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7 Key States and Transitions

NIST platform security: roots of trust, firmware and secure enclaves SP 800-57 Part 1 Rev. 4
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Key States and Transitions

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A key may pass through several states between its generation and its destruction. Figure 3 depicts an example of the key states that a key could assume and the transitions among them.

Figure 3: Key state and transition example.

A key is used differently, depending upon its state in the key’s lifecycle. Key states are defined from a system point-of-view, as opposed to the point-of-view of a single cryptographic module. The following sections discuss the states that an operational or backed-up key may assume, along with transitions to other states, as shown in Figure 3 . Additional states may be applicable for some systems (e.g., a destroyed compromised state, which was depicted in the example provided in a previous version of this Recommendation), and some of the identified states may not be needed for other systems (e.g., if keys are to be activated immediately after generation, the pre-activation state may not be needed, or a decision could be made that the suspended state will not be used). Transitioning between states often requires recording the event. Suitable places for such recordings are audit logs and the key's metadata (see Section 6.2.3.1 ). [SP800-152] also discusses the logging of these events. The following sections discuss the example provided in Figure 3.