Proxy Key Vault Trust Model for External Cloud Key Management
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Cloud computing environments face challenges in managing encryption keys securely, as customers require regulatory compliance that necessitates storing keys outside the cloud environment while ensuring secure access and cryptographic operations.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a key management service (KMS) with a proxy key vault that communicates via an authenticated path to an external key manager (EKM), utilizing a two-way trust model for cryptographic operations, where the identity service verifies and signs communication credentials to ensure secure access to external cryptographic keys.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If encryption keys are stored within the cloud environment for convenient access and management, then key accessibility and operational efficiency are improved, but regulatory compliance and security control are compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a key management service (KMS) as an intermediary component that mediates between cloud services and external key managers. The KMS enables cloud services to perform cryptographic operations with externally stored keys without requiring the keys to be physically present in the cloud environment, thus maintaining both accessibility and compliance. The authenticated communication path acts as a controlled intermediary channel between the KMS and external key managers.
Solution Approach 2:
The system segments the key management functionality into distinct components: the KMS within the cloud environment, external key managers outside the cloud, and an authenticated communication path connecting them. This segmentation allows keys to remain externally stored (compliance) while enabling cloud services to access them through the structured KMS interface (accessibility).
2Reliability
If encryption keys are stored outside the cloud environment to meet regulatory requirements, then security control and compliance are improved, but key accessibility and system complexity are worsened
Solution Approach 1:
The key management service is designed as a universal interface that handles multiple cryptographic operations (encryption, decryption, key generation) and supports both internally and externally stored keys through a unified API. This multi-functionality reduces system complexity by providing a single point of access regardless of key location, while maintaining security control through external key storage.
Solution Approach 2:
The KMS serves as a mediator that abstracts the complexity of external key management from cloud services. It handles authentication, communication protocol management, and cryptographic operations, presenting a simplified interface to cloud services while managing the complexity of external key manager interactions behind the scenes.
3Reliability
If an authenticated communication path is established between the proxy key vault and external key manager, then secure access is improved, but trust model complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system uses credential copying where the identity service creates and manages communication credentials that represent trusted relationships. Instead of implementing complex mutual authentication protocols between all components, the identity service copies and distributes appropriate credentials to the KMS and external key managers, simplifying the trust model while maintaining secure access.
Solution Approach 2:
The identity service enables self-service authentication by automatically verifying credentials and establishing trusted communication paths between the KMS and external key managers. The system performs self-verification of authentication credentials without requiring manual trust configuration, reducing trust model complexity while ensuring secure access.
Data Source
AI summary
An identity service in a cloud environment is communicatively coupled to a proxy key vault in the cloud environment and to an external key manager (EKM) located outside of the cloud environment. The identity service receives a token request for a communication credential from the proxy key vault and verifies the request based on a client credential associated with the proxy key vault. The identity service generates the client credential and signs the communication credential with a private key associated with the EKM. The identify service transmits the signed communication credential to the proxy key vault. The communication credential can be used to substantiate cryptographic operation requests to the EKM.