Vaultless® Secrets Management
What is Vaultless Secrets Management?
Vaultless Secrets Management is a modern approach to managing sensitive information such as credentials, certificates, and encryption keys without relying on traditional vault infrastructure. By eliminating the need for vaults, this methodology simplifies operations while enhancing security, scalability, and cost-efficiency in cloud-native and distributed environments.
Why Vaultless?
Traditional secrets management solutions rely on centralized vaults to store sensitive information. While effective for on-premises setups, these vaults struggle in modern IT landscapes characterized by multi-cloud environments, rapid scaling, and DevOps practices. Vault-based architectures often lead to operational bottlenecks, increased costs, and security vulnerabilities.
Vaultless Secrets Management addresses these challenges by employing Distributed Fragments Cryptography™ (DFC), a patented cryptographic method that eliminates the need for a central vault by securing secrets as distributed fragments.
Key Features of Vaultless Secrets Management
- Vault-Free Architecture: Operates without traditional vaults, reducing complexity and operational overhead.
- Cloud-Native SaaS Delivery: Designed for modern, distributed environments, ensuring seamless scalability and availability.
- Enhanced Security with DFC™: Employs distributed cryptographic fragments, ensuring no single entity can access the full encryption key, even in the event of a breach.
- Zero Deployment and Maintenance: Requires no installation or upkeep of vault infrastructure, freeing up resources.
- Cost Efficiency: Eliminates the expenses associated with deploying and maintaining vault clusters, reducing total cost of ownership by up to 70%.
How Does Vaultless Secrets Management Work?
The core of Vaultless Secrets Management lies in its lightweight, stateless gateway deployed within the organization’s environment. Here’s how it functions:
- Distributed Fragments Cryptography: Secrets are encrypted using key fragments distributed across multiple regions and cloud providers. No single fragment contains enough information to decrypt the secret.
- Gateway Deployment: A stateless gateway, installed within the organization’s environment, securely connects to the SaaS platform without requiring inbound access. This setup facilitates secure operations, even during network disruptions.
- Zero Knowledge Security: One fragment of the encryption key remains within the organization’s gateway, ensuring neither the SaaS vendor nor external entities can access the complete key.
Benefits of Vaultless Secrets Management
- Simplified Operations: Eliminates the need to deploy, manage, or scale vaults.
- Scalability: Adapts effortlessly to multi-cloud and multi-region environments.
- Zero Knowledge Security: Ensures no entity, including the SaaS vendor, has access to sensitive data.
- Cost Savings: Reduces operational costs by removing vault management expenses.
- High Availability: The stateless gateway ensures uninterrupted access to secrets.
Who Should Consider Vaultless?
Organizations facing the challenges of scaling in distributed, cloud-native environments or those seeking to simplify secrets management should consider adopting Vaultless Secrets Management. It is particularly beneficial for:
- Enterprises operating in multi-cloud and multi-region environments.
- Teams seeking to reduce the overhead of managing vault clusters.
- Organizations prioritizing Zero Knowledge security.
Best Practices for Implementation
- Deploy Lightweight Gateways: Ensure the stateless gateway is strategically placed within your environment to maximize security and performance.
- Automate Secret Rotations: Leverage automation to maintain the integrity and security of secrets throughout their lifecycle.
- Monitor Access Logs: Regularly audit access to identify and address potential security risks proactively.
- Adopt the Least Privilege Principle: Limit access to sensitive resources based on user roles and requirements.
The Future of Secrets Management
Vaultless® Secrets Management represents a paradigm shift, addressing the complexities and inefficiencies of traditional vault-based systems. By leveraging distributed cryptographic methods and cloud-native technologies, it provides a streamlined, secure, and cost-effective solution tailored to modern IT environments.
Ready to learn how Vaultless Secrets Management can transform your secrets management strategy? Get a Demo.
