Why CSPM Vendors Are Not Securing Your Encryption Keys

Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) solutions monitor and manage the security of their cloud environments continuously, identify misconfigurations, enforce compliance, and detect vulnerabilities. Leading CSPM vendors like Palo Alto Networks, Orca Security, and Trend Micro offer these services to keep your cloud infrastructure secure.

Cloud security is essential for keeping a watch on infrastructure risks. However, organizations need to assess how secure their cloud infrastructure is in protecting data and identifying vulnerabilities before they become entry points for attackers.

The (Misunderstood) Role of CSPM Vendors in Securing Encryption Keys

When cloud security professionals and data security officers search for CSPM vendors, they want the solutions to assess, monitor, and mitigate risks across their cloud environments.

However, there is a common misconception that Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) vendors also handle the security of encryption keys.

Why This Misconception Exists

Here’s a connection between cloud security and data protection. For many, the cloud is the default location for storing sensitive data, and keeping this data secure is a top priority. Since CSPM tools are tasked with safeguarding cloud environments, organizations presume these tools are also directly responsible for the security of the data itself, including encryption. This simplification is appealing for organizations under pressure to secure data and meet compliance.

However, this misunderstanding can create security gaps and misplaced trust, putting sensitive data at risk.

Consequences of Misplaced Trust in CSPM Solutions

Relying too heavily on CSPM tools can distract from implementing strong cryptography practices, leaving security gaps. While CSPM tools (cloud security posture management) focus on identifying misconfigurations and compliance issues, encryption requires specialized tools such as key lifecycle management to govern access controls, rotation policies, and key audit logs.

Without centralized key management, there’s a risk of policy gaps that enable unauthorized access to encryption keys, potentially leading to data breaches. This oversight increases the chances of data leakage, non-compliance with regulations, and a loss of customer trust.

What is the Role of CSPM Vendors?

CSPM vendors provide a broad view of cloud infrastructure, focusing on identifying misconfigurations, ensuring compliance, and identifying security threats. They continuously monitor cloud resources, flag policy violations, and offer automated fixes to maintain a strong security posture, acting as a checkpoint to prevent vulnerabilities.

Maintaining cryptographic security is not the CSPM’s focus. Creating an inventory of all cryptographic assets and assessing how well encryption is applied throughout the organization is essential.

In addition, encryption key management demands specialized capabilities, including strict access controls, automated key rotation, and comprehensive auditing. These capabilities ensure that keys are only accessible to authorized individuals, rotated frequently to prevent compromise, and monitored thoroughly to detect unauthorized access attempts.

Relying on CSPM vendors, who do not specialize in these areas, introduces vulnerabilities by potentially allowing unauthorized access to encryption keys or insufficient key protection protocols.

Consequently, this leads to an increased risk of data breaches and regulatory non-compliance and a false sense of security.

Who is Responsible for Encryption Security?

Organizations are responsible for knowing where, how, and how well encryption protects their sensitive data. Maintaining end-to-end control of cryptographic workflows throughout the organization also requires controlling the entire key lifecycle—from generation to revocation—organizations retain full ownership and avoid dependency on third-party security practices.

They need to invest in dedicated Key Management Services (KMS) or Hardware Security Modules (HSMs) that provide full control and visibility over their encryption keys. These tools can ensure that keys are stored securely, access is tightly controlled, and audits are conducted to track who has used the keys and when.

This direct control ensures data remains secure even if the cloud provider's security measures are compromised and meet compliance requirements.

Achieve Full Visibility and Control Over Encryption

Protecting your cryptographic security posture is essential for avoiding data exposure. Implement solutions that allow organizations to:

• Discover where encryption is or isn’t applied
• Assess policy and compliance gaps
• Securely generate and store encryption keys.
• Control and restrict access to keys based on roles and responsibilities.
• Regularly rotate keys to minimize the risk of compromise.
• Audit and monitor key usage to detect any unauthorized access.

How Fortanix Can Help

The Fortanix Data Security Manager (DSM) offers a comprehensive key management solution that streamlines key lifecycle administration across hybrid and multicloud environments.

With DSM, you can securely generate, store, and manage cryptographic keys, certificates, passwords, and API keys, whether in the cloud or on-premises. DSM’s flexible deployment options support both on-premises and SaaS models, allowing organizations to deploy across major public clouds like Azure, AWS, and GCP, or within their own datacentres.

Complementing DSM’s capabilities, Fortanix offers Key Insight, a tool that helps organizations discover and analyze all encryption keys and data services. Many organizations struggle to identify exactly where and how cryptography is applied within their infrastructure.

Key Insight addresses this by scanning on-premises and multicloud environments with read-only access, providing a central, unified dashboard of all encryption keys and their association with data services.

The scan results, secured by Confidential Computing, are accessible only to authorized personnel, offering visibility into unencrypted services, shared keys, long-lived keys, or keys lacking rotation schedules. With these insights security teams can assess vulnerabilities and plan targeted remediation steps.

Conclusion

CSPM solutions provide valuable contributions to maintain a strong cloud security posture. However, recognize that maintaining cryptographic security is not within their scope of responsibilities. The onus of visibility, managing and protecting these keys lies with the organization itself.

Organizations need to invest in robust key management solutions and implement best practices to ensure the safety of their sensitive information. If you're ready to take control of your cryptographic security, start by discovering and assessing your current encryption practices and invest in the right tools to protect your valuable assets.