Moving secrets from a war zone: Keyless SSL

The invasion of Ukraine is so sad and takes us back to an old world. Most had thought that a war in Europe could never happen again, especially as there is nothing to gain, and so much to lose.

And so, our world has changed so much, and where at one time a defender would destroy their secrets so that they did not get into the hands of an invader. But, these days our secrets are protected with cryptography, and within data centres. For the invaders, these data centres will hold sensitive data and which could reveal key information around finance, government records, and so much more. Web content too hold important information for citizens. So while the likelihood of an invasion is extremely low in most countries, global companies need to have a playbook that involves protecting the secrets of citizens.

And, so, we see Cloudflare acting quickly on this, and removing cryptographic material from their servers in Ukraine. The CEO of Cloudflare posted:

This takes the secret information and related encryption keys, moves the data to a safe haven, and still allow Ukranian customers the opportunity to still access their encrypted content and make secure…