Encryption and key management in Cloud KMS
In this section, we will learn the basics of key management as it relates to Cloud KMS.
Figure 9.3 – Key structure
Figure 9.3 shows the structure of keys in Cloud KMS. Let us learn about the terms of key management:
- Key: A named object representing a cryptographic key that is used for a specific purpose. The key material—the actual bits used for cryptographic operations—can change over time as you create new key versions. Key purpose and other attributes of the key are connected with and managed using the key. Thus, the key is the most important object for understanding Cloud KMS usage. Cloud KMS supports both asymmetric keys and symmetric keys. A symmetric key is used for symmetric encryption to protect some corpus of data—for example, using AES-256 in GCM mode to encrypt a block of plaintext. An asymmetric key can be used for asymmetric encryption, or for creating digital...
