Government Agency Automates Digital Certificate Management to Reduce Complexity and Prevent Security Incidents

Venafi, the inventor of machine identity management, today announced that the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has implemented Venafi’s TLS Protect solution to automate the entire lifecycle of digital certificates and other machine identities to meet cybersecurity requirements.

In March 2023, the White House released its National Cybersecurity Strategy to strengthen cybersecurity for the nation and better defend against increasingly malicious cyber threats. At the core of securing modern applications are machine identities such as digital certificates and keys, which protect the information that flows from machines to machines – much like usernames and passwords protect human identities. Compromised machine identities can have a significant security impact on organizations, and effective machine identity management is critical to preventing security incidents and application outages.

“At the USPTO, we receive more than 600,000 patent and trademark applications annually. To keep up with the innovation that comes through our doors every day, we bake technical innovation into everything we do – from machine learning and AI to machine identity management – to improve the efficiency, performance and security of our operations,” said Jamie Holcombe, Chief Information Officer at the USPTO. “Implementing Venafi into our software infrastructure enables us to better manage and secure all the machine identities across our organization and fulfill one of the five pillars of the National Cybersecurity Strategy.”

The USPTO’s Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) team historically managed the certificate process manually, which was time-consuming with many steps and created potential pitfalls and barriers throughout the process. Venafi’s platform allows the team to automate the entire machine identity management process across more than 10,000 machines, streamlining digital certificate issuance – including better certificate organization and customized alerting – and reducing the risk of private key theft through shorter key lifespans. Since implementing Venafi, the USPTO has significantly cut down the certificate process time from 10 hours to 30 minutes.

“Today, organizations not only need to be vigilant when it comes to security, but they must also take proactive measures to protect themselves and their customers,” said Jeff Hudson, Chief Executive Officer at Venafi. “What’s more, amid federal directives and guidance related to hardening public sector cybersecurity posture, security has never been more important for this industry. Identity is the foundation of security, and with the growth in both variance and volume of machines, effective management of the identities of these machines is critical for security. With Venafi, the leader and inventor of machine identity management, the USPTO is making strides in innovation while ensuring bad actors aren’t taking advantage of machine identities.”