Venafi unveils machine identity management solution featuring Intel SGX
Venafi announced a machine identity management solution that combines the powerful, machine identity lifecycle automation in the Venafi Trust Protection Platform with Intel Software Guard Extensions (Intel SGX) powered by 3rd Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors. The combined, software-only solution protects private keys when they are distributed to cloud services or used in runtime, even in untrusted, shared cloud environments.
“Organizations in the throes of digital transformation are consistently grappling with increasingly sophisticated attacks that target their machine identities,” said Kevin Bocek, vice president of security strategy and threat intelligence at Venafi.
“Additionally, businesses using machine identities with cloud native software and services are especially vulnerable. This pioneering collaboration between Intel and Venafi delivers a brand-new approach to securing the lifecycle of private keys, from issuance to revocation, wherever they are distributed and used. This new solution makes it possible for our customers to move faster, be more agile, and reduce costs in every deployment scenario: on premises, cloud and edge.”
Today’s digitally transforming businesses depend on the private keys and digital certificates that serve as machine identities to authenticate secure communication between a wide range of machines, including infrastructure-as-a-service instances, virtualized infrastructure and cloud-native microservices.
However, private keys are exposed when they are distributed between systems or are used in runtime, leaving them vulnerable to theft and compromise. In the past, protecting these sensitive cryptographic security assets required specialized hardware that added security and operational complexity and is increasingly problematic for applications running in the cloud.
“Many customers investing in security are prioritizing agility and speed as competitive differentiators, and in response, companies like Venafi are innovating with new solutions that build on Intel SGX integrated in the latest 3rd Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors,” said Jeremy Rader, general manager of enterprise strategy & solutions, Data Platforms Group at Intel. “Venafi’s solution helps protect machine identities while significantly reducing cost and overhead from traditional HSMs.”