How does this compare to Userify's plain-jane SSH key technique?
That agent (Python, single-file https://github.com/userify/shim) sticks with decentralized regular keys and only centralizes the control plane, which seems to be more reliable in case your auth server goes offline - you can still login to your servers (obviously no new users or updates to existing keys). It just automates user and sudo configuration using things like adduser and /etc/sudoers.d. (It also actively kills user sessions and removes the user account when they're deleted, which is great for when you're walking someone out in case they have cron-jobs or a long-running tmux session with a revenge script.)
This project looks powerful but with a lot of heavy dependencies, which seem like an increased surface area (like Userify's Active Directory integration, but at least that's optional)
I believe the idea of this scheme is so that the NSA tailored access operations staff embedded in organizations such as google and cloudflare can authorize access without having to individually intercept each server (or jumphost) you own.
You benefit from more reliable shipping delivery times, no more mysterious city-of-industry->ftmeade->sanfrancisco detours or hardware that fails prematurely due to uncleaned flux or whiskers from implant installations.
That agent (Python, single-file https://github.com/userify/shim) sticks with decentralized regular keys and only centralizes the control plane, which seems to be more reliable in case your auth server goes offline - you can still login to your servers (obviously no new users or updates to existing keys). It just automates user and sudo configuration using things like adduser and /etc/sudoers.d. (It also actively kills user sessions and removes the user account when they're deleted, which is great for when you're walking someone out in case they have cron-jobs or a long-running tmux session with a revenge script.)
This project looks powerful but with a lot of heavy dependencies, which seem like an increased surface area (like Userify's Active Directory integration, but at least that's optional)