Key Management System (KMS) Licensing - There Has to Be a Better Way

Take a little imaginary trip with me.

You want to buy a new car and you are dreaming of all of the great places you can go and hikes you can take. You’ve done your research, you’ve identified a favorite model, you know the mileage and quality ratings, and you’ve made up you mind! That dream car is going to be yours.

You spend the obligatory two hours at the dealer and drive away with your dream vehicle. You drive it home and park it in the driveway.

Time to head out to your first destination! You pile your hiking gear into the car and head for the Appalachians for your first hike.

Suddenly, your car stops dead in the road and says “Sorry, you need to pay for this destination. It is not a part of your original car purchase plan. That will be an extra $5,000 please. Credit cards accepted!”

WTF?

You didn’t read the fine print. This car purchase plan only includes 5 destinations and the Appalachians aren’t in the plan. Each new destination is going to cost you a bundle.

Welcome to Key Management System licensing.

Most Enterprise Key Management Systems (KMS) work with this licensing model. You will usually find that you need to license each end-point that connects to the key manager. One end-point may be included in the KMS pricing, but you need to purchase additional “license packs” to attach additional systems. Or, you find that your KMS only supports a limited number of encryption keys. As soon as you roll your keys to meet compliance requirements, it is suddenly time to purchase capacity for more keys! Or, for that new encryption project, you may find that you need to purchase new software to enable encryption for that environment.

And it can get really bad when you discover that the KMS system comes in different hardware models and you suddenly need to purchase an entirely different hardware model and do full replacements. That’s painful.

This typical KMS licensing model works really well for the companies that sell them. For companies who need to deploy encryption?

Not so much …

It means going to management for new budget approval every time you want to extend your security through better encryption. Over time this can add up to hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars in new license and maintenance fees.

There has to be a better way, right?

There is. Here at Townsend Security we do things differently with our Alliance Key Manager licensing. You purchase the KMS platform of your choice and use it the way you want. It is that simple. From that point on:

• We never charge you fees for connecting a new end-point that needs a KMS.
• We never limit the number of end-points based on the model of the KMS.
• We never limit the number of encryption keys generated or stored on the KMS.
• We never force you to pay extra fees for software patches.
• We never force you to pay extra fees for routine software upgrades.
• If you have a hardware HSM, we do not force you to re-purchase the KMS at end of life. Just replace the hardware and keep on keepin’ on!

Fortunately, the story about purchasing a car was completely made up. But the nightmare of KMS licensing is real. Just know that it doesn’t have to be that way. Take a look at our KMS offerings and see a new path forward.

Pinch yourself. And get ready for that dream trip.

We provide Alliance Key Manager as a hardware security module (HSM), as a VMware software appliance, and as a cloud instance (Azure, AWS) - All running the same key management software with the same interfaces and applications.

Patrick