Optiv + HR Software Company = Secret Data Safe In The HashiCorp Vault

The Situation – ineffective secrets management program causing severe security gaps

 

A global payroll provider had ambitious plans for their digital transformation, which involved keeping large amounts of sensitive client data secret and secure. Due to their size (supporting 36 million workers and more than 500,000 organizations global), the organization had volumes of secrets and dynamic identities sprawled across their technology ecosystem.

 

This sprawl of overlapping secrets management solutions – including a mix of third-party and home-grown applications – was causing increased security risks, a lack of visibility, unnecessary costs, operational inefficiencies, critical compliance findings and even failed audits.

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The Solution – improved security posture through HashiCorp Vault technology

 

With an all-hands kick-off to start the discovery process and initial assessment, we worked with the client to demonstrate and deploy HashiCorp Vault technology. Vault recommended a best-practice architecture that accounted for serverless and containerized compute platforms, VMs (virtual machines) in existing data centers and a Jenkins CI/CD (continuous integration and deployment) delivery pipeline with build tests.

 

The clustered Vault environment enabled higher availability and improved secrets resiliency as part of a unified secrets management program. It integrated the client’s home-grown apps, remedied the apps that failed audits and eliminated ineffective tools. Through Kubernetes, we also streamlined the client’s authentication methods. Together, these processes and technologies led to an improved security posture, reduced costs and enhanced visibility, productivity and governance.

Industry Served: HR Management Software/Services

Our Starting Point

  • Consolidate secrets management program
  • Reduce redundancies and security gaps created by disparate third-party and home-grown applications
  • Improve operational efficiencies
  • Meet urgent compliance requirements

Accelerating Forward:

  • Discovery and assessment of technical and business requirements
  • Solution and architecture design
  • Implementation of HashiCorp Vault technology, utilizing automation and orchestration, as well as testing and validation throughout the process
  • The new secrets management program included use cases such as:
    • Dynamic database credentials
    • Token lifecycle auto-renewal
    • LDAP authentication method
    • Kubernetes authentication method
    • Approle authentication method
    • Deployment via Helm chart
    • Multi-cluster Terraform configuration
    • Vault agent templating
    • Integration of pilot use cases

Client Outcomes

  • Better visibility and security thanks to centralized secrets management capabilities
  • Reduced enterprise risk, due to sunsetting legacy and home-grown applications
  • Improved operational efficiencies due to streamlined authentication processes
  • Multi-tenancy design allows for future integration of applications and services into Vault
  • Client empowered with autonomy to control their users and access via centralized secrets management
  • Optiv to continue partnering with the client to enable an enterprise-wide adoption program

How can we help you secure greatness?

 

Optiv can advise on, deploy and operate end-to-end cybersecurity programs aligned to your business goals. As the cyber advisory and solutions leader, we serve nearly 6,000 companies across every major industry. Our certified experts can help you gain the agility, security, scale and control you need to stay ahead of the competition.