Upgrade

This chapter details how to update an existing KeySafe 5 install to the latest version.

When upgrading KeySafe 5 it is recommended to first update the Helm charts installed in the central platform and then update all KeySafe 5 Agent installs on host machines being managed by KeySafe 5.

Upgrading from KeySafe 5 1.4

To upgrade the release of a Helm Chart we do a helm upgrade command, see Helm Upgrade

List all installed releases using helm list -A.

$ helm list -A
NAME            	NAMESPACE      	REVISION	UPDATED                                	STATUS  	CHART                         	APP VERSION
keysafe5-backend	nshieldkeysafe5	1       	2024-04-25 15:59:40.995994525 +0100 BST	deployed	nshield-keysafe5-backend-1.4.0	1.4.0
keysafe5-istio  	nshieldkeysafe5	1       	2024-04-25 15:58:09.344300669 +0100 BST	deployed	nshield-keysafe5-istio-1.4.0  	1.4.0
keysafe5-ui     	nshieldkeysafe5	1       	2024-04-25 15:57:42.260802671 +0100 BST	deployed	nshield-keysafe5-ui-1.4.0     	1.4.0
mongo-chart     	mongons        	1       	2024-04-25 15:55:05.825098514 +0100 BST	deployed	mongodb-12.1.31               	5.0.10
rabbit-chart    	rabbitns       	1       	2024-04-25 15:58:19.881365343 +0100 BST	deployed	rabbitmq-11.16.2              	3.11.18

Ensure all pods are healthy prior to performing an upgrade, unhealthy pods can prevent helm from fully completing an upgrade.

The process involves upgrading the charts in the following order:

mongo-chart
keysafe5-backend
keysafe5-ui
keysafe5-istio
keysafe5-prometheus
keysafe5-alertmanager

Unpack the source

mkdir ~/keysafe5-1.6.1
tar -C ~/keysafe5-1.6.1 -xf nshield-keysafe5-1.6.1.tar.gz
cd ~/keysafe5-1.6.1/keysafe5-k8s

Docker Images

The Docker images need to be loaded onto a Docker registry that each node in your Kubernetes cluster can pull the images from.

Follow the instructions on this section of the install guide to do this: Docker Images.

Moving the CA

The CA needs to be moved from the 1.4 directory of KeySafe 5 to the 1.6.1 directory. Depending on your existing setup this is done in different ways. This guide includes the steps for moving internalCA and externalCA.

Both methods use the ~/keysafe5-1.6.1/keysafe5-k8s/updateinternalcerts.sh script.

externalCA

For externalCA a new directory will need to be created in the 1.6.1 upgrade directory. This directory will need to contain the server, the client keys and certificates in PEM format.

mkdir ~/keysafe5-1.6.1/keysafe5-k8s/externalCA

The following files will need to be included in this directory:

  ca.crt                      The certificate of the CA that is to be trusted by
                              the system.
  agentcomms.key              The key to be used by the Agent Communications
                              Server
  agentcomms.crt              And its certificate
  ks5agentcomms.key           The key to be used by ks5
  ks5agentcomms.crt           And its certificate
  mongodb-0.key               The key to be used by mongo-chart-mongodb-0
  mongodb-0.crt               And its certificate
  mongodb-1.key               The key to be used by mongo-chart-mongodb-1
  mongodb-1.crt               And its certificate
  mongodb-a.key               The key to be used by mongo-chart-mongodb-arbiter
  mongodb-a.crt               And its certificate
  ks5mongodb.key              The key to be used by ks5-mongo-user
  ks5mongodb.crt              And its certificate

Once this directory has been created, updateinternalcerts.sh can be used to refresh certificates:

This specific command refresh certificates in the "certs" namespace, for more instructions refer to the help of updateinternalcerts.sh

./updateinternalcerts.sh -n certs externalCA

internalCA

If you are using internalCA then the CA is contained within a folder called "CA" or "internalCA" of the previous installation. Copy this existing folder into the current directory for the upgrade. This might be something like

cp -r ~/existing-ks5-install/internalCA .

Then generate the new certificates using updateinternalcerts.sh. The following example sets the expiration date for 1 year. This command may appear to fail, but if a folder called keysafe5-cert-update-agentcomms is created then this step was successful.

