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Accelerating the New Data Frontier of Identity Governance with IdentityIQ File Access Manager 6.0

Today there is a perfect storm of risk brewing within many organizations as they attempt to manage access to more applications, and more files and documents amongst a sea of growing internal and external threats. In an atmosphere already congested with regulations, we’re also seeing the impact of GDPR (which just took effect), perhaps the most far-reaching mandate to protect the privacy of EU citizen personal data. Unfortunately, most organizations do not have a comprehensive identity governance approach to weather the storm.

Many identity programs are focused on controlling access to the variety of applications that users interface with every day, such as SAP, Workday or Salesforce. But as organizations undergo a digital transformation and users become more collaborative, much of the data once within these applications is being extracted to create documents, spreadsheets, reports and presentations. This data is typically stored in local file shares or in cloud storage systems such as Box and OneDrive.

This is where the typical application-focused identity program begins to break down. Without any governance controls that extend to these file shares and cloud storage systems, there is little to no visibility or control to this data is being accessed by the business. For a company that must adhere to HIPAA or GDPR requirements, it’s difficult to know where their files are, what’s in them, who has access, and how they’re being used. Lacking appropriate governance policies and processes, cyber threats including data breach and ransomware now become very real risks with significant financial and reputational consequences.

Introducing IdentityIQ File Access Manager 6.0

As we continue through this era of digital transformation, data has taken center stage for identity governance. With the introduction of IdentityIQ File Access Manager 6.0, companies can take the next step in extending their identity governance strategy to include sensitive data stored in files. IdentityIQ File Access Manager, as part of a comprehensive identity program, enables organizations to find and control access to the explosion of sensitive data, monitor for suspicious activity, and confidently address today’s complex regulations.

What’s New in IdentityIQ File Access Manager 6.0

In this latest release, organizations now have the freedom of choice to deploy IdentityIQ File Access Manager on cloud platforms including AWS and Azure, or in the data center with the same identity governance functionality. Enterprises with a cloud-first strategy can now govern access to files stored in the cloud or on-premises resources, and realize the elasticity and scalability benefits of deploying IdentityIQ File Access Manager from a cloud infrastructure.

A new connector architecture provides significant advances in performance and scalability, especially in large storage environments. With an adaptive connectivity model, organizations can simultaneously deploy multiple connector engines as needed to accelerate data classification and permission analysis tasks. New low-footprint indexing, regardless of data volume, allows for optimized data classification without the need to allocate long-term storage for indexing.

IdentityIQ File Access Manager 6.0 also provides enhanced risk-based forensics and alert management that arm security and audit teams with the tools needed to quickly detect and remediate suspicious activities. The updated forensics interface provides dashboard-level insight into user activities and surfaces the suspicious behavior with the highest risk to take appropriate action.

Also, an enhanced alert management framework now supports alerts based on threshold triggers, which provide notifications when threat patterns associated with complex threats such as ransomware are detected within file storage resources.

Preparing Your Organization for the Next Data Frontier

Data is a force that will continue to proliferate, and with it bring about escalating risk and a variety of threats that enterprises cannot continue to ignore. By establishing a comprehensive identity governance approach across applications and files, you can safely navigate through your digital transformation and prepare your organization for the new frontier.

To learn more about how IdentityIQ File Access Manager can help you secure your files as part of a holistic identity program, watch Securing Sensitive Data Stored in Files in a Digital World.


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