Generating Keys for Encryption and Decryption.; 3 minutes to read +7; In this article. Creating and managing keys is an important part of the cryptographic process. Symmetric algorithms require the creation of a key and an initialization vector (IV). The key must be kept secret from anyone who should not decrypt your data. Mar 05, 2015  Using Key/SecureKey. Now, let's show a simple example of creating an encrypted standard string with the use of a key. AES encryption only supports 128-bit (16 bytes), 192-bit (24 bytes) or 256-bit key (32 bytes) lengths, so we'll need to create or generate an appropriate key. You can either import your RSA keys to your Key Vault or generate new RSA keys in Azure Key Vault. Azure managed disks handles the encryption and decryption in a fully transparent fashion using envelope encryption. It encrypts data using an AES 256 based data encryption key (DEK), which is, in turn, protected using your keys.

• Using An Image To Generate An Encryption Key In Excel

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All environments of Common Data Service use SQL Server Transparent Data Encryption (TDE) to perform real-time encryption of data when written to disk, also known as encryption at rest.

You can either import your RSA keys to your Key Vault or generate new RSA keys in Azure Key Vault. Azure managed disks handles the encryption and decryption in a fully transparent fashion using envelope encryption. It encrypts data using an AES 256 based data encryption key (DEK), which is, in turn, protected using your keys. The Storage service generates data encryption keys and encrypts them with customer. The paper proposes an algorithm for image encryption using the random bit sequence generator and based on chaotic maps. Chaotic Logistic and Tent maps are used to generate required random bit.

By default, Microsoft stores and manages the database encryption key for your environments so you don't have to. The manage keys feature in the Power Platform admin center gives administrators the ability to self-manage the database encryption key that is associated with the Common Data Service tenant.

Important

Self-managed database encryption keys are only available for customers who have more than 1000 Power Apps plan and/or Dynamics 365 plan licensed user seats and who have opted in to the feature. To opt in to this program, contact your account or sales representative.

Encryption key management is only applicable to Azure SQL environment databases. The following features and services use their own key to encrypt their data and can't be encrypted with the self-managed encryption key:

• Relevance Search
• Mobile Offline
• Activity Log (Office 365 portal)
• Exchange (Server-side sync)

Encryption key management cannot be applied to environments that have data stored in File and Image fields.

A majority of existing environments have file and log stored in non-Azure SQL databases. These environments cannot be opted in to self-managed encryption key. Only new environments (once you signed up for this program) can be enabled with self-managed encryption key.

Introduction to key management

With key management, administrators can provide their own encryption key or have an encryption key generated for them, which is used to protect the database for an environment.

The key management feature supports both PFX and BYOK encryption key files, such as those stored in a hardware security module (HSM). To use the upload encryption key option you need both the public and private encryption key.

The key management feature takes the complexity out of encryption key management by using Azure Key Vault to securely store encryption keys. Azure Key Vault helps safeguard cryptographic keys and secrets used by cloud applications and services. The key management feature doesn't require that you have an Azure Key Vault subscription and for most situations there is no need to access encryption keys used for Common Data Service within the vault.

The manage keys feature lets you perform the following tasks.

• Enable the ability to self-manage database encryption keys that are associated with Common Data Service environments.

• Generate new encryption keys or upload existing .PFX or .BYOK encryption key files.

• Lock and unlock tenant environments.

  Warning

  While a tenant is locked, all environments within the tenant can't be accessed by anyone. More information: Lock the tenant.

Understand the potential risk when you manage your keys

As with any business critical application, personnel within your organization who have administrative-level access must be trusted. Before you use the key management feature, you should understand the risk when you manage your database encryption keys. It is conceivable that a malicious administrator (a person who is granted or has gained administrator-level access with intent to harm an organization's security or business processes) working within your organization might use the manage keys feature to create a key and use it to lock all environments in the tenant.

Consider the following sequence of events.

The malicious administrator signs in to the Power Platform admin center, goes to the Environments tab and selects Manage encryption key. The malicious administrator then creates a new key with a password and downloads the encryption key to their local drive, and activates the new key. Now all the environment databases are encrypted with the new key. Next, the malicious administrator locks the tenant with the newly downloaded key, and then takes or deletes the downloaded encryption key.

These actions will result in disabling all the environments within the tenant from online access and make all database backups un-restorable.

