        accessKeyId: process.env.NX_AWS_ACCESS_KEY,
-        secretAccessKey: process.env.NX_AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY,
+        accessKeyId: process.env.AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID,
+        secretAccessKey: process.env.AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY,
       },
     });
-
-    this.clientSecret = process.env.COGNITO_CLIENT_SECRET;
   }
 
   // Computes secret hash to authenticate this backend to Cognito