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| layout | page_title | sidebar_current | description |
|---|---|---|---|
| intro | Vault vs. Keywhiz | vs-other-keywhiz | Comparison between Vault and Keywhiz. |
Vault vs. Keywhiz
Keywhiz is a secret management solution built by Square. Keywhiz has a client/server architecture. Clients of Keywhiz make use of a FUSE filesystem to expose secrets as files on disk, and use Unix file permissions for access control. Underneath, the Keywhiz clients use mutual TLS (mTLS) to authenticate with a Keywhiz server, which serves secrets.
Vault similarly is designed as a comprehensive secret management solution. The client interaction with Vault is much more flexible, both for authentication and usage of secrets. Vault supports mTLS authentication along with many other mechanisms. The goal being to make it easy to authenticate as a machine for programmatic access and as a human for operator usage.
Vault exposes secrets via an API and not over a FUSE filesystem. The ACL system is used to protect secrets and gate access, and depends on server side enforcement instead of Unix permissions on the clients. All auditing is also done server side using audit backends.
Keywhiz focuses on storage and distribution of secrets and decouples rotation, and expects external systems to be used for periodic key rotation. Vault instead supports dynamic secrets, generating credentials on-demand for fine-grained security controls, auditing, and non-repudiation. Key rotation is a first class concern for Vault, so that no external system needs to be used.
Lastly Vault forces a mandatory lease contract with clients. All secrets read from Vault have an associated lease which enables operators to audit key usage, perform key rolling, and ensure automatic revocation. Vault provides multiple revocation mechanisms to give operators a clear "break glass" procedure after a potential compromise.