General Purpose Hardware Security Modules – The crucial Root of Trust for your digital environment
General Purpose Hardware Security Modules (GP HSMs) are the crucial Root of Trust for your digital environment as they perform a variety of cryptographic operations, such as key generation, storage, management, encryption, signature creation, or key exchange within a tamper-resistant, hardened physical environment, guaranteeing integrity and confidentiality.
Having your data encrypted, utilizing highly-secure cryptographic keys generated in a GP HSM, helps to reliably protect them. Even if the keys are lost or stolen, they will not be exposed as the utilization of a GP HSM also includes the secure storage of the encryption keys.
The logic is simple: No access to the encryption key, no access to the data.
The same applies also for access to environments and applications secured with crypto keys.
HSM as a Service – A New Deployment Model Revolutionizing the Market
In recent years, the focus has shifted from traditional on-premises deployment options to an increasing number of GP HSM as a Service offerings (GP HSMaaS). Now, fully managed as a Service offerings are at the forefront of the cybersecurity landscape.
In this blog, we’ll explore how GP HSMaaS can help secure your cloud infrastructure, the benefits it brings over traditional setups, and why it is becoming the preferred choice for organizations looking to enhance their cybersecurity posture in a cost-effective and flexible way.
Securing Cloud Environments Can Be Challenging...
Cloud utilization became a standard for companies of all sizes and throughout each industry. While it is often just referred to as ‘the cloud’, cloud environments are primarily patchworks of various cloud systems.
With the diversification of those heterogenous cloud setups, organizations must deal with special requirements for reliable protection of cloud-stored data as well as access to cloud-deployed applications. Multi-cloud environments come with challenges related to data protection and their reliable protection requires the use of high-quality crypto keys to reliably encrypt and manage access to your cloud setup.
Challenges in Securing Cloud Environments
The clear security challenge referring to your data and application stored and hosted in the cloud arises from the nature of the cloud itself and gets multiplied in the light of the heterogenous cloud landscape. The individual cloud deployment models (Public, Private, Community, Hybrid as well as Multi-Cloud) all come with individual benefits but also with specific security challenges per cloud deployment model.
The most crucial challenges connected to cloud setups are:
- Possible access through the Cloud Service Provider (CSP) or third parties
- Security gaps caused by updates
- Regulatory compliance issues
- Data security threats based on national legislation
- Insufficient organization-internal access control
- High efforts for maintaining security and handling possible incidents
…But Enabling Complete Security in the Cloud Can Be Easy
The clear go to in any cloud environment is the reliable protection of data and applications stored and hosted in the cloud. In first place this refers to the secure and central generation and storage of highly secure crypto keys outside of the cloud and hence, under your full control.
In general, by providing those capabilities, GP HSMs are the enabler for complete security throughout your cloud environment, independent of how your individual setup looks like.
By choosing the right deployment option, you can also add efficiency and cost reduction to the list of advantages when using a GP HSM.
But does that mean I can’t trust the native HSM offerings from the CSPs?
The short answer is No!
The CSPs invest a lot of money to provide you with robust data protection based on certified HSM solutions.
However, you might have to fulfill specific compliance requirements in terms of maintaining full control of the generation and storage of your keys used to protect your corporate data in the cloud. This especially applies to organizations in highly regulated industries such as Health, Insurances or Government and Public Services.
Besides the compliance aspect, having HSM capabilities under your sole control to separate the keys from the data and to maintain full control over them helps you to significantly increase the security of your cloud environment!
Always think about this comparison:
How does it help you store your family jewelry in a bank safe deposit when you leave the key in the lock?
GP HSM as a Service – The Better Choice for Securing your Cloud Environments
Utilizing a cloud-hosted GP HSMaaS reduces your total cost of ownership by eliminating hardware and staff costs, provides flexible deployment and scalability and enables the most robust security for your digital infrastructure throughout all cloud setups.
In addition, GP HSMaaS provide you with the crucial advantage to leverage from the fact that the vendor is providing all services related to the HSMs, hosting, maintenance and management, including crucial tasks such as HSM setup, load monitoring and balancing, alert handling, secure backups, top-level key exchanges, network and hardware updates as well as end of life refresh.
Read our blog post explaining the GP HSMaaS basics and helping you understand the crucial commonalities and differences compared to traditional on-premise offerings.
With a cloud-native GP HSMaaS you can enable the security of your cloud strategy while leveraging from:
- Strong data security
Based on high-quality encryption, even in shared cloud environments. - Compliance with regulatory frameworks
GDPR, PCI DSS, and eIDAS. - Scalability & Elasticity
enabling you to scale with your cloud resources and usage. - High security assurances
exceeding software-based or CSP native solutions. - No vendor lock-in
Interoperability with various cloud-native services. - Data Sovereignty
by navigating data residency across different environments and regions. - Get prepared for future threats
by the capability to upgrade to quantum-safe algorithms - Reduced total cost of ownership
by reduced infrastructure management, operational and hardware costs.
Make the better choice for adopting GP HSMaaS
Utimaco’s GP HSMaaS as part of the Trust as-a-Service Marketplace can transform your cybersecurity strategy.
Utimaco’s cloud-enabled Trust as-a-Service marketplace exemplifies the potential of data security as a Service offerings. With a range of services designed to meet diverse security requirements, Utimaco provides businesses with the tools they need to secure their digital infrastructure.
- The General Purpose HSM as a Service provides access to a FIPS 140-2 Level 3 GP HSM that is fully hosted by Utimaco but under your sole control.
- Payment HSM as a Service offers a suite of fully managed services as an alternative to operating your own estate of Payment HSMs in your own data center.
- File and Folder Encryption as a Service enables the protection of files and folders against unauthorized internal and external access, irrespective of their storage location.
- Key Exchange and Escrow as a Service – The PCI-PIN certified service provides trusted cryptographic key operations executed by trained Utimaco staff available 24x7.
- eInvoice Signature as a Service provides eIDAS-compliant Qualified Electronic Signatures, enabling their generation, validation and archiving to create trust in digital invoices.
- Timestamp as a Service provides Qualified Electronic Timestamps, enabling eIDAS-compliant proof of time and content allowing you to use digital documents as legal evidence.
- Device Attestation as a Service establishes unique digital identities for IoT devices, enhancing security and enabling remote management for effortless control over cryptographic key injection.
Utimaco's unique cybersecurity solution portfolio allows businesses to choose between on-premises, cloud-based solutions, or hybrid setups.
