Identity Security for SAP

The role of identity security in manufacturing

Because cybercriminals seek to exploit vulnerabilities and gain access to valuable systems and critical data, protecting employees, contractors, suppliers and vendors is critical. But how do companies strike the right balance between shortening their time-to-market and comprehensively protecting their network from internal and external threats?

When people think of digitization in industry, they think of intelligent, networked production characterized by automation. But collaboration and services are also part of this world, in which not only users but also machines must authorize themselves. However, the more identities are added, the more critical their doubtless identification and the management of authorizations become. This is why a future-proof solution for identity security is needed to ensure security and, not least, agility.

Access hierarchies

Organizations using SAP ERP to integrate their business processes and increase productivity face the challenge of navigating complex access hierarchies that make it difficult to gain visibility into their environment. Identity security solutions tailored for SAP extend end-to-end identity lifecycle and compliance management capabilities to business-critical SAP environments, regardless of where the organization is on the SAP adoption and maturity curve. Future-ready identity security for SAP should enable visibility and management of access to all resources across a complex, hybrid IT environment.

Overprovisioned accounts

Companies need to ensure that access to sensitive information is protected by strong access policies, minimizing the risk of information theft, fraud and data breaches. As a foundation for digitization and an important building block of sustainable enterprise security, identity security should focus on the following aspects: Managing and controlling human and non-human user access to all applications, systems, platforms and data; maximizing visibility into high-risk users and overprovisioned accounts to identify and mitigate potential security issues; reducing IT costs and help desk tickets by automating access requests, provisioning and password resets via policy-driven self-service tools; and leveraging adaptive governance capabilities to adjust access controls and policies as the business evolves and new threats emerge.

Organizations should ensure that access is granted and revoked automatically based on roles and policies, with 360-degree real-time visibility across all identities, permissions, systems and cloud services. It's not enough to simply control access to applications and systems - you also need to manage and govern fine-grained access to data that employees and suppliers use every day. The use of machine learning and AI capabilities makes it possible to identify risky access behavior and prevent attackers from compromising sensitive data - both structured and unstructured. In addition, it is recommended to implement a complete audit trail of accounts, privileges, policies, and actions to meet audit requirements with easy-to-detect compliance reports.

Now more than ever, manufacturers need resilient, flexible supply chains equipped with automated, intelligent systems to ensure uninterrupted production. However, these interconnected supply chains move too quickly for manual or legacy systems to effectively manage access. However, as SailPoint's Identity Score Report shows, only a small percentage of manufacturers have automated identity security.

Identity security is at the heart of effective access management in a networked supply chain. While most companies routinely restrict access to data, many struggle to apply this process to automated manufacturing systems, intelligent supplier platforms and predictive maintenance software. As the manufacturing industry undergoes significant change and new technologies are introduced at an accelerating pace, while at the same time increasing the risk of internal and external threats to networked supply chains, companies have a responsibility to optimize their identity security.