What Is Bring Your Own Key (BYOK)? | IBM

Bring your own key (BYOK) and hold your own key (HYOK) both give organizations more control over encryption, but they differ in how and where the keys are stored and managed.

With BYOK, the organization creates and owns the encryption keys but uploads them to the cloud provider’s key management system to use with cloud services.

With HYOK, the organization keeps the encryption keys entirely in its own environment and never shares them with the cloud provider. This arrangement offers a higher level of control and privacy, but it’s more complex to manage and not supported by all cloud services.

BYOK offers convenience with control, while HYOK offers maximum control but with more responsibility.