Failure Pattern
Microsegmentation enforces path restrictions but still trusts metadata-based identity. Attackers impersonate allowed workloads.
What We See in the Field
A compromised workload reuses IPs, tags, or certificates to traverse segmented boundaries. Microseg allows it because identity checks are shallow.
Underlying Causes
Metadata-based segmentation
Certificate reuse
Dynamic cloud drift
No workload-bound identity
Static rules in dynamic environments
Trust-Native Network Resolution
DTL enforces segmentation on cryptographic identity. Attackers cannot impersonate trusted workloads even if metadata appears correct.
Broken Trust Assumption
This failure pattern has played out repeatedly in real security incidents—not because of missing tools, but because of how trust is assigned.
In breaches such as SolarWinds, Capital One, Okta, and MOVEit, attackers did not bypass security controls. They operated through them, using valid identities, trusted credentials, signed code, and encrypted sessions. Security systems accepted these signals as proof of legitimacy, allowing malicious behavior to proceed.
The common thread across these incidents is structural: identity was assumed based on trust signals, not proven at the moment of execution.