Most companies fear the cost of data breaches more than anything, while others fear the embarrassingly negative publicity which can have great negative impact on their organization when misuse of privilege makes the national news.
So it comes as no surprise that when I read the headline "Top 13 Most Embarrassing Data Breaches" that the first thing I wanted to analyze was the preventability of those breaches if a least privilege solution had been in place on the affected systems. The article starts out with "Identity theft is on the rise each year. In 2011 alone, Sony won the crown for largest number of people affected with a shade over 100 million. In spite of more advanced security measures, it seems data leaks are here to stay." It then goes on to list the 13 most embarrassing data breaches, many of which we have already blogged about here as well in the past.
Please feel free to check out the link above to see the breaches, but more importantly you need to begin the process of implementing a comprehensive Identity & Access Management solution. One good way to get started is to pick up the new book published by Apress Media "Preventing Good People From Doing Bad Things." This book will help you establish a well-defined awareness of boundaries which enables end users and applications to communicate freely within an IT environment without worry of intentional, accidental, or indirect misuse of privilege. It fully details how this concept of least privilege can provide the security and governance your organization needs to succeed.
