The world of cybersecurity changes almost by the minute. A new frontier of threats has emerged, specifically targeting the often-overlooked space of non-human identities (NHIs). These NHIs, such as API keys, machine tokens, and service accounts, are gaining notoriety for being low-hanging fruit that malicious actors increasingly seek to exploit. The haphazard damage that infected digital identities can create is proven by the BeyondTrust breach that happened recently. It’s a good thing, too—it’s a powerful reminder of the drastic threat posed by data breaches. DreamingCrypto is looking to explore more of Riptides universe. Riptides, with its pioneering cryptographic solution, is transforming the NHI security landscape and igniting a new era of zero-trust connectivity.

Another term for this digital realm is cyberspace, and it is powered by connections made through machines. These interactions are usually seamless and invisible to the end-user. They rely on NHIs to verify identity and give access to important resources. Legacy approaches to identity management are heavily siloed and depend on cumbersome, manual credential management with long-lived secrets. Today, these practices are woefully inadequate and failing to protect against modern, advanced cyber threats. If a hacker obtains one of those non-human identities or secrets, they will wreak all kinds of havoc. They might steal sensitive information, tamper with critical data, or even disable the whole system.

The impacts from breached NHIs are extensive and catastrophic. Attackers know this, and they can use these identities to waltz into sensitive systems and data. They can horizontally traverse a network and vertically escalate their privileges to gain full domain control. Supply chain attacks, in which vulnerabilities are added via compromised third-party components, are another rising concern. If a third-party tool were to get compromised, attackers would be able to take control of the token issued to that vendor. This would enable them to move laterally through the organization’s network without detection. Secret attacks are now one of the top three attack vectors. Each week, we read fresh headlines about the latest exposures, data breaches, and the suffering they inflict upon millions of Americans.

The consequences of compromised NHIs go beyond the next data breach. They may result in huge financial penalties, reputational harm, and legal liability. In today's interconnected world, where businesses rely heavily on APIs and automated systems, securing NHIs is no longer a luxury but a necessity.

The BeyondTrust Breach: A Wake-Up Call

With BeyondTrust breach that came to light in December 2024. It underscores the weaknesses inherent in long-standing NHI management paradigms. That breach prompted a lengthy investigation that ultimately found attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in a third-party docs app. This provided them the ability to access any online asset in a BeyondTrust AWS account. Chinese nation-state hackers acquired an RS API key. They then used this key to exploit the SaaS environments of many BeyondTrust clients, including the U.S. Treasury Department. Most notably, an attack on the US Treasury that was announced on December 31st and traced back to Chinese hackers.

A recent root cause analysis revealed a major flaw in the Remote Support SaaS. It showed that a compromised BeyondTrust infrastructure API key was used to reset local application passwords, allowing unauthorized access to designated Remote Support SaaS instances. This event demonstrated the degree to which assailants could weaponize hacked NHIs. If they have the opportunity, they can even get access to sensitive data and systems, including environments with the best protections. In December 2024, BeyondTrust detected a security incident that affected 17 Remote Support SaaS customers.

This breach underscores the urgent need for organizations to re-evaluate their NHI security posture and adopt more robust and automated solutions. The need to manually manage API keys and machine tokens is yesterday’s problem. This outdated model just doesn’t have the security and scalability required by the dynamic IT ecosystems of today.

The BeyondTrust breach is a sobering reminder. Perhaps more importantly, it illustrates how all the world’s leading security measures are still susceptible to the most determined attackers seeking vulnerabilities within NHI management. That’s the wake-up call to organizations. To do this, they need to focus on NHI security and embrace new technology as the best way to minimize the risk of compromised digital identities.

