A Guide To Securing Identities Across Cloud Infrastructure

(MENAFN- Robotics & Automation News) When there is corporate restructuring (like a merger or split), most IT teams often focus on getting emails, files and business applications running in the new environment. And fairly enough, those are the visible priorities, so they tend to receive the most attention.

Unfortunately, in the middle of all that, they end up completely missing the real danger zone: migrating identities.

Identities are often treated as something to tidy up afterwards, once everything else is complete. Unfortunately, that is where many security problems begin. That is because every user account, service account and security group carries permissions that need to be transferred carefully.

The good news is that these risks are largely avoidable. Let's look at the reasons why identity mapping is a security nightmare and how IT teams can handle it securely without disrupting daily operations.

Why Manual Identity Mapping Creates Security Gaps

Matching users between two cloud environments is manageable when you are dealing with only a handful of accounts. However, things can get complicated very fast when there are hundreds or thousands of identities involved.

Think about it this way – a typical identity mapping process involves things like changing user principal names (UPNs), duplicate usernames and nested permissions, which happen across different domains. If it's a handful of identities, your team can easily complete them in a few days.

However, when in scale, manually remapping user identities and active directory domain names between cloud systems becomes a recipe for disaster.

The most common issues will stem from:

Human errors Missed permissions Orphaned accounts

For instance, a single typo in a CSV file can accidentally grant domain admin privileges to an intern. Or worse, lock the management out of their mailboxes on day one.

How to Secure Identities During a Cloud Migration Clean up Existing Identities before Migration

The very first thing you need to do is to think of migration as the perfect opportunity to clean house. That means purging stale guest accounts – there is zero value in carrying these unnecessary complexities into a new environment.

By stale guest accounts, we mean inactive employee accounts, unused guest users and outdated security groups. Removing these unnecessary identities not only reduces risks later but also reduces the amount of work during migration.

Your main focus should be on privileged accounts. As administrative accounts, they deserve extra attention because they have the greatest impact if something goes wrong.

Automate Identity Mapping and Synchronisation

Another way to secure identities during cloud migration is automation. For most people, automation may sound like a step for simply saving time. However, it is about reducing opportunities for human error, while also keeping users productive during the migration.

A dedicated tenant-to-tenant migration solution can automate a lot during the migration. With such automation, you can ensure identity mapping, group memberships, permissions and security settings can all move together instead of being recreated manually.

As mentioned, these automated migration tools also support ongoing synchronisation while both cloud environments remain active. That means there are fewer disruptions during longer migration projects.

Remember to also review group memberships, application access and privileged accounts before shutting down the old environment. It is easier to fix any problems while both systems are still available.

Verify Before Retiring Legacy Systems

Migration isn't finished the moment the data reaches its destination. Verification is just as important as the migration itself.

To carry out the verification, start by testing user logins across different departments. Make sure everything is working as designed.

Conclusion

A successful cloud migration isn't measured only by whether applications and data arrive safely. Identity management has a lot of influence on every other security control.

If identities are wrong, permissions, authentication and compliance all become harder to manage. So, ensure you plan for identity migrations from the very beginning, instead of treating it as a final checklist item.

Main image by Christina Morillo, Pexels

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