Cloud and mobility are exacerbating problems in an already-fragile IAM infrastructure. This will drive changes to areas such as single sign-on, multi-factor authentication, IAM centralization, and skills.

Many organizations are struggling to maintain tight security controls in an era of cloud computing and mobility in the areas of Identity management and data security.

Organizations continue to increase their use of cloud computing, and the technology continues to follow a pace of rapid innovation. Most large firms now employ heterogeneous hybrid clouds, including multiple public and private cloud services and technologies. Furthermore, many firms have a mix of virtual servers, bare metal servers, containers, and applications based upon microservices.

4 IAM issues affected by cloud and mobile computing

As cloud and mobile computing expose cracks in IAM, Bowker is focused on a few key areas, including:

Single sign-on (SSO): Cloud computing and mobility are driving a tsunami of new applications and associated application authentication and access controls.

Multi-factor authentication (MFA): ESG research indicates that 65 percent of organizations use some form of MFA but only for a small percentage of their applications.

IAM centralization: When you talk about IT technology silos, identity management takes the cake because it is made up of a morass of application controls, network controls, administration tools, etc.

IAM skills: Given the global IT skills shortage, it’s not surprising that 27 percent of organizations lack the right IAM skills, while 31 percent of organizations claim they don’t have enough IAM specialists.