Governance Policies Azure Security Key Vault

Key Vault

Governance policies for Key Vault

Domain: azure-security

Patterns

Name	Description
Key Vault with RBAC and private endpoint	Complete Key Vault deployment with RBAC authorization, soft-delete, purge protection, private endpoint, diagnostics, and role assignments

Anti-Patterns

Description	Instead
Do not use access policies for authorization	Set enableRbacAuthorization = true and use role assignments
Do not disable soft-delete or purge protection	Keep both enabled with at least 90-day retention
Do not use service principal secrets to access Key Vault	Use managed identity with Key Vault RBAC roles

References

• Key Vault best practices
• Key Vault RBAC
• Key Vault private endpoints

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Checks (2)

Check	Severity	Description
AZ-KV-001	Required	Create Key Vault with RBAC authorization, soft-delete, purge protection, and public access disabled
AZ-KV-002	Required	Assign Key Vault RBAC roles to application identities

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AZ-KV-001

Create Key Vault with RBAC authorization, soft-delete, purge protection, and public access disabled

Severity: Required
Rationale: RBAC is the recommended authorization model; soft-delete and purge protection prevent accidental permanent deletion; private access only
Agents: terraform-agent, bicep-agent, cloud-architect

Targets

• Microsoft.KeyVault/vaults

Companion Resources

Resource	Name	Purpose
Microsoft.Network/privateEndpoints	pe-keyvault	Private endpoint for Key Vault — required when publicNetworkAccess is Disabled
Microsoft.Network/privateDnsZones	privatelink.vaultcore.azure.net	Private DNS zone for Key Vault private endpoint resolution
Microsoft.Insights/diagnosticSettings	diag-keyvault	Diagnostic settings for Key Vault to Log Analytics — audit trail for secret access and key operations

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AZ-KV-002

Assign Key Vault RBAC roles to application identities

Severity: Required
Rationale: Least-privilege access via built-in roles replaces broad access policies
Agents: terraform-agent, bicep-agent, cloud-architect

Targets

• Microsoft.KeyVault/vaults

Companion Resources

Resource	Name	Purpose
Microsoft.Authorization/roleAssignments	Key Vault Secrets User	Key Vault Secrets User role (4633458b-17de-408a-b874-0445c86b69e6) for reading secrets
Microsoft.Authorization/roleAssignments	Key Vault Crypto User	Key Vault Crypto User role (12338af0-0e69-4776-bea7-57ae8d297424) for cryptographic operations — ONLY required when the architecture uses key encrypt/decrypt/wrap/unwrap operations

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