Short-circuit data access

A policy system enforces data security policies for requests from accessing data stored on a distributed data storage system received from a client device. The policy enforcement system can determine user credentials from the requests. The enforcement system then determines whether the user credentials allow the request to retrieve the data and if yes, whether the user credentials allow the request to retrieve the data without obligations. Upon determining that user credentials allow the request to retrieve the data without obligations, the policy enforcement system directs the client device to communicate directly with a name node of the data storage system, short-circuiting additional data retrieval and filtering of the policy system.