System administrators hold the keys to your organization’s cybersecurity. However, their accounts can also be a source of cybersecurity risks to your company. Both cybercriminals and malicious administrators can exploit the elevated privileges for their own benefit. In this article, we explore key risks coming from admin accounts and offer seven effective best practices on how to protect administrative access to your organization’s critical systems and data.

Privileged users are an essential part of any organization. However, with access to commercial secrets and to the most vulnerable parts of the corporate network, they can pose high risks to your corporate cybersecurity. For this reason, the more privileges users have, the closer they need to be monitored. Furthermore, privileged user monitoring (PUM) is a requirement of multiple laws, regulations, and data security standards including NIST 800-53, GDPR, and HIPAA.

Access control is one of the most important cybersecurity practices. Careful adjustment of users’ access rights helps to secure sensitive data and reduces the chance of a successful attack. However, choosing an access control model relevant to your organization can be tricky. In one of our previous posts, we reviewed role-based and attribute-based access control models. This article discusses use cases for mandatory and discretionary access control models.