./updateinternalcerts.sh agentcomms 365

Create secrets

In order for the services to communicate with the message bus, secrets need to be created to be referenced during helm installation. Now that the CAs have been moved, these secrets can be made. Replace "CA" in the following scripts with the name of the CA you created in the previous step.

kubectl create secret generic agentcomms-server-certificates \
  --namespace=nshieldkeysafe5 \
  --from-file=ca.crt=CA/cacert.pem \
  --from-file=tls.crt=keysafe5-cert-update-agentcomms/agentcomms.crt \
  --from-file=tls.key=keysafe5-cert-update-agentcomms/agentcomms.key

kubectl create secret generic agentcomms-client-certificates \
  --namespace=nshieldkeysafe5 \
  --from-file=ca.crt=CA/cacert.pem \
  --from-file=tls.crt=keysafe5-cert-update-agentcomms/keysafe5-backend-services.crt \
  --from-file=tls.key=keysafe5-cert-update-agentcomms/keysafe5-backend-services.key

MongoDB to 8.0.13

To update a non-Kubernetes existing MongoDB install to a MongoDB 8.0.13 install, see the official documentation at Upgrade to the Latest Revision of MongoDB.

To update a MongoDB 8.0.13 install deployed via Bitnami Helm Charts:

First ensure that MongoDB is running.

helm list -A

Fetch the existing helm chart’s settings

helm -n mongons get values --output yaml mongo-chart > mongo-chart-values.yaml

The password and replicaset key have not changed, so we can upgrade.

helm upgrade --install mongo-chart \
  --namespace mongons \
  --set image.registry=$DOCKER_REGISTRY \
  --set image.tag=8.0.13-debian-12-r0-2025-09-15 \
  --set image.repository=keysafe5/bitnami/mongodb \
  --set tls.image.registry=$DOCKER_REGISTRY \
  --set tls.image.tag=1.29.1-debian-12-r0-2025-09-15 \
  --set tls.image.repository=keysafe5/bitnami/nginx \
  --set architecture=replicaset \
  --set auth.enabled=true \
  --set image.debug=false \
  --set systemLogVerbosity=5 \
  --set auth.rootPassword=secret \
  --set tls.enabled=true \
  --set tls.mTLS.enabled=true \
  --set tls.autoGenerated=false \
  --set 'tls.replicaset.existingSecrets={mongodb-certs-0, mongodb-certs-1}' \
  --set tls.arbiter.existingSecret=mongodb-certs-arbiter-0 \
  --set featureCompatibilityVersion=7.0 \
  --set global.security.allowInsecureImages=true \
  --values mongo-chart-values.yaml \
  --wait --timeout 3m \
  helm-charts/bitnami-mongodb-17.0.0.tgz

There will be some warnings regarding rolling tags and container substitution. This is expected as we are using the container images supplied in the release package. See Release Package - Docker Images for more information.

Obtain details of newly deployed helm charts.

helm list -A

Define and update the new database users

First connect to the database

export MONGO1=mongo-chart-mongodb-0.mongo-chart-mongodb-headless.mongons.svc.cluster.local:27017
export MONGO2=mongo-chart-mongodb-1.mongo-chart-mongodb-headless.mongons.svc.cluster.local:27017
export MONGODB=${MONGO1},${MONGO2}
export MONGO_RUN="kubectl -n mongons exec mongo-chart-mongodb-0 0 -- "
export TLS_PRIVKEY="$(${MONGO_RUN} bash -c 'cat /certs/mongodb.pem')"
export TLS_CERT="$(${MONGO_RUN} bash -c 'cat /certs/mongodb-ca-cert')"

export MONGODB_ROOT_PASSWORD=$(kubectl get secret --namespace mongons \
mongo-chart-mongodb -o jsonpath="{.data.mongodb-root-password}" \
  | base64 --decode)

kubectl run --namespace mongons mongo-chart-mongodb-client \
  --rm --tty -i --restart='Never' --env="MONGODB_ROOT_PASSWORD=$MONGODB_ROOT_PASSWORD" \
  --env="TLS_PRIVKEY=$TLS_PRIVKEY" --env="TLS_CERT=$TLS_CERT" --env="MONGODB=$MONGODB" \
  --image $DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/bitnami/mongodb:8.0.13-debian-12-r0-2025-09-15 --command -- bash

then new definitions have to be added

$ echo "$TLS_CERT" > /tmp/tls.crt
$ echo "$TLS_PRIVKEY" > /tmp/tls.key
$ mongosh admin --tls --tlsCAFile /tmp/tls.crt --tlsCertificateKeyFile /tmp/tls.key \
  --host $MONGODB --authenticationDatabase admin -u root -p $MONGODB_ROOT_PASSWORD

