What Is User Access Review? – Source: heimdalsecurity.com

User access review is an essential component of any organization’s Identity and Access Management (IAM) strategy. Also known as access audit, entitlement review, account attestation, or account recertification, it describes the process of periodically reviewing the access rights and privileges of all users who have access to a company’s data and applications.

This includes the management of all employees, vendors, service providers, and other third parties with whom an organization has any type of collaboration.

In a nutshell, access reviews guarantee that the access rights granted to a user to the data and systems of an organization are authorized and suitable for that user’s position and operations.

A user access review’s purpose is to lessen the risk of security breaches by restricting access to crucial information and assets. That’s why some security professionals may be tempted to leave out the review process if they have implemented the principle of least privilege, zero trust architecture, and granular access management practices. But that’s not a good idea.

Why Are User Access Reviews Essential?

According to Expert Insights, the second most popular targeted area for identity and access-related breaches is represented by privileged accounts. These accounts refer to user accounts with elevated levels of access and control within a computer system or network. These accounts have admin privileges, which allow them to carry out critical operations, including:

• configuring settings,
• installing software,
• accessing sensitive data, and
• managing other user accounts.

Privileged accounts are usually assigned to sysadmins, IT employees, or people who are in charge of maintaining the system’s overall security and performance. Given their extensive privileges, these accounts are highly lucrative targets for cybercriminals and need rigorous security measures to prevent unauthorized access and misuse. Hence, among other measures, user access reviews are essential for minimizing the risk of such cybersecurity risks.

How Can User Access Review Help Companies?

Mitigates privilege creep and privilege misuse

Reviewing user access is crucial to mitigating security threats such as privilege creep and privilege misuse.

Privilege creep

…refers to the process of users gradually accumulating unnecessary permissions, rights, or privileges over time, granting them access to excessive levels of sensitive data or systems. In a nutshell, new permissions are added, but existing ones are never removed.

Source

Privilege misuse occurs when an insider uses granted privileges in a manner that differs from or contradicts the intended usage. Such behavior may be unintended, planned, or the result of ignorance. But, regardless of the reason, they frequently lead to cybersecurity risks.

During an access review, users’ access permissions are aligned with their current positions, and employees’ privileges are limited in order to minimize the risk of privilege creep and misuse.

Makes offboarding secure

In the case of an employee leaving the company or getting fired, it is critical to remove access rights to protect confidential data. If access rights are not removed, the former employee will be able to access sensitive information even after leaving the organization. This can result in potential security breaches if the person who leaves is disgruntled and determined to abuse their active credentials during the termination time.

Less licensing fees

If user access to specific systems is not monitored and restricted, it can lead to overspending on system licenses and accounts.  For example, if a member from the finance department does not need a Semrush license, they should not be provided with access to systems running the platform.

Helps achieve compliance

In addition to mitigating security issues, performing a user access review is imperative for complying with various IT requirements.

NIST, PCI DSS, HIPAA, GDPR, and SOX are just a few of the international IT security standards that call for user access reviews. For instance, the PCI DSS mandates companies review their access control policies at least once a year, while NIST requires regular reviews of access rights and guidelines.

Likewise, HIPAA requires a periodic evaluation of access policies and implementation of processes to establish, document, review, and change user access privileges. Furthermore, GDPR asks organizations to audit the data they handle and the users who have access to it, whereas SOX emphasizes the importance of enforcing access control procedures, including through user access reviews.

User Access Review Best Practices

To ensure the effectiveness of user access reviews, it is recommended to follow the steps below:

Define the scope

It is vital to define the scope of the user access review procedure in order to perform the audit in a more organized, timely, and productive manner. Prioritizing the accounts with the highest risk profiles is recommended because it will speed up and make the process more efficient. You should make sure that your user access policy includes:

• An inventory of all information and assets that must be kept safe;
• A list of user roles, tasks, and categories of authorization;
• Documentation regarding the controls, technologies, and approaches employed to ensure safe access;
• The processes for providing, revoking, and reviewing access.

Define review intervals

You have to schedule your user access review and decide how frequently they should be carried out. This decision should take into account both compliance requirements and security concerns.

Revoke former employees’ permissions

During the user access review process, it is crucial to pay close attention to whether the accounts of former workers are still functional within the company’s network. In order to ensure that their access is revoked, it might be wise to keep track of all employees who have left the company since the last user access review.

Beware of shadow admin accounts

The term “shadow admin accounts” refers to user accounts with administrative access rights that aren’t typically found in privileged Active Directory (AD) groups. If these accounts are not closely monitored, threat actors might target them, escalating and abusing their permissions.

Avoid passing access permissions from one job role to the next

When employees change roles within the organization, their access permissions may gradually increase, resulting in something that’s called privilege escalation. When conducting a user access review, make sure that employees’ access rights correspond to their current tasks.

Adopt the Principle of Least Privilege

The Principle of Least Privilege (PoLP) has a significant role in performing user access reviews. This approach to security ensures that users, such as employees and third parties, only have access to the resources required to do their job. This measure not only helps to mitigate insider threats but is also necessary to comply with the previously mentioned regulations. Furthermore, it’s crucial to identify precisely who needs permanent privileged access permissions. For those who only sometimes need access to confidential information, you might want to consider adopting one-time passwords (OTP) or Just-in-Time (JIT) access approaches.

Implement Role-based Access Control (RBAC)

In a role-based access control (RBAC) approach, user roles are created for similar positions rather than individual user accounts being configured. Then every role is assigned a list of access permissions. Thanks to RBAC, the user access review process is conducted faster. With this method implemented, organizations can review roles instead of separate profiles.

Document the process

This part is crucial hence you should consider keeping comprehensive records of the challenges and outcomes of each step of the process. This way, all members involved in the user access review procedure will better understand it. In addition, it can assist organizations in demonstrating compliance with regulations and laws, as well as identifying obstacles and errors in the review process.

Train your employee about the importance of access reviews

If employees don’t understand the importance of adopting certain practices or using specific technologies, there’s a good chance they will unintentionally undermine them. That is why, during periodic cybersecurity awareness sessions, organizations must communicate the principles and relevance of user access management to their employees. Workers involved in a user access review need to learn how to perform it correctly and according to the existing policy.

Organizations should also educate their staff about the numerous cybersecurity threats out there, such as the ones related to access rights and privileged accounts. This can be accomplished with regular training sessions and tests.

Conclusion

A user access review is an essential part of the access management process. It can help organizations minimize cybersecurity-related risks by revoking unnecessary access to sensitive data and assets and limiting users’ privileges to the bare minimum. You may find that using dedicated access management tools makes conducting a user access review easier and more effective.

As mentioned at the beginning of this article, privileged accounts are highly appealing targets for threat actors, and they should be monitored closely. This is where Heimdal ® will make a difference for your organization.

Heimdal’s Privileged Access Management PAM solution is the only tool on the market that automatically de-escalates users’ rights on threat detection and at the same time makes you achieve two vital things: full compliance, being NIST AC-5 and NIST AC-1,6 compliant, and also increased productivity.

Moreover, a cool centralized dashboard will allow your sysadmins to manage access granting efficiently and offer you a complete overview of your users’ activity.

Combine it with Application Control for app, user & process throttling or with Next-Gen Antivirus for a secondary security shield. Heimdal Privileged Access Management streamlines and secures your rights management flows and can be combined with more Heimdal® products to deliver an authentic Endpoint Prevention, Detection and Response (EPDR) stance.

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