Using Fortanix Data Security Manager with MinIO (KES Server)

  • Updated on Apr 23, 2025
  • Published on Jun 26, 2024
  • 5 minute(s) read
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1.0 Introduction

This article describes how to integrate Fortanix-Data-Security-Manager (DSM) with MinIO’s Key Encryption Service (KES) server that uses Fortanix DSM as a persistent and secure key store. KES server runs inside Kubernetes and distributes cryptographic keys to Fortanix DSM applications.

This article also contains the information that a user needs to:

  • Configure Fortanix DSM

  • Set up KES server

2.0 Architecture Workflow

KES-Architecture.png

Figure 1: KES with DSM architecture

KES Server acts as a bridge between the Fortanix DSM and cloud-native applications. Here Fortanix DSM is the central KMS that protects the master keys and acts as the root of trust in your infrastructure. Instead of deploying and managing one KMS per set of applications, when an application wants to encrypt data, it can request a new DEK from a KES server or ask the KES server to decrypt an encrypted DEK. This way the load on the central KMS (Fortanix DSM) does not increase much because KES can serve the vast majority of application requests without talking to Fortanix DSM. For more details, refer to https://blog.min.io/introducing-kes/.

3.0 Configure Fortanix DSM

A Fortanix DSM service must be configured, and the URL must be accessible. To create a Fortanix DSM account and group, refer to the following sections:

3.1 Signing Up

To get started with the Fortanix Data Security Manager (DSM) cloud service, you must register an account at <Your_DSM_Service_URL>. For example, https://eu.smartkey.io.

For detailed steps on how to set up the Fortanix DSM, refer to the User's Guide: Sign Up for Fortanix Data Security Manager SaaS documentation.

3.2 Creating an Account

Access the <Your_DSM_Service_URL> on the web browser and enter your credentials to log in to the Fortanix DSM.

Figure 1: Logging In

3.3 Creating a Group

Perform the following steps to create a group in the Fortanix DSM:

  1. Click the Groups menu item in the DSM left navigation panel and click the + button on the Groups page to add a new group.

    Figure 2: Add Groups

  2. On the Adding new group page, enter the following details:

    • Title: Enter a title for your group.

    • Description (optional): Enter a short description for the group.

  3. Click the SAVE button to create the new group.

The new group has been added to the Fortanix DSM successfully.

3.4 Creating an Application

Perform the following steps to create an application (app) in the Fortanix DSM:

  1. Click the Apps menu item in the DSM left navigation panel and click the + button on the Apps page to add a new app.

    Figure 3: Add Application

  2. On the Adding new app page, enter the following details:

    • App name: Enter the name of your application.

    • Interface (optional): Select the REST API option as interface type from the drop down menu.

    • ADD DESCRIPTION (optional): Enter a short description for the application.

    • Authentication method: Select the default API Key as the method of authentication from the drop down menu. For more information on these authentication methods, refer to User's Guide: Authentication documentation.

    • Assigning the new app to groups: Select the group created in Section 3.3: Creating a Group from the list.

  3. Click the SAVE button to add the new application. 

The new application has been added to the Fortanix DSM successfully.

3.5 Copying the API Key

Perform the following steps to copy the API key from the Fortanix DSM:

  1. Click the Apps menu item in the DSM left navigation panel and click the app created in Section 3.4: Creating an Application to go to the detailed view of the app.

  2. On the INFO tab, click the VIEW API KEY DETAILS button.

  3. From the API Key Details dialog box, copy the API Key of the app to use it later.

4.0 KES Server Setup

First, you need to generate a TLS private key and certificate for the KES server. A KES server can only be run with TLS - since secure-by-default. Here we use self-signed certificates for simplicity. For a production setup, we highly recommend using a certificate signed by CA (for example, your internal CA or a public CA like Let's Encrypt).

4.1 Generate a TLS Private Key and Certificate for the KES Server

The following command will generate a new TLS private key server.key and a X.509 certificate server.cert that is self-signed and issued for the IP 127.0.0.1 and DNS name localhost (as SAN). You may want to customize the command to match your setup.

kes tool identity new --server --key server.key --cert server.cert --ip "127.0.0.1" --dns localhost

Any other tooling for X.509 certificate generation works as well. For example, you could use openssl:

$ openssl ecparam -genkey -name prime256v1 | openssl ec -out server.key
$ openssl req -new -x509 -days 30 -key server.key -out server.cert \
   -subj "/C=/ST=/L=/O=/CN=localhost" -addext "subjectAltName = IP:127.0.0.1"

4.2 Create Private Key and Certificate for your Application

kes tool identity new --key=app.key --cert=app.cert app

You can compute the app identity using:

kes tool identity of app.cert

4.3 Create Configuration File

Now, you have defined all entities in your demo setup. Wire everything together by creating the config file server-config.yml:

address: 0.0.0.0:7373
root:    disabled  # We disable the root identity since we don't need it in this guide 
   
tls:
key : server.key
cert: server.cert
   
policy:
  my-app:
     allow:
     - /v1/key/create/my-app*
     - /v1/key/generate/my-app*
     - /v1/key/decrypt/my-app*    
    identities:
    - ${APP_IDENTITY}
   
 keystore:
   fortanix:
     sdkms:
       endpoint: "<your-fortanix-sdkms-endpoint>"    # Use your Fortanix instance endpoint.
       credentials:
         key: "<your-api-key>" # Insert the application's API key

4.4 Start the KES Server

Finally, start the KES Server in a new window/tab.

export APP_IDENTITY=$(kes tool identity of app.cert)
kes server --config=server-config.yml --auth=off

Where, --auth=off is required since your root.cert and app.cert certificates are self-signed.

4.5 Connect to the Server

In the previous window/tab, you can now connect to the server using the following commands:

export KES_CLIENT_CERT=app.cert
export KES_CLIENT_KEY=app.key
kes key create -k my-app-key

Where, -k is required because your are using self-signed certificates.

4.6 Decrypt Data Encryption Keys

Finally, you can derive and decrypt the data keys from the previously created my-app-key.

kes key derive -k my-app-key
{
   plaintext : ...
   ciphertext: ...
}

kes key decrypt -k my-app-key <base64-ciphertext>

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