> use admin
> db.createRole(
  {
    role: "monitoring-mgmt-db-user",
    privileges: [
        {
          "resource": {"db": "monitoring-mgmt-db", "collection": ""},
          "actions": ["createIndex", "find", "insert", "remove", "update"]
        },
      ],
    roles: []
  }
)
> db.createRole(
  {
    role: "licence-mgmt-db-user",
    privileges: [
        {
          "resource": {"db": "licence-mgmt-db", "collection": ""},
          "actions": ["createIndex", "dropCollection", "find", "insert", "remove", "update"]
        },
      ],
    roles: []
  }
)
> db.createRole(
  {
    role: "agent-mgmt-db-user",
    privileges: [
        {
          "resource": {"db": "agent-mgmt-db", "collection": ""},
          "actions": ["createIndex", "dropCollection", "find", "insert", "remove", "update"]
        },
      ],
    roles: []
  }
)
> db.updateRole( "hsm-mgmt-db-user",
  {
    privileges : [
        {
          "resource": {"db": "hsm-mgmt-db", "collection": ""},
          "actions": ["createIndex", "dropIndex", "find", "insert", "remove", "update"]
        },
      ]
  }
)
> use $external
> x509_user = {
   "roles" : [
     {"role": "agent-mgmt-db-user", "db": "admin" },
     {"role": "codesafe-mgmt-db-user", "db": "admin" },
     {"role": "hsm-mgmt-db-user", "db": "admin" },
     {"role": "sw-mgmt-db-user", "db": "admin" },
     {"role": "monitoring-mgmt-db-user", "db": "admin" },
     {"role": "licence-mgmt-db-user", "db": "admin" },
   ]
 }
> db.updateUser("CN=ks5-mongo-user", x509_user)
> exit
$ exit

Upgrading the KeySafe 5 backend

The parameters used for the running Helm chart need to be retrieved into a file called keysafe5-backed-values.yaml.

helm -n nshieldkeysafe5 get values --all --output yaml keysafe5-backend > keysafe5-backend-values.yaml

The new services, monitoring_mgmt, licence_mgmt and agent_mgmt support the same common values as other services, such as probe thresholds. These can be added to the keysafe5-backend-values.yaml file if desired.

In order to send email notifications for alerts, an email server must be configured. The additional required configuration options need to be added to the instructions for installing the KeySafe 5 backend services below.

  --set monitoring_mgmt.alertmanager.email.smarthost=email.server.com:port \
  --set monitoring_mgmt.alertmanager.email.from=no-reply@yourdomain.com \
  --set monitoring_mgmt.alertmanager.email.auth_username=username \
  --set monitoring_mgmt.alertmanager.email.auth_password=password \

helm upgrade --install keysafe5-backend \
  --namespace=nshieldkeysafe5 \
  --set hsm_mgmt.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/hsm-mgmt:1.6.1 \
  --set sw_mgmt.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/sw-mgmt:1.6.1 \
  --set codesafe_mgmt.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/codesafe-mgmt:1.6.1 \
  --set agent_mgmt.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/agent-mgmt:1.6.1 \
  --set licence_mgmt.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/licence-mgmt:1.6.1 \
  --set monitoring_mgmt.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/monitoring-mgmt:1.6.1 \
  --set messageBus.compatibilityMode=true \
  --set messageBus.URL=127.0.0.1:18084 \
  --set messageBus.auth.type=tls \
  --set messageBus.tls.enabled=true \
  --set messageBus.tls.existingSecret=agentcomms-client-certificates \
  --set messageBus.serverTLS.existingSecret=agentcomms-server-certificates \
  --values keysafe5-backend-values.yaml \
  --wait --timeout 3m \
  helm-charts/nshield-keysafe5-backend-1.6.1.tgz

