Engineering the Datadog Agent for FedRAMP High® Certification

Datadog faced significant challenges in achieving FedRAMP High certification for its Agent software, which operates on customer-managed infrastructure and must adhere to stringent security and compliance requirements. Unlike the FedRAMP Moderate baseline, the High baseline demands more rigorous control enforcement and cryptographic operations, eliminating exceptions allowed in the Moderate level. The transition required a complete redesign of the Agent's architecture to integrate cryptographic enforcement directly into its runtimes, rather than relying on an external proxy, which was the solution for Moderate compliance. This redesign involved selecting between cryptographic implementations for Go and Python runtimes, ultimately opting for Microsoft's Go distribution to ensure broader platform support and control over cryptographic libraries. The new architecture simplifies customer interactions by embedding cryptographic operations within the Agent itself, thus reducing environment-specific configurations and facilitating easier compliance demonstrations during audits. Despite achieving certification, Datadog remains committed to maintaining compliance as system components evolve, ensuring the Agent continues to meet FedRAMP High requirements.

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