Important

To prevent the malicious administrator from interrupting the business operations by locking the database, the managed keys feature doesn't allow tenant environments to be locked for 72 hours after the encryption key has changed or activated. Additionally, anytime an encryption key is changed for a tenant, all administrators receive an email message alerting them of the key change. This provides up to 72 hours for other administrators to roll back any unauthorized key changes.

Key management requirements

Privileges required

To use the manage keys feature you need one of the following privileges:

• Global admin membership.

• Dirt 3 product key skidrow. Office 365 Service administrators group membership.

• System administrator security role for the environment that you want to manage the encryption key.

Encryption key requirements

If you provide your own encryption key, your key must meet these requirements that are accepted by Azure Key Vault.

• The encryption key file format must be PFX or BYOK.

• 2048-bit RSA or RSA-HSM key type.

• PFX encryption key files must be password protected.

For more information about generating and transferring an HSM-protected key over the Internet see How to generate and transfer HSM-protected keys for Azure Key Vault.

Key management tasks

To simplify the key management tasks, the tasks are broken down into three areas:

Administrators can use the Power Platform admin center or the Microsoft.Xrm.OnlineManagementAPI PowerShell module cmdlets to perform the key management tasks described here.

Generate or upload the encryption key for a tenant

All encryption keys are stored in the Azure Key Vault, and there can only be one active key at any time. Since the active key is used to encrypt all the environments in the tenant, managing the encryption is operated at the tenant level. Once the key is activated, each individual environment can then be selected to use the key for encryption.

Use this procedure to set the manage key feature the first time for an environment or to change (or roll-over) an encryption key for an already self-managed tenant.

Warning

When you perform the steps described here for the first time you are opting in to self-managing your encryption keys. More information: Understand the potential risk when you manage your keys.

1. Sign in to the Power Platform admin center.

2. Select the Environments tab, and then select Manage encryption keys on the toolbar.

3. Select Confirm to acknowledge the manage key risk.

4. Select New key on the toolbar.

5. On the left pane, complete the details to generate or upload a key:

   • Select a Region. This option is only shown if your tenant has multiple regions.
   • Enter a Key name.
   • Choose from the following options:
     • To create a new key, select Generate new (.pfx). More information: Generate a new key (.pfx).
     • To use your own generated key, select Upload (.pfx or .byok). More information: Upload a key (.pfx or .byok).

6. Select Next.

7. Email notification is sent to all administrators. More information: Encryption key change notification.

Generate a new key (.pfx)

1. Enter a password, and then re-enter the password to confirm.
2. Select Create, and then select the created file notification on your browser.
3. The encryption key .PFX file is downloaded to your web browser's default download folder. Save the file in a secure location (we recommend that this key is backed up along with its password).

To perform this task using PowerShell, see Get-CRMGenerateProtectionkey and Set-CrmTenantProtectionKey.

Upload a key (.pfx or .byok)

1. Select Upload the Key, select the .pfx or .byok¹ file, and then select Open.
2. Enter the password for the key, and then select Create.

¹ For .byok encryption key files, make sure you use the subscription id as shown on the screen when you export the encryption key from your local HSM. More information: How to generate and transfer HSM-protected keys for Azure Key Vault.

To perform this task using PowerShell, see New-CRMImportProtectionKey and Set-CrmTenantProtectionKey.

Note

To reduce the number of steps for the administrator to manage the key process, the key is automatically activated when it is uploaded the first time. All subsequent key uploads require an additional step to activate the key.

Activate an encryption key for a tenant

Once an encryption key is generated or uploaded for the tenant, it can be activated.

1. Sign in to the Power Platform admin center.
2. Select the Environments tab, and then select Manage encryption keys on the toolbar.
3. Select Confirm to acknowledge the manage key risk.
4. Select a key that has an Available state and then select Activate key on the toolbar.
5. Select Confirm to acknowledge the key change and that all administrators will be notified.More information: Encryption key change notification

When you activate a key for the tenant, it takes a while for the key management service to activate the key. The status of the Key state displays the key as Installing when the new or uploaded key is activated.Once the key is activated, the following occurs:

• All encrypted environments automatically get encrypted with the active key (there is no downtime with this action).
• When activated, the encryption key will be applied to all environments that are changed from Microsoft-provided to self-managed encryption key.

To perform this task using PowerShell, see Set-CrmProtectWithTenantKey.

Important

To streamline the key management process so that all environments are managed by the same key, the active key can't be updated when there are locked environments. All locked environments must be unlocked before a new key can be activated. If there are locked environments that don't need to be unlocked, they must be deleted.