Upgrading the KeySafe 5 UI

The same process as for the backend is also used for the UI:

helm -n nshieldkeysafe5 get values --all --output yaml keysafe5-ui > keysafe5-ui-values.yaml

You may make changes to the yaml files before upgrading though this is not required.

helm upgrade --install keysafe5-ui \
  --namespace=nshieldkeysafe5 \
  --set ui.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/mgmt-ui:1.6.1 \
  --set ui.pullPolicy=Always \
  --values keysafe5-ui-values.yaml \
  --wait --timeout 3m \
  helm-charts/nshield-keysafe5-ui-1.6.1.tgz

Upgrading the KeySafe 5 Istio

Check the version of Istio installed aligns with the software version of istioctl.

Enable the agent-mgmt port and certificates reference

helm -n nshieldkeysafe5 get values --all --output yaml keysafe5-istio > keysafe5-istio-values.yaml

istioctl x precheck

istioctl upgrade -y \
  --set values.gateways.istio-ingressgateway.ingressPorts[0].name=agent-comms \
  --set values.gateways.istio-ingressgateway.ingressPorts[0].port=18084 \
  --set values.gateways.istio-ingressgateway.ingressPorts[0].protocol=TCP

helm upgrade --install keysafe5-istio \
  --namespace=nshieldkeysafe5  \
  --wait --timeout 3m  \
  --values keysafe5-istio-values.yaml \
  helm-charts/nshield-keysafe5-istio-1.6.1.tgz

Prometheus

Create a file with the name "pvc.yaml" with the following contents in your current folder:

kind: PersistentVolumeClaim
apiVersion: v1
metadata:
  name: prometheus-data-keysafe5
spec:
  storageClassName: local-path
  accessModes:
    - ReadWriteOnce
  resources:
    requests:
      storage: 4Gi

Then it can be created in kubernetes

kubectl apply -f pvc.yaml --namespace=nshieldkeysafe5

Once the volume is created prometheus helm chart can be installed

helm install keysafe5-prometheus \
  --namespace=nshieldkeysafe5 \
  --set HostIP=<HOST_IP> \
  --set prometheus.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/prometheus:v3.6.0-rc.0 \
  --set prometheus.pvc=prometheus-data-keysafe5 \
  --set prometheus.sharedpvc=data-nshield-keysafe5 \
  --wait --timeout 3m \
  helm-charts/nshield-keysafe5-prometheus-1.6.1.tgz

Prometheus Alertmanager

Alertmanager helm chart can be installed with helm install keysafe5-alertmanager.

helm install keysafe5-alertmanager\
  --namespace=nshieldkeysafe5 \
  --set HostIP=<HOST_IP> \
  --set alertmanager.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/alertmanager:v0.28.1 \
  --set alertmanager.sharedpvc=data-nshield-keysafe5 \
  --set sidecar.image=$DOCKER_REGISTRY/keysafe5/alert-manager-sidecar:1.6.1 \
  --set sidecar.configPath=/etc/shared_volume/prometheus \
  --wait --timeout 3m \
  helm-charts/nshield-keysafe5-alertmanager-1.6.1.tgz

Agent Upgrade

The following information may be useful when upgrading:

Agents must be upgraded to 1.6.1 before use, mixing 1.6.1 and 1.4 is not supported.
The TLS certificate doesn’t need to be generated again, as the backed up directory contains it. However, it can be generated again if preferred.
If the agent config from 1.4 is configured with the RabbitMQ(AMQP) message bus it cannot be used in 1.6.1 as RabbitMQ(AMQP) is no longer supported.
Any existing agent configuration files that use the RabbitMQ(AMQP) message bus must be re-configured to use the NATS message bus. Information on configuration can be found in Agent configuration.
New agents that are upgraded to 1.6.1 will be added as new hosts and modules on the UI, old 1.4 agents will be staled and lose connection. These hosts and modules must be manually removed individually. Pools will be removed automatically after hosts and modules are removed.

