Protecting information assets – and the business as a whole – requires a way to identify, assess and take the necessary steps to reduce IT-related risk to an acceptable level. However, many organizations neglect to perform any sort of risk assessment for identity compliance because they have no way to tie business risk information to low-level identity data. Plus, most companies have tens of thousands of employees, thousands of systems and gigabytes of data spread across multiple geographies.

As a result, they have no way to focus resources or efforts based on business risk. These companies fall into the trap of applying compliance monitoring and controls across the board to all users and all applications. However, all users are not the same. Treating them as such results in a "boil the ocean" approach that leaves many businesses crippled under the weight of their compliance or governance initiatives.

Compliance IQ is packed with features designed expressly for identity risk management. Using Compliance IQ's Identity Risk Scorecard, businesses can assign a unique multi-factor score to specified users. Scores are based on multiple factors – everything from basic profile and job function data to assessment of complex user privilege information mined from the IT environment. The Risk Scorecard combines this business risk information with technical knowledge about systems, data and applications – then generates a graphical snapshot that pinpoints areas of greatest risk. Armed with this information, organizations can then focus their risk-management efforts strategically, track progress and provide quantifiable proof of enhanced security and reduced risk to the business over time.