AZ-500 Microsoft Azure Security Technologies Exam

Manage certificates, secrets, and keys

Implement and Harden Azure Key Vault Governance

Azure Key Vault governance starts with defining cloud governance policies to ensure vaults meet organizational standards. Administrators use Azure Policy or Azure Blueprints to enforce settings like HSM-backed key creation, soft-delete, and purge protection. These policies help maintain a consistent security baseline and prevent vault misconfiguration. By applying policy audit or deny effects, teams can detect or block non-compliant vaults before they go live, reducing the risk of data loss or unauthorized access.

Controlling who can manage certificates, secrets, and keys relies on role-based access control (RBAC) and Key Vault access policies. Common roles include:

• Key Vault Crypto User
• Key Vault Contributor
• Key Vault Reader
  Using managed identities on Azure resources allows seamless, credential-free access and follows the principle of least privilege. For highly sensitive keys, deploying Managed HSM isolates root keys in hardware. This combination of RBAC and managed identities reduces overprivileged credentials and strengthens overall security.

Securing network traffic to vaults involves implementing network-level controls such as firewall rules, virtual network integration, and private endpoints. By disabling public network access and specifying allowed IP ranges, organizations ensure that only approved networks can reach vault endpoints. Azure Policy can automatically audit vaults that lack these network restrictions, enforcing consistent network security. This layered defense model minimizes the attack surface and aligns with best practices for network security.

Automating the lifecycle of keys and secrets is critical to avoid expired or weak credentials. Azure Key Vault offers Key Rotation Policies for both secrets and keys, enabling scheduled rotations and retention of previous versions. Integration with Azure Event Grid and Azure Functions can handle certificate renewals or trigger alerts as expiration nears. Defining lifecycle management policies via Azure Policy ensures vaults adhere to rotation schedules without manual steps. This automation lowers operational overhead while maintaining continuous compliance.

Detecting and responding to suspicious vault activity requires forwarding vault diagnostics to security tools. By enabling Diagnostic Settings, vault logs and metrics flow into Microsoft Sentinel and Microsoft Defender for Cloud. Sentinel’s built-in analytics rules can alert on anomalous actions like unauthorized key deletion or mass secret retrieval. Integrating Key Vault logs into Sentinel workspaces supports rapid investigation and automated response playbooks. This visibility completes the governance lifecycle by enabling proactive detection of unauthorized access or anomalous key usage.

Conclusion

Effective management of certificates, secrets, and keys in Azure hinges on strong governance, fine-grained access controls, network restrictions, and continuous automation. By enforcing policies for HSM-backed key creation, automating key and secret rotation, and forwarding logs to Sentinel, organizations build a robust security posture. These measures work together to ensure that Azure Key Vault remains a trusted component in protecting sensitive data and cryptographic materials.