To update the KeySafe 5 Agent installed on a machine:

Take a backup of the Agent config directory located at %NFAST_DATA_HOME%/keysafe5/conf.
Uninstall the existing KeySafe 5 Agent as detailed in the KeySafe 5 Installation Guide for the currently installed version of the product.
Install the new KeySafe 5 Agent as detailed in chapter KeySafe 5 Agent Installation.

Confirm Upgrade

To ensure that the upgrades have been successful, you can run the following commands and ensure they look similar to the recommended output.

First check:

helm list -A

Output should look like:
[source, subs="attributes"]
NAME                    NAMESPACE       REVISION        UPDATED                                 STATUS       CHART                                   APP VERSION
keysafe5-alertmanager   nshieldkeysafe5 1               2025-09-10 14:26:31.744396244 +0100 BST deployed     nshield-keysafe5-alertmanager-{prod_vrsn}     {prod_vrsn}
keysafe5-backend        nshieldkeysafe5 1               2025-09-10 14:18:14.413954531 +0100 BST deployed     nshield-keysafe5-backend-{prod_vrsn}          {prod_vrsn}
keysafe5-istio          nshieldkeysafe5 1               2025-09-10 10:53:07.370113525 +0100 BST deployed     nshield-keysafe5-istio-{prod_vrsn}            {prod_vrsn}
keysafe5-prometheus     nshieldkeysafe5 1               2025-09-10 14:25:11.814394741 +0100 BST deployed     nshield-keysafe5-prometheus-{prod_vrsn}       {prod_vrsn}
keysafe5-ui             nshieldkeysafe5 1               2025-09-10 10:44:59.935963805 +0100 BST deployed     nshield-keysafe5-ui-{prod_vrsn}               {prod_vrsn}
mongo-chart             mongons         1               2025-09-10 10:31:07.844261312 +0100 BST deployed     mongodb-17.0.0                          8.0.13
rabbit-chart            rabbitns        1               2025-09-10 09:54:54.077173236 +0100 BST deployed     rabbitmq-12.13.1                        3.12.13

As shown in the above example, rabbitmq may still be present. It does not affect the installation whether it is available or not. Once the upgrade is completed, the old RabbitMQ components can be safely removed.

Second check:

kubectl get pods -A

Output should look like:

NAMESPACE         NAME                                         READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
kube-system       coredns-6799fbcd5-sflbm                      1/1     Running   0          5h39m
kube-system       local-path-provisioner-6c86858495-5v8rb      1/1     Running   0          5h39m
kube-system       svclb-rabbit-chart-rabbitmq-750352e4-jt2fl   5/5     Running   0          5h38m
nshieldkeysafe5   ratelimit-588cd5944c-85kck                   1/1     Running   0          5h32m
nshieldkeysafe5   redis-6d75fc6d74-sr852                       1/1     Running   0          5h32m
rabbitns          rabbit-chart-rabbitmq-1                      1/1     Running   0          5h32m
rabbitns          rabbit-chart-rabbitmq-0                      1/1     Running   0          5h31m
mongons           mongo-chart-mongodb-1                        1/1     Running   0          4h56m
mongons           mongo-chart-mongodb-arbiter-0                1/1     Running   0          4h56m
mongons           mongo-chart-mongodb-0                        1/1     Running   0          4h55m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-keysafe5-ui-6d9b97c57b-hjvgv         1/1     Running   0          4h42m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-keysafe5-ui-6d9b97c57b-wchpd         1/1     Running   0          4h42m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-keysafe5-ui-6d9b97c57b-xs9bl         1/1     Running   0          4h41m
istio-system      istiod-6f4cc8459f-wn6cp                      1/1     Running   0          4h35m
kube-system       svclb-istio-ingressgateway-106b0a9e-4lr7w    4/4     Running   0          4h35m
istio-system      istio-ingressgateway-c5fbff6d6-q4b9s         1/1     Running   0          4h35m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-keysafe5-2                           6/6     Running   0          69m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-keysafe5-1                           6/6     Running   0          69m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-keysafe5-0                           6/6     Running   0          68m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-prometheus-0                         1/1     Running   0          62m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-alertmanager-0                       2/2     Running   0          61m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-alertmanager-1                       2/2     Running   0          61m
nshieldkeysafe5   nshield-alertmanager-2                       2/2     Running   0          61m