At the heart of this growing risk is identity, with over 60% of all breaches today involving identity exploitation.
As organizations continue to expand their digital footprints, driven by a move towards cloud resources and remote systems, their identity data, both at a device and user level, also grows.
The attack surface also expands, giving threat actors more scope to leverage identity vulnerabilities and gain access to critical systems.
Reducing these blind spots requires a greater focus on effective identity data management.
Identity data management provides a proactive approach to addressing these threats.
Every component in our IT infrastructure-people, servers, applications-has an identity.
Gaining visibility into how identities can be used to access sensitive data and systems is critical for getting ahead of threats.
A recent report from Gartner highlights that quality identity data is critical for successful security projects and scaling access controls across complex IT environments.
Identity management is imperative for a robust zero-trust architecture.
Even two-factor authentication can be manipulated, which brings us back to the importance of robust identity management.
Identity data informs Zero Trust protocols at every stage.
Understanding the true nature of identity data-including the identity of users, services, applications and devices-is paramount for setting up a Zero Trust architecture.
How to achieve greater visibility over all identity data points.
Firstly, organizations need to develop a clear understanding of what identity data is.
One major issue that tends to be overlooked in cybersecurity discussions, even by esteemed organizations like CISA, is the nuanced role of identity that extends beyond human users.
To implement a genuinely robust security posture, the quality of the identity data is also paramount.
The repercussions of poor-quality identity data can be devastating for a business's security infrastructure.
The integrity of identity data becomes the bedrock upon which all your network security policies should be built.
Implementing robust procedures to ensure data accuracy and continuously auditing and monitoring identity data can thwart attempts to corrupt the system.
This approach demands meticulous attention to the quality, visibility and continuous monitoring of identity data.
This Cyber News was published on www.cyberdefensemagazine.com. Publication date: Tue, 09 Apr 2024 14:43:05 +0000