These days it seems that IT and security professionals can't go a day or week without some new "as-a-service" offering. The proliferation of cloud-powered subscription services has empowered providers to deliver products and software with little or no footprint and management overhead. In the past, limited in-house personnel, costly hardware, and cumbersome implementations often dictated the appetite for new products, software, and services. But now that providers have overcome these issues, businesses' thirst for new services seems almost unquenchable.
Software-as-a-Service (or SaaS), software applications hosted in the cloud, is perhaps the most popular as-a-Service model currently and ranges from enterprise-grade technologies to consumer-grade products like Netflix and Gmail. Many more types of as-a-Service applications exist, including:
- Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), or development tools and servers for building applications in the cloud
- Infrastructure-as-Service (IaaS) or servers in the cloud
- Function-as-a-Service (FaaS) or serverless computing in the cloud
Identity-as-a-Service, or IDaaS, is a type of SaaS.
What Is IDaaS?
Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS) is an identity and access management (IAM) solution delivered as a hosted cloud-based service managed by a trusted third party. IDaaS combines all of the functions and benefits of an enterprise-class identity access management solution with a cloud-based service's delivery model, including operational and cost advantages.
C-suite security and technology leaders implement IDaaS solutions to reduce risk, avoid IT infrastructure cost and complexity and accelerate modernization initiatives for enterprise and beyond. IDaaS identity access management solutions such as Bravura Identity do this by ensuring users are who they claim to be, blocking cybercriminals and other unauthorized users’ access to vital functions and essential data.
What Are the Applications of IDaaS?
You can use IDaaS across any applications that consume or contain user identities to control access to organizational resources. According to Gartner, identity access management solutions and IDaaS implementations, including Bravura Identity, ensure the right individuals have access to the right resources, for the right reasons, at the right time with fundamental identity-based security measures, including:
- Adaptive Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)
- You can protect against credential theft with MFA. A user must present multiple forms of proof like a password or fingerprint and a one-time-passcode code to access a resource, increasing security over single-factor authentication.
Modern IDaaS-powered MFA offers adaptive authentication methods that grant access dynamically, depending on the risk users present. Cloud MFA providers enable organizations to implement MFA with plug-and-play capability quickly.
- Single Sign-On (SSO)
- SSO allows users to sign on only once to establish a session that an array of programs and resources can then trust.
By employing an IDaaS-enabled SSO, your organization can improve user experience, reduce password fatigue, and streamline access and IT operations by centralizing and unifying administrative functions. Most SSO services are cloud-hosted and allow access through a web browser.
- User provisioning and life cycle management
- IDaaS identity access management solutions give IT and security administrators the tools to onboard users and manage access throughout their time at the organization. These cloud-based solutions provide self-service portals that let users request access rights and update account information without the intervention of your help desk.
IDaaS solutions typically also include monitoring and reporting to help your enterprise IT and security teams support compliance audits and data-forensic investigations.
What Are the Benefits of IDaaS?
Historically, on-premise identity and access management solutions limited enterprise IT and security leaders because they were expensive and time-consuming to implement and maintain. Today, many organizations implement IDaaS solutions to eliminate cost and complexity, accelerate time-to-value, reduce risks, and enhance UX, along with many other benefits. Instead of significant investment in hardware, your organization reduces its expenses to just the subscription fee and administration work.
Your All-In-One IDaaS Platform
Many enterprise and modern organizations choose a range of providers to deliver their suite of IDaaS powered solutions from password management, identity access management, and privileged access management. You can transform your digital identity and access security culture with the best and only singular identity and access platform, Bravura Security Fabric, which includes layers of access management-based security across passwords, identity, privilege, and more.
Learn how SaaS (and IDaaS) create the cohesive and future-forward identity-based cybersecurity solution that modern enterprises require in the Bravura Security Fabric.