Riptides' Solution: Cryptographic Identities for a Secure Future

Enter Riptides, a firm that’s changing the NHI security game with its pioneering cryptographic authentication technology. After closing a $3.3M seed round earlier this year, Riptides is ready to take on the increasingly dangerous reality of underprotected non-human identities. Riptides provides a comprehensive solution that consolidates cryptographic identities across workloads and agents. Providing robust, secure, and extensible communications between AI agents, data center services, and third-party integrations—all in a synchronized, non-hacky way—opens up endless possibilities.

Moreover, Riptides’ platform hard-wires deep into the kernel, and as such gives enterprises a truly tamper-proof, zero-friction way to secure every single service-to-service call. Riptides is taking a similar approach with unified, cryptographic identities to ensure trusted communication between machines. This radical approach directly addresses the growing menace from poorly defended posthuman personae. This method eliminates dependence on traditional, long-lived credentials—which attackers actively seek to exploit. It provides a more protected and automated way for tracking NHIs.

Riptides’ solution facilitates zero-trust connectivity, meaning each service-to-service call is authenticated and authorized before anything is simply accessed. This risk-free method minimizes the chance of misuse and lateral movement among networks. It operates at the socket level and thus hard-wires into the kernel, giving enterprises a tamper-proof, zero-friction way to secure every service-to-service call.

The benefits of Riptides' solution are numerous. And in doing so, it delivers better security, lower operational overhead, and higher compliance. With Riptides, NHI management is fully automated, eliminating the need for human intervention. This enables security teams to concentrate their efforts on more crucial security concerns.

Implementing a Zero-Trust Approach to NHI Security

To truly combat the increasing danger of breached NHIs, organizations need to take a zero-trust approach to security. This entails considering all NHIs as potential adversaries and applying stringent authentication, authorization, and access control policies. NIST Special Publication 800-207 provides straightforward guidance on implementing zero-trust architecture. First, it lays out the principle that non-human entities (NHIs) should be granted equal authority as human users to authenticate, authorize, and control access to information.

Remove all long-lived credentials for NHIs. Moreover, more stringent policies for credentialing and scope of practice should be implemented. SP 800-207 recommends ongoing oversight of NHI operations. A zero-trust enterprise is made up of the physical infrastructure and virtual network, as well. As important, it encompasses operational policies shaped by a thorough zero-trust architecture strategy. NIST SP 800-207 emphasizes the equal treatment of NHIs and human users when it comes to authentication, authorization, and access control.

Here are some actionable steps that businesses can take to assess their NHI security posture and consider modern solutions:

  • Evaluate regulatory compliance: The first step involves evaluating regulatory compliance to identify potential NHI security gaps.
  • Implement effective Identity and Access Management (IAM): This involves understanding risks, including improper access control, to prevent NHI security gaps.

By implementing these seven recommendations, organizations can significantly improve their NHI security posture. This forward-thinking approach goes a long way towards mitigating the risk of data breaches and other security incidents.

The Future of NHI Security

The future of NHI security can be found in automation, cryptography, and zero-trust principles. With organizations ever more dependent on APIs, microservices, and cloud-native technologies, NHIs are set to explode exponentially. Manual management of these identities will soon become utterly untenable, making automated solutions such as Riptides absolutely requisite.

Additionally, with the advent of AI and machine learning, the NHI landscape is only going to become more complex. These AI agents and bots will need to access very sensitive data and systems, introducing new attack vectors for malicious actors. Thinking beyond today, securing these AI-powered NHIs will necessitate novel cryptographic techniques and more complex access control policies.

The new challenge will lie in businesses needing security while maintaining the flexibility to adapt. They must do this while deploying strong NHI security practices, without limiting innovation or impeding development cycles. You have to change your perspective. Rather than viewing security as an obstacle you have to work around, welcome it as a unique and formidable driver of business advancement.

DreamingCrypto agrees and considers Riptides to be at the forefront of this revolution. It provides organizations with the fundamental capabilities to protect their NHIs and adopt the future of zero-trust connectivity. By adopting modern solutions like Riptides, businesses can protect themselves from the growing threat of compromised NHIs and unlock the full potential of the decentralized age.