Four Things to Consider About Privileged Access Management
Recently the Privileged Access Management (PAM) becomes the most effective security management method with its ability to provide comprehensive end-to-end solutions to achieve data security for companies. The most prominent reason for this is neither the government agencies nor the private sector is safe from cyber-attacks, regardless of time and location. As hackers evolve in terms of their resources and methods, so are the security features taken to stop them.
Although the cybersecurity technologies of today are quite efficient, they are not sufficient when deployed as the sole precaution. Keep in mind for any security precaution, including Privileged Access Management, the people who create malicious software are not machines, therefore the situations may not always play out by the book. For that reason, as institutions deploy the security infrastructure, it becomes imperative to move forward with a structure that focuses on the human factor as much as the technologies. This requires a foreseeing approach against the internal and external threats. Therefore, infrastructures that offer data security such as Privileged Access Management (PAM), which provides multi-layer, user-based, and instant system monitoring, have become non-negligible. In general, Privileged Access Management applications consist of four main elements and manage to balance the technology and human factors. You can enhance your business' data security precautions to the next level via Privileged Access Management by following the steps below.
1. Monitor and Secure All Privileged Accounts
The identification and control of authorized accounts are among the fundamental and crucial elements of Privileged Access Management. Regardless of being malicious, an uncontrolled authorized account will pose a risk. For instance, if an employee bestowed with privileged access rights without supervision has a momentary slip-up, this may cause significant security gaps and compromise your company's critical data.
For efficient process management regarding privileged access; always act with knowledge in hand, always be aware of the users and their respective access rights, the people who conduct improper operations must be kept under record and reviewed, and if required, their access rights should be restricted. In order to execute these steps in a healthy, seamless, and efficient manner, you can use a Privileged Access Management platform having a modular structure at its multiple security layers.
2. Manage and Control Access
The two most basic steps in Privileged Access Management determine the accounts with privileged access and the diligent specification of the areas that these accounts can access. Therefore, it is required to manage the people who have authorized accounts and the changes through these accounts in time and control regularly. As we mentioned in our article regarding the Principle of Least Privilege, individual authorized accounts can be monitored by Privileged Access Management to achieve maximum efficiency without disrupting business processes while keeping the privileges of the users that access the data fields at a minimum level.
For an effective control process regarding privileged access, technologies such as privileged session manager, two-factor authentication (2FA), dynamic password manager allow you to control authorized accounts and audit the process completed via these accounts. Furthermore, Privileged Access Management offers time, location, or device-based verification features and thus ensures only the authorized accounts to access the system within specified hours, from specified locations or specified devices. Therefore, all these advanced and detailed applications provide a huge advantage in terms of data security.
3. Record and Audit Privileged Account Activities
Audits and controls conducted by people are as important as technology-supported controls in terms of Privileged Access Management. For this purpose, the access, authorization and/or data security system should have efficient features in terms of recording and reporting the activities of the authorized accounts on the system, in addition to taking high-level precautions. Therefore, these accounts with various levels of privileges, changes on these accounts, or the actions conducted by these accounts can be reviewed via video recordings and can be effectively audited.
4. Ensure More Functional Privileged Tasks
It is best to adopt a holistic and functional approach that consists of all real and virtual users inside or outside the system to provide a seamless, technology and human-focused cybersecurity infrastructure. For this purpose, in addition to the employees, the supply chain providers, i.e., third parties and the database services, i.e., virtual users should be taken into consideration. Otherwise, it is possible to experience various vulnerabilities and failures in terms of cybersecurity. Therefore, the details about the identification of these users should be carefully reviewed during the Privileged Access Management integration, the room for human error should be minimized or removed. At this stage, as one of the fundamental steps of risk management, the application of the Principle of Segregation of Duties approach is critical. Privileged Access Management applications which can automatize and control the principle of Segregation of Duties requirements, make authorized account management more efficient and functional.
Kron’s PAM solution Single Connect which is also a niche player in Gartner Magic Quadrant for Privileged Access Management (PAM) report, increases operational efficiency by automatizing routine tasks. It also compiles all applications that your company may require to ensure access and data security such as privileged task automation, central password management, two-factor authorization, and dynamic data masking.