Note

After an encryption key is activated, you can't activate another key for 24 hours.

Manage encryption for an environment

By default, each environment is encrypted with the Microsoft-provided encryption key. Once an encryption key is activated for the tenant, administrators can elect to change the default encryption to use the activated encryption key. To use the activated key, follow these steps.

Apply encryption key to an environment

1. Sign in to the Power Platform admin center.
2. Select the Environments tab.
3. Open a Microsoft-provided encrypted environment.
4. Select See all.
5. In the Environment Encryption section, select Manage.
6. Select Confirm to acknowledge the manage key risk.
7. Select Apply this key to accept changing the encryption to use the activated key.
8. Select Confirm to acknowledge that you are managing the key directly and that there is downtime for this action.

Return a managed encryption key back to Microsoft-provided encryption key

Returning to the Microsoft-provided encryption key configures the environment back to the default behavior where Microsoft manages the encryption key for you.

1. Sign in to the Power Platform admin center.
2. Select the Environments tab, and then select an environment that is encrypted with a self-managed key.
3. Select See all.
4. In the Environment Encryption section, select Manage, and then select Confirm.
5. Under Return to standard encryption management, select Return .
6. For production environments, confirm the environment by entering the environment's name.
7. Select Confirm to return to standard encryption key management.

To perform this task using PowerShell, see Set-CrmProtectWithMicrosoftKey.

Lock the tenant

Since there is only one active key per tenant, locking the encryption for the tenant disables all the environments that are in the tenant. All locked environments remain inaccessible to everyone, including Microsoft, until a Power Platform service admin in your organization unlocks it by using the key that was used to lock it.

Caution

You should never lock the tenant environments as part of your normal business process. When you lock a Common Data Service tenant, all the environments will be taken completely offline and they can't be accessed by anyone, including Microsoft. Additionally, services such as synchronization and maintenance are all stopped. If you decide to leave the service, locking the tenant can ensure that your online data is never accessed again by anyone.
Note the following about tenant environments locking:

• Locked environments can't be restored from backup.
• Locked environments are deleted if not unlocked after 28 days.
• You can't lock environments for 72 hours after an encryption key change.
• Locking a tenant locks all active environments within the tenant.

Important

• You must wait at least one hour after you lock active environments before you can unlock them.
• Once the lock process begins, all encryption keys with either an Active or Available state are deleted. The lock process can take up to an hour and during this time unlocking locked environments is not allowed.

1. Sign into the Power Platform admin center.
2. Select the Environments tab and then on the command bar select Manage encryption keys.
3. Select the Active key and then select Lock active environments.
4. On the right pane select Upload active key, browse to and select the key, enter the password, and then select Lock.
5. When prompted, enter the text that is displayed on your screen to confirm that you want to lock all environments in the region, and then select Confirm.

To lock a tenant using the PowerShell cmdlet, see Set-CrmLockTenantProtectedInstances.

Unlock locked environments

To unlock environments you must first upload and then activate the tenant encryption key with the same key that was used to lock the tenant. Please note that locked environments do not get unlocked automatically once the key has been activated. Each locked environment has to be unlocked individually.

Important

• You must wait at least one hour after you lock active environments before you can unlock them.
• The unlock process can take up to an hour. Once the key is unlocked, you can use the key to Manage encryption for an environment.
• You can't generate a new or upload an existing key until all locked environments are unlocked.

Unlock encryption key

1. Sign into the Power Platform admin center.
2. Select the Environments tab and then select Manage encryption keys.
3. Select the key that has a Locked state, and then on the command bar select Unlock key.
4. Select Upload locked key, browse to and select the key that was used to lock the tenant, enter the password, and then select Unlock.The key goes into an Installing state. You must wait until the key is in an Active state before you can unlock locked environments.
5. To unlock an environment, see the next section.

Unlock environments

1. Select the Environments tab, and then select the locked environment name.

   Tip

   Don't select the row. Select the environment name.

2. In the Details section, select See all to display the Details pane on the right.

3. In the Environment encryption section on the Details pane select Manage.

4. On the Environment encryption page select Unlock.

5. Select Confirm to confirm that you want to unlock the environment.

6. Repeat the previous steps to unlock additional environments.

To unlock an environment using the PowerShell cmdlet, see Set-CrmUnlockTenantProtectedInstance.

Environment database operations

A customer tenant can have environments that are encrypted using the Microsoft managed key and environments that are encrypted with the customer managed key. To maintain data integrity and data protection, the following controls are available when managing environment database operations.

1. RestoreThe environment to overwrite (the restored to environment) is restricted to the same environment that the backup was taken from or to another environment that is encrypted with the same customer managed key.

2. CopyThe environment to overwrite (the copied to environment) is restricted to another environment that is encrypted with the same customer managed key.

   Note

   If a Support Investigation environment was created to resolve support issue in a customer managed environment, the encryption key for the Support Investigation environment must be changed to customer managed key before the Copy environment operation can be performed.

3. ResetThe environment's encrypted data will be deleted including backups. After the environment is reset, the environment encryption will revert back to the Microsoft managed key.

Encryption key change notification

Important

When an encryption key is activated or changed, all administrators receive an email message alerting them of the change. This provides a means to allow other administrators to verify and confirm that the key was updated by an authorized administrator. Since it takes time to activate the key and to encrypt all the environments, and to send out the email notification, an encryption key can only be updated once every 24 hours.

See also

Office 2007 vlk key generator. Microsoft.Xrm.OnlineManagementAPI PowerShell reference
SQL Server: Transparent Data Encryption (TDE)

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Creating and managing keys is an important part of the cryptographic process. Symmetric algorithms require the creation of a key and an initialization vector (IV). The key must be kept secret from anyone who should not decrypt your data. The IV does not have to be secret, but should be changed for each session. Asymmetric algorithms require the creation of a public key and a private key. The public key can be made public to anyone, while the private key must known only by the party who will decrypt the data encrypted with the public key. This section describes how to generate and manage keys for both symmetric and asymmetric algorithms.

Symmetric Keys

The symmetric encryption classes supplied by the .NET Framework require a key and a new initialization vector (IV) to encrypt and decrypt data. Whenever you create a new instance of one of the managed symmetric cryptographic classes using the parameterless constructor, a new key and IV are automatically created. Anyone that you allow to decrypt your data must possess the same key and IV and use the same algorithm. Generally, a new key and IV should be created for every session, and neither the key nor IV should be stored for use in a later session.

To communicate a symmetric key and IV to a remote party, you would usually encrypt the symmetric key by using asymmetric encryption. Sending the key across an insecure network without encrypting it is unsafe, because anyone who intercepts the key and IV can then decrypt your data. For more information about exchanging data by using encryption, see Creating a Cryptographic Scheme.

The following example shows the creation of a new instance of the TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider class that implements the TripleDES algorithm.

When the previous code is executed, a new key and IV are generated and placed in the Key and IV properties, respectively.

Sometimes you might need to generate multiple keys. In this situation, you can create a new instance of a class that implements a symmetric algorithm and then create a new key and IV by calling the GenerateKey and GenerateIV methods. The following code example illustrates how to create new keys and IVs after a new instance of the symmetric cryptographic class has been made.

When the previous code is executed, a key and IV are generated when the new instance of TripleDESCryptoServiceProvider is made. Another key and IV are created when the GenerateKey and GenerateIV methods are called.

Asymmetric Keys

The .NET Framework provides the RSACryptoServiceProvider and DSACryptoServiceProvider classes for asymmetric encryption. These classes create a public/private key pair when you use the parameterless constructor to create a new instance. Asymmetric keys can be either stored for use in multiple sessions or generated for one session only. While the public key can be made generally available, the private key should be closely guarded.

A public/private key pair is generated whenever a new instance of an asymmetric algorithm class is created. After a new instance of the class is created, the key information can be extracted using one of two methods:

• The ToXmlString method, which returns an XML representation of the key information.

• The ExportParameters method, which returns an RSAParameters structure that holds the key information.

Both methods accept a Boolean value that indicates whether to return only the public key information or to return both the public-key and the private-key information. An RSACryptoServiceProvider class can be initialized to the value of an RSAParameters structure by using the ImportParameters method.

Asymmetric private keys should never be stored verbatim or in plain text on the local computer. If you need to store a private key, you should use a key container. For more on how to store a private key in a key container, see How to: Store Asymmetric Keys in a Key Container.

The following code example creates a new instance of the RSACryptoServiceProvider class, creating a public/private key pair, and saves the public key information to an RSAParameters structure.

Using An Image To Generate An Encryption Key In Excel

See also