Danna Bethlehem | Director, Product Marketing
Thales is happy to participate in the first-ever Identity Management Day which is held on 13 April 2021. The purpose of this event is to raise awareness and “educate business leaders, IT decision-makers, and the general public about the importance of managing and securing digital identities.”
Why is this important?
As businesses and organizations are migrating apps, services and data to the cloud, and as all enterprise users work remotely in a post pandemic world, it has become obvious that traditional, perimeter-based “castle and moat” style security strategies/controls are not adequate anymore.
In an era where security strategies are adapting to the “trust no one, verify everywhere” mantra, validating that only authorized and authenticated individuals gain access to corporate assets and data is a necessity. Data is the asset and it must be protected, but effective security in the modern perimeter-less enterprise requires a layered approach. Therefore first and foremost, identity and access to sensitive data and applications must be protected. The statistics dictate that it is time for businesses to evolve their security policies and move to an identity-centric security strategy.
- 79% of organizations have experienced an identity-related security breach in the last two years.
- 81% of security breaches leverage weak, stolen, or otherwise compromised credentials.
- 74% of data breaches involve access to a privileged account.
Identity is the new perimeter
Identity is the new perimeter in a perimeter-less business environment. “In a world defined by our use of technology, how we are identified digitally is important. Our digital identities and the credentials that protect them define how we work, interact with each other, access technology, execute transactions, and so much more,” says Julie Smith, Executive Director at Identity Defined Security Alliance.
Businesses need to evolve their identity management program to a cloud-based, modern Identity and Access Management (IAM) strategy to “enable the right individuals to access the right resources at the right times for the right reasons,” as Gartner notes. A modern and effective IAM policy, based on the least privilege principle, is important for both businesses and their consumers.
With apps, services and data in the cloud, literally everyone is an outsider. Establishing and enforcing robust identity and access security helps businesses to safeguard the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of their assets both in the cloud and on-premises. At the same time, they can protect the privacy of their customers’ personal data and sustain compliance with a growing number of security and privacy regulations, laws, and jurisdictions.
As technology evolves, businesses can select from a great variety of available authentication solutions to strengthen their IAM program. However, they need to balance security with user experience to reap the full spectrum of a robust IAM program. Organizations need to invest in IAM solutions that offer passwordless, multi-factor, adaptive and contextual authentication to support their business cases and risk environment.
A business-oriented approach
In today’s environment, an organization’s authentication solution need not be monolithic. The variety of available authentication methods allows organizations and agencies to employ standards-based, pluggable authentication solutions based on mission need. Stronger authentication and adopting methods with higher authentication assurance levels, requires malicious actors to have better capabilities and expend greater resources to successfully subvert the authentication access. Stronger authentication really can effectively reduce the risk of attacks.
Thales offers the SafeNet suite of identity and access management solutions to help you protect your data and secure your digital transformation initiatives. You may read the following resources to learn how you can benefit:
Passwordless Authentication: https://cpl.thalesgroup.com/resources/access-management/passwordless-authentication-white-paper
A Comprehensive Guide to Authentication Mechanisms: https://cpl.thalesgroup.com/resources/access-management/strong-authentication-technologies-survey-white-paper
Migrating from Legacy IAM to Modern Access Management: https://cpl.thalesgroup.com/resources/access-management/migrating-from-legacy-iam-to-modern-access-management-white-paper
SafeNet Access Management and Authentication Solutions: https://cpl.thalesgroup.com/resources/access-management/safenet-access-management-authentication-solutions-solution-brief