Five worthy reads is a regular column on five noteworthy items we have discovered while researching trending and timeless topics. This week’s article elucidates what non-human identities are and why they are garnering attention today.
Undoubtedly, today’s digital environment is burgeoning with technological advancements across various spheres, and cybersecurity is no exception. We are in an era where automation, cloud computing, and AI play a more critical role than humans. This shift has led to the rise of identities that extend beyond humans to machines, known as non human identities (NHIs).
You might wonder what they are, so let’s zero in on NHIs today and understand why they are important in cybersecurity, the challenges of managing and securing NHIs, key strategies for protecting them, and more.
NHIs, or digital identities, are the credentials that enable machines to verify identity and communicate with each other. They have become prevalent in today’s modern ecosystem, now outnumbering human identities by as much as 50 to one. NHIs are often created by developers or citizen developers and are not controlled by IT teams. For this reason, governing them can be challenging.
Because large organizations handle millions of NHIs, it’s hard to manually pay attention to every digital entity, which creates an ideal situation for bad actors to access data. To mitigate risks and ward off breaches, enterprises should implement heightened security measures to stay resilient to forthcoming NHI-related threats. Here are five compelling articles about NHIs and why it’s crucial to stay on top of them.
1. What are non-human identities and why do they matter?
NHIs, also known as machine identities, refer to the credentials required by machines or devices to autonomously perform specific tasks without human intervention. Examples of non human identities include API keys, IoT devices, service accounts, tokens, and bots. As organizations embrace this concept, governing NHIs becomes challenging for security teams. A lack of oversight can create an entry point for malicious actors, increasing the potential for breaches. Organizations must take a comprehensive approach to identify security gaps to safeguard themselves from attack vectors.
2. How Non-Human Identities Differ from Human Identities
Just like their human counterparts, NHIs require secrets to communicate securely. However, non-human identities typically receive less attention and visibility. What differentiates them from humans are the personal attributes or behaviors that individuals hold. Unlike human identities, managing NHIs poses more risks and challenges. Mismanagement of these secrets can lead to incidents that massively disrupt business operations. It is, therefore, vital to understand their nature and the challenges they present to avert breaches.
Organizations must understand the characteristics of NHIs to better navigate the risks they possess. Although non-human identities have several attributes, their core characteristics include the possession of highly privileged accounts, which amplifies the risk of credential misuse. Additionally, there is a lack of structured life cycle management processes, the challenge of complex anomaly detection due to continuous and automated activity, and the absence of security frameworks and standards that expressly address managing and securing NHIs. Enterprises must be wary of the possible consequences if robust identity management measures are not in place.
4. Why Non-Human Identities Should Be A Top Cybersecurity Priority
NHIs are the backbone of modern enterprises, making it indispensable for SOC teams to govern and secure them. While the cost of comprehensive NHI management systems may seem initially high, it is justified by the long-term financial benefits. The average cost of a data breach is around $4.45 million, which often validates the investment. Properly managing NHIs allows organizations to grow rapidly, control access better, and remain efficient without compromising security.
5. Seven best practices for managing non-human identities
Organizations should adopt the following strategies to effectively manage and secure NHIs while ensuring operational efficiency. Build and maintain an inventory of NHIs across the enterprise, automate credential rotation processes, enforce the principle of least privilege, set up continuous monitoring mechanisms to get real-time alerts, encrypt sensitive data and secrets, apply MFA and SSO mechanisms, and regularly audit and review access logs.
Wrapping up
Introducing and governing NHIs is complex, but it’s no longer optional. Offering both challenges and opportunities, NHIs have become an integral aspect of cybersecurity and are used extensively in automation and cloud environments. As they evolve rapidly, the strategies for managing them must also evolve concurrently. In today’s digital climate, where organizations are veering towards AI, IoT, and automation, securing these machine identities is the first line of defense.
By understanding the threat landscape and adopting best practices for managing and securing NHIs, enterprises can protect their assets and data from vulnerabilities and cyberattacks. Properly managing these secrets not only reinforces security but also fosters a security-first culture, enabling businesses to reap maximum benefits.
