Case Study

Global Investment Bank Secures AWS Access

How a Fortune 100 investment bank implemented ZeroTrustKerberosLink to secure their AWS access while maintaining Kerberos authentication

Financial Services

Global Investment Bank Secures AWS Access with Zero Trust Principles

99.99% Uptime
87% Reduction in Access Issues
3.5 FTE Engineering Time Saved
45 min Implementation Time

About the Client

A Fortune 100 global investment bank with over 50,000 employees worldwide and $2 trillion in assets under management. The bank operates in 60+ countries and has been in business for over 150 years.

The organization has a complex IT infrastructure with a mix of legacy systems and modern cloud services. They have been using Kerberos authentication for over 15 years as part of their enterprise identity management strategy.

The Challenge

The bank was accelerating their AWS adoption as part of a multi-year digital transformation initiative. However, they faced significant challenges in integrating their existing Kerberos authentication infrastructure with AWS services:

  • Security Gaps: Their existing solution required storing long-lived AWS credentials, creating security vulnerabilities.
  • Compliance Concerns: As a financial institution, they needed to maintain strict compliance with regulations including SOX, GDPR, and various banking regulations.
  • Operational Overhead: Their security team was spending 4+ hours daily managing AWS credentials and troubleshooting access issues.
  • Scalability Issues: Their custom-built solution couldn't scale to support their growing AWS footprint, which was expanding from 5 to 25+ accounts.
  • Audit Challenges: They lacked comprehensive audit trails for AWS access, creating challenges during security audits.

The bank had attempted to build an in-house solution, but after 8 months of development and over $1.2 million invested, they were still facing significant challenges with reliability and security.

The Solution

After evaluating several options, the bank selected ZeroTrustKerberosLink to bridge their Kerberos authentication with AWS services. Key factors in their decision included:

  • Zero Trust Architecture: ZeroTrustKerberosLink's zero trust approach aligned with their security strategy.
  • Self-Hosted Deployment: The ability to deploy within their own infrastructure addressed data sovereignty concerns.
  • Comprehensive Audit Logging: Detailed logs for all authentication and authorization events.
  • Seamless Integration: No changes required to their existing Kerberos infrastructure.
  • Rapid Deployment: The solution could be implemented in under 60 minutes.

Implementation Timeline

Week 1: Planning & Preparation

The bank's security team worked with ZeroTrustKerberosLink to plan the implementation. This included defining security requirements, mapping Kerberos principals to AWS IAM roles, and preparing the deployment environment.

Week 2: Initial Deployment

ZeroTrustKerberosLink was deployed in a test environment. The actual deployment took only 45 minutes. The bank's security team was surprised by the simplicity of the process, having expected a multi-week implementation.

Week 3: Testing & Validation

The solution underwent rigorous security testing, including penetration testing and compliance verification. No critical issues were found, and the few minor recommendations were addressed within days.

Week 4: Production Rollout

ZeroTrustKerberosLink was deployed to production, initially supporting 5,000 users across 12 business units. The rollout was completed without any service disruptions.

Weeks 5-8: Expansion

The solution was expanded to cover all 25 AWS accounts and integrated with the bank's existing monitoring and alerting systems. Additional security policies were implemented based on business unit requirements.

ZeroTrustKerberosLink allowed us to maintain our security posture while accelerating our AWS adoption. The implementation was completed in just 45 minutes, and the ROI was evident within the first month. Our security team can now focus on strategic initiatives instead of managing credentials.

James Wilson Chief Information Security Officer

Results & Benefits

87%
Reduction in AWS access-related incidents
3.5 FTE
Engineering resources reallocated to strategic projects
99.99%
Authentication service uptime since implementation
100%
Compliance with financial regulations
45 min
From deployment to production-ready
$1.4M
Annual cost savings compared to previous solution

Key Lessons

  1. Don't Reinvent the Wheel: The bank had spent 8 months trying to build a custom solution before realizing that a specialized product would be more effective and less costly.
  2. Security and Convenience Can Coexist: ZeroTrustKerberosLink proved that strong security doesn't have to come at the expense of user experience.
  3. Start Small, Scale Fast: The phased implementation approach allowed for quick wins while ensuring security at each step.
  4. Compliance as a Driver: Regulatory requirements were a key driver for the project, but the solution delivered benefits beyond compliance.

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