Machine Identity Attestation On-Prem with SPIRE and TPM

On-premises workloads often lack the native machine-identity integration available in AWS, GCP, and Azure, leading some organizations—particularly those operating regulated or self-managed infrastructure—to rely on hardcoded credentials despite their security risks. The approach described uses a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) or virtual TPM as a hardware-rooted identity, SPIFFE/SPIRE to attest machines and issue short-lived SPIFFE Verifiable Identity Documents (SVIDs) or JWTs, and Infisical to provide authenticated access to secrets. A SPIRE server validates TPM endorsement-key hashes, while agents on virtual machines authenticate to the server and can issue identities scoped not only to a host but also to a specific systemd service through workload selectors. The walkthrough outlines configuring SPIRE server and agent binaries, TPM attestation plugins, trust bundles, systemd services, node and workload registration, and JWT-based login to Infisical. This model avoids storing long-lived secrets on machines, automatically renews credentials, and restricts secret access to verified workloads, aiming to replicate cloud-style machine authentication on self-managed hardware.

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