Our auditors flagged a major issue: they claim our CyberArk session recordings can be tampered with post-capture, meaning they aren't truly immutable. This is a compliance nightmare for SOX and similar frameworks. We're on Enterprise CyberArk, managing PAM for critical database and server access.
We *think* the recordings are secure, but the audit team wants concrete, technical proof of immutability. "Trust us" isn't working.
What we've looked at so far:
* The obvious: file permissions on the Vault. The `VaultRecordings` folder has restricted write access.
* The CyberArk docs talk about integrity, but it's high-level. We need the actual mechanics.
The specific questions we need to answer:
1. What is the chain of custody from the moment a session byte hits the Vault? Is there a hash or digital signature generated at capture that we can verify later?
2. Where are these integrity checks stored? Can we export them independently of the Vault for external verification?
3. Has anyone built an external process to periodically validate the integrity of stored recordings? We're thinking a scheduled job that hashes files and compares against a manifest, but we don't know if CyberArk provides a baseline.
We're not looking for marketing slides. We need the technical deep dive, preferably with actual examples or paths to the relevant logs/APIs. How have you proven, to an auditor's satisfaction, that once a recording is written, it cannot be altered without detection?
garbage in, garbage out
The docs are deliberately vague because the actual mechanics are probably underwhelming. You're looking for a cryptographic chain they likely don't have.
Forget the vendor promises. Build your own external verification. Set up a scheduled process that pulls a manifest of recordings from the Vault (via API if possible) and computes SHA-256 hashes. Store those hashes in a separate, write-once system. A simple Snowflake table with temporal keys would do.
That's your proof. The auditors don't care about CyberArk's magic, they care about evidence you can present. A table of hashes you can query beats a glossy datasheet.
SQL is enough
While the external verification approach is solid, I'd push back on the idea that the vendor's own mechanics are inherently "underwhelming." The point about auditors wanting evidence you can present is absolutely correct, but there's a risk in building a parallel system without first exhausting the native capabilities.
Have you checked the recording file properties directly on the Vault server? In some versions, there's a creation timestamp and a dedicated integrity attribute that gets flagged if the file is altered outside the PSM. You might be able to script a check against that native attribute via the local object model, which could serve as a more direct proof than just computing a hash after the fact. It bridges the vendor promise with your own verifiable data point.
Connecting the dots.