What is Identity Governance and Administration (IGA)?

Identity and access management (IAM) and identity governance and administration (IGA) work hand-in-hand to control access to resources, prevent data breaches, and comply with regulations. IGA isn’t something offered by Ping, but we work with partners that provide this crucial solution. Read on to learn more about IGA, its importance in any security strategy, and how IGA and IAM work together.

What is Identity Governance and Administration (IGA)?

Identity Governance and Administration, also known as IGA in cybersecurity or identity security, is a strategic approach to security that aims to help companies reduce cyber risk, manage digital identities and access privileges, and comply with government regulations to secure sensitive information. Thanks to Identity Governance and Administration, sys admins have better visibility into identities and access privileges and can implement the necessary controls to thwart unauthorized or dangerous access. So basically, to prevent data breaches, they ensure that the right users have access only to the information they need.

Why is IGA important for companies?

Identity Governance and Administration security’s value was first acknowledged in 2012 when the world’s leading information technology research and advisory company Gartner said it is the fastest-growing sector in the identity and access management market.

In the corporate world, growing digitization translates to more devices, users, and information across on-premises and multi-cloud or remote environments. Hence, sometimes it is challenging to successfully manage user identities and access in such intricate IT security settings. When users are granted unrestricted or unnecessary access to computer systems, apps, or data, security risks increase, the volume of cyber threats also increases, and the organization becomes vulnerable to cyber-attacks and data breaches.

By using IGA solutions, as part of the cloud governance approach, IT teams can monitor and manage user access for both on-premises and cloud-based systems. They can protect users by making sure that the right user accounts can access the right systems and identify and stop unauthorized access. Organizations can reduce risk and keep up with regulatory compliance by putting the right controls in place with Identity Governance and Administration.

Benefits of Identity Governance and Administration

Digital work environments are increasing in complexity, with more demands for access to more apps. In fact, companies will deploy 95% of new digital workloads to the cloud by 2025. Each new application requires a new onboarding process and point of entry, complicating access. IGA ensures enterprises can scale their complex environments, keeping the convenience of cloud-based services without the specter of escalating breaches.

Benefits of Identity Governance and Administration include:

• Scalable access: Because it’s automated, access is more easily scalable to multiple environments with multiple permissions. That makes for faster provisioning, even as the number of users grows.
• Streamlined user lifecycle: Automation makes employee onboarding and offboarding practically effortless. When employees change roles, their permissions change immediately—just adjust their role, and all apps and databases set the correct access level.
• Automatic logging of access requests: A central vantage point ensures visibility into possible breaches, providing greater control over users, devices, and networks. That makes problems easier to spot and resolve.
• Enhanced reporting: Reports and analytics include information from across the entire IT environment for easy auditing. Automated reporting minimizes errors and supports more accurate decision-making.
• Safer remote and hybrid work: Employees, regardless of their location, can access the data they need from multiple devices. That lets businesses stay flexible and workers stay productive.

What is the role of IGA in Identity Security?

Identity governance helps support overall identity management, IT security, and regulatory compliance. Its purpose is to ensure that identity and access management (IAM) policies are monitored and enforced to make sure users only have access to the resources they are authorized to access.

Identity Governance and Administration can be used for:

• Onboarding and offboarding employees
• Auditing and compliance reporting
• Managing access to resources across IT environments (on-premises, SaaS, and cloud-based applications)
• Visibility into provisioning and entitlements
• Reducing risk and strengthening security

How is IGA Different from IAM?

Identity Governance and Administration is a sub-category of Identity and Access Management (IAM). However, IGA systems provide additional functionality beyond standard the IAM solution and help address common IAM challenges.

For example, inappropriate and/or outdated access to enterprise resources is a common problem in IAM. A remote workforce, time-consuming provisioning processes, weak Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policies and strict compliance requirements are some other identity management system challenges. These issues increase security risk and weaken organizations’ compliance posture. However, organizations can address these challenges by strengthening their identity solutions with IGA.

With IGA, organizations can automate the workflows for access approvals and reduce risk. They can also define and enforce IAM policies and audit user access processes for compliance reporting. That’s why many organizations use IGA to meet the compliance requirements laid out in GDPR, HIPAA, SOX, and PCI DSS.

Conclusion

An Identity Governance and Administration approach helps ease the IT team’s burden by enabling the organization to automate processes that include access requests by role and manage bulk approvals. Regardless of the size of your company, it’s essential to acknowledge the importance of cybersecurity and be aware of the risk of breaches caused by gaps between erroneous access and security concerns.

In a nutshell, these types of solutions aid organizations in minimizing risks, improving their identity access management, boosting compliance and audit performance, increasing productivity and efficiency, and cutting costs.