The Hidden Threat to the Digital Future - Essay Example

In a typical network, each account holder needs to be authenticated, authorized, and granted access permissions to network objects. In order to share data users must be able to access the same network objects. This requires the IT users and managers to spend precious time walking over the same ground, with perhaps one or two changes in access permission on a case-by-case basis. For organizations with thousands of network users, this is neither time nor cost-effective for IT teams/managers or ultimately network users.

IAM solutions are relatively new and consist of an integrated stable of tools. Increasingly these tools are based upon open standards to ensure as much backward compatibility as possible with legacy systems. The tools assist organizations to streamline identity management, manage data consistently across different platforms and hence enhance regulatory compliance. Well, known tools include: Centralized user directories (such as lightweight directory access protocol, LDAP) - to track a user's credentials; Password management systems - allow users to reset their passwords using a variety of means of authentication; Access management (or provisioning) systems - manage user access to multiple systems.

Such systems usually provide workflow capabilities to handle change requests from users or departments. Web access management tools - primarily used to manage user access to multiple web-based applications. Single sign-on systems - allow users to sign on once for access to multiple applications. Costing an IAM integration project depends on the number of users, types of applications already installed, platform interoperability, the time-scale, the amount of expertise within the organization, and so forth, leading to a wide variation in final project costs.

It is very difficult to centrally manage multiple applications, particularly when they reside on different operating systems and hardware platforms, with different authentication and authorization protocols. A minimum cost for implementing an IAM is $100,000 per annum in license fees (in a market that is predicted to grow from $1.2b in 2005 to $8b by 2009) (Tynan, page 2). The most costly and time-consuming area of digital identity management is support for legacy systems (such as mainframes and older applications).