The 46th Edition of the Identity Jedi Newsletter

Let’s talk Microsoft

So Microsoft Entra made their big announcement in the last couple of weeks about the new features and name change. ( Entra was just Azure AD).

So why the name change? Well according to to MS :

We’ve long waited for Microsoft to pull everything together and offered a unified service. This isn’t their first attempt, and history tells us it won’t be their last. But it’s just yet another interesting signal of where the market is trending. Combined features, one platform, managing everything identity and security.

Sounds too good to be true right?

It might just be. Time will tell with Microsoft. They’ve had the all the pieces for a while now, and could never quite put them together. Let’s see if this will be any different.

( I can hear all the Microsoft supporters coming to yell at me..lol).

Mind the Gap

IAM practitioners ≠ security.

GASP! What, but, but all the vendors say identity is Security! And that their products are security products.

This is all true. However, nuance is a funny thing.

Identity is 1000% percent apart of security. BUT from an operations standpoint, we haven’t really treated it that way. Most IAM operations sit inside the IT function and focus on administrative tasks. They are not involved in the day-to-day operation of securing an organization. And vendors created tools to help relieve the burden of ADMINISTRATIVE issues and not SECURITY issues. But as we see this convergence of platforms, and identity products starting to move and react like security products, we have to bring the staff along for the ride. Time to rethink what it means to be an identity practitioner.

99 Alerts but a breach ain’t one

So let’s talk about reality for a moment. We’ve done a really good job at building systems that crunch data, and give alerts.

Awesome.

Buuuut, now what? Alert fatigue is real, but even bigger than that, we have all this data and no clue what any of it means. The point of collecting data is to provide context. Is to give details to a story, not be the story themselves, yet that’s what we’ve focused on and that’s what we’ve built.

And we wonder why organizations continue to “miss” incidents.

Hopefully, we are learning from these moments. As new vendors come into this space and we get all aboard this next wave of the AI craze, I’m hopeful that we will start to apply the right frame of mind to data. How we collect it and shape it to deliver context and tell meaningful, enriched stories.

Oh and ya know also stop the bad guys from doing bad stuff.

Gaslighting The Industry

Aidan Parisian, Johanna Baum and David Lee all walk into a bar….

And the identity industry was never the same!

Does identity have to be as expensive and hard as we’ve made it out to be? Join us for an engaging discussion on this very topic. The best webinar you will ever attend, hands down.

No hyperbole.

Maybe a little.

Job Opportunities

We all know it’s been a tough year in the job market, and one of the things that’s awesome about having a community is that means you have a growing network. For those of you that know me, you know I’m always looking to help whoever I can, however, I can. So recently, I’ve come across some opportunities with a growing Identity company. They are looking for Product Owners and Sales staff, so if that’s you. Let me know and I’ll put you in touch with the right people.