What is a Security Framework?

What is a Security Framework?

A Security Framework provides a structured approach to managing and protecting identities, ensuring compliance with regulations, and mitigating risks related to access control within an organization. It encompasses policies, processes, technologies, and standards to secure identity lifecycle management and access governance.

Key Components of a Security Framework

Identity Lifecycle Management

Organizations use this approach to managing the entire lifecycle of user, machine, and AI-generated identities. It includes processes and policies to create, modify, and deactivate user identities securely and efficiently. Identity Lifecycle Management ensures that employees, partners, contractors, vendors and systems have a level of access to sensitive data and applications sufficient to fulfill their roles at every stage of their relationship with the organization, including when they join, when their responsibilities change, and when they leave the organization.

Access Governance

Enables IT administrators and managers to control and monitor which users can gain access to their systems, applications, and other resources. Access governance is foundational for managing user permissions and access controls as well as ensuring compliance. It is critical in ensuring that users access only specific resources and that their access rights consistently align with their functions within the organization, even as these functions and the number and sensitivity of the organization’s resources change.

Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) and Attribute-Based Access Control (ABAC)

The RBAC method assigns permissions to roles rather than directly to individual users. Users may be assigned to one or more roles based on their job functions or responsibilities. The role assignment policy that RBAC drives enables administrators to define and manage permissions at the role level and simplifies permission management across cloud environments.

ABAC makes access control decisions by evaluating various attributes of users, resources, and the current context. These attributes can include user roles, user attributes (such as department or location), resource attributes (such as sensitivity or type), and environmental factors (such as time of access or network location).

Authentication and Authorization

A Security Framework employs secure authentication mechanisms, such as multi-factor authentication (MFA). MFA compels users to complete multiple steps before being granted access to internal resources, applications, or data. MFA adds extra layers of verification and requires users to prove their identity using two or more independent authentication factors. It enhances security by making it more difficult for unauthorized users to gain access, even if passwords are compromised.

Segregation of Duties (SoD)

This facilitates the division of tasks and responsibilities among multiple individuals to reduce the risk of error, fraud, or malicious activity. The mechanism is designed to ensure that no single individual has control over all aspects of any critical process, thereby engaging fraud prevention and limiting opportunities for mistakes or intentional wrongdoing.

Risk Management

This process identifies, evaluates, and mitigates risks associated with user access to systems, applications, and data within the IT infrastructure of an organization. It is designed to continuously monitor use activity and effectively and efficiently reduce the threat of security breaches, compliance violations, or operational disruptions.

Compliance and Auditability

Ensures adherence to legal, regulatory, and organizational policies such as GDPR, HIPAA, or SOX by maintaining detailed audit trails for identity and access management activities.

Privileged Access Management (PAM)

Enables organizations to secure, monitor, and manage access to critical systems, applications, and sensitive information by privileged users or accounts. Privileged user accounts, such as system administrators, database administrators, and network engineers, often have elevated permissions to resources. This creates an environment in which there is significant potential for security concerns that could lead to identity theft and costly breaches of an organization’s IT infrastructure.

Integration with Security Operations

Provides identity-related insights to support incident response and connect IGA, Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) systems, and other Identity Access Management (IAM) tools to enhance threat detection.

Benefits of a Security Framework in IGA

Enhanced Security

Reduces the risk of identity theft, unauthorized access, and insider threats.

Compliance

Helps meet regulatory requirements and avoids penalties.

Operational Efficiency

Streamlines identity management processes and reduces manual overhead.

Risk Reduction

Minimizes the attack surface and improves the organization’s security posture.

Security Framework Examples

National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Cybersecurity Framework

This set of guidelines, standards, and best practices is designed to help organizations manage and mitigate cybersecurity risks. The framework is intended to enhance the security and resilience of critical infrastructure sectors but is broadly applicable across industries and organizations of all sizes.

The goals of the framework are:

• Improve the management of cybersecurity risks.
• Foster collaboration between public and private sectors.
• Provide a flexible and scalable approach that organizations can customize.
• Ensure alignment with existing standards, regulations, and business needs.

ISO/IEC 27001

This is an internationally recognized standard for managing information security. It provides a systematic framework for establishing, implementing, maintaining, and continually improving an Information Security Management System (ISMS). The standard is designed to help organizations of any size or industry protect sensitive information and ensure its confidentiality, integrity, and availability.

CIS-18

This framework from The Center for Internet Security (CIS) outlines best control practices for organizations to secure their IT systems against common cyber threats. These controls are grouped into categories like Basic, Foundational, and Organizational to guide organizations in building a robust security posture.

Control Objectives for Information and Related Technologies (COBIT)

A globally recognized framework created by ISACA (Information Systