AI Cyber Defense / Cloud, Kubernetes and software supply chain
AI Cyber Defense: Replace persistent workload keys with scoped temporary identity
Migrate supported workloads to short-lived role-based access and reduce resource permissions. Plan revocation and failure handling for applications that cache credentials.
Environment and inputs: Cloud control planes, workload identity, Kubernetes clusters, CI/CD pipelines and immutable deployment artifacts; provider support varies.
Scenario and goal
Long-lived credentials copied into scripts can support unattended unauthorized API access.
Why it matters
For this scenario, an attacker can automate permitted API operations after gaining a workload or pipeline identity. Review who can change trust, who can assume the resulting identity and what resources it can reach. Keep source review, build provenance, deployment authorization and runtime permissions as distinct checks. A configuration object or successful deployment does not prove the intended runtime boundary is enforced.
Evidence to collect
Inventory credential owners, age, last use, storage locations and the deployments consuming them without printing secret values.
Validate with an authorized exercise
Run a staging job with temporary identity, verify expiry handling and confirm the retired test key no longer authorizes requests after its consumers are migrated.
Rollout and checks
Evaluate effective permissions and runtime behavior in a disposable account or namespace before production rollout. Retain the approved source revision, resulting artifact and independent audit trail. Plan recovery if identity, policy or admission dependencies fail. Reconcile running assets after the change because resources created outside the normal pipeline can otherwise remain outside its checks.
Scope and limits
This guide proposes a defensive test; it is not a tested production design. Check platform support and local requirements. References explain the mechanisms but do not certify the design. Behavior alone does not prove AI involvement.