Hierarchical HSM Sessions for Secure Guest Key Binding
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Current methods for establishing identity-based hierarchical sessions on hardware security modules (HSMs) for binding secure keys to guest systems face challenges in synchronizing associations with specific sessions, leading to potential misuse and security breaches.
Innovation Solution
A method and system for establishing identity-based, end-to-end encrypted communication channels between guest systems and HSMs, ensuring that child sessions do not exceed the security level of their parent sessions, using challenge-response protocols and hierarchical session management to maintain compliance and securely bind HSM-generated keys to guest systems.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If traditional session management methods are used on HSMs, then ease of operation is improved, but security reliability deteriorates due to potential misuse and inability to synchronize associations with specific sessions
Solution Approach 1:
The session management is segmented into hierarchical levels (parent sessions and child sessions) with distinct security levels. Each session type has specific authorized operations, creating a segmented access control structure that improves security while maintaining manageable complexity through clear separation of duties.
Solution Approach 2:
Different security levels and operation authorizations are applied locally to different session types. Parent sessions have higher security levels with broader authorizations, while child sessions have lower security levels with restricted authorizations. This local differentiation of security properties resolves the contradiction by tailoring security measures to specific operational contexts.
2Reliability
If hierarchical session management with security level enforcement is implemented, then security reliability is improved, but ease of operation worsens due to complex session synchronization requirements
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by establishing parent sessions first with higher security levels, then deriving child sessions from them with appropriate security level enforcement. This preliminary structuring of sessions hierarchically before operations begin simplifies subsequent synchronization by providing a predetermined framework that automatically enforces security levels.
Solution Approach 2:
The HSM monitors and enforces security level constraints in real-time during session operations. When a child session attempts operations exceeding its authorized security level, the HSM provides feedback by blocking the operation and can terminate the session. This continuous feedback mechanism maintains hierarchy integrity while automating the complex synchronization requirements.
3Reliability
If challenge-response protocols are used for session ownership verification, then security reliability is improved through secure key binding, but device complexity increases due to additional protocol overhead
Solution Approach 1:
The challenge-response protocol is merged with the existing hierarchical session management framework. The ownership verification process is combined with the session establishment and authorization checks already present in the HSM, rather than implementing it as a separate standalone protocol. This merging reduces overall system complexity while maintaining the security benefits of challenge-response verification.
Data Source
AI summary
According to one embodiment, a method, computer system, and computer program product for establishing identity-based hierarchical sessions on a hardware security module (HSM) for binding secure keys to a guest system, is disclosed. The present invention may include establishing a communication channel between the guest system and the HSM, wherein the communication channel is identity-based, end-to-end and encrypted, thereby establishing a session, transferring login information of the guest system through the communication channel to the HSM, maintaining a predefined security level throughout a hierarchy of the sessions, wherein no child session has a higher security level than its parent session, and performing a challenge-response protocol based on a session ownership verification with the guest, such that an HSM generated and secured key is bound to a related session.