Enable AES-NI in your BIOS.Ĭonsider the following caveats when you plan your virtual machine encryption strategy. AES-NI significantly improves encryption performance. Consider storage tradeoffs when using vSphere Virtual Machine Encryption. Backend storage features such as deduplication and compression might not be effective for encrypted virtual machines. ■ The encryption process encrypts data on the host before it is written to storage. It is possible that your changes make the virtual machine unrecoverable, and that the recovery problem cannot be fixed. These files contain the encryption bundle. ■ Do not edit VMX files and VMDK descriptor files. In that case, remove the KMS from the vCenter Server and add it with the cluster name that you used initially. If the KMS cluster name changes for a KMS that is already in use, any VM that is encrypted with keys from that KMS enters an invalid state during power on or register.
CLONE VM ESXI 6.5 PASSWORD
If the host is rebooted, it is possible that the host key changes and you can no longer generate a support bundle with a password or decrypt core dumps in the support bundle with the host key. The host key must be available if you want to generate a support bundle that uses a password, or if you want to decrypt the core dump. ■ If your ESXi host crashes, retrieve the support bundle as soon as possible. ■ Do not encrypt any vCenter Server Appliance virtual machines. Advanced Encryption Standard Instruction Set is an extension to the x86 instruction set and provides accelerated encryption and decryption functions on a per-core basis in the CPU.įollow these general best practices to avoid problems. VM Encryption leverages the latest CPU hardware advances in AES-NI encryption. In a large enterprise, key management would be done by the security team, and key usage would be done by IT, in this example via vCenter Server.ĥ. It also provides a separation of duty between key usage and key management. This provides customers with choice and flexibility. vCenter Server is considered a KMIP client, and it works with many KMIP 1.1 key managers. We are qualifying against KMIP version 1.1. Key Management is based on the industry-standard Key Management Interoperability Protocol (KMIP). Encryption keys are not contained in the memory of the VM or accessible to the VM in any way.Ĥ. There are no encryption “special cases” that require in-guest configuration and monitoring.
Encryption is not managed “within” the VM. The policy framework being used leverages vSphere Storage Policy Based Management (SPBM).ģ. Verifying that the VM is encrypted can be done by confirming that the policy is applied. The policy can be applied to many VMs, regardless of their guest OS.
Because encryption occurs at the hypervisor level and not in the VM, VM Encryption works with any guest OS and datastore type.Ģ. Protect access to the vCenter Server system.ġ. Dumps on the vCenter Server system are not encrypted.