AWS details how to connect Claude Desktop to secure Web Search via Amazon Bedrock AgentCore

Claude Desktop on Amazon Bedrock provides AI assistance, but its responses are limited to the model’s training knowledge cutoff unless augmented with external data. AWS describes a method to connect Claude Desktop to Web Search using Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Gateway, a capability of Amazon Bedrock AgentCore designed to build, connect, and optimize agents at scale.

Web Search is presented as a fully managed, Model Context Protocol (MCP)-compatible web search capability backed by an Amazon web index spanning tens of billions of documents. All query traffic remains within AWS infrastructure, eliminating the need for external API keys and preventing queries from leaving the customer’s AWS boundary.

The integration uses JSON Web Token (JWT)-based inbound authentication, federated through AWS IAM Identity Center and Amazon Cognito. AWS IAM Identity Center provides single sign-on (SSO) access to AWS accounts via SAML, while Amazon Cognito issues JWTs used by the AgentCore Gateway to validate each request. The authentication chain remains entirely within AWS.

The guide outlines prerequisites including an AWS account with IAM and AgentCore permissions, AWS IAM Identity Center configured for SSO, Claude Desktop set up with Amazon Bedrock, AWS CLI v2, Python 3.10+, and the latest Boto3 SDK. The described Web Search capability is available in the US East (N. Virginia), Europe (Ireland), and Asia Pacific (Tokyo) AWS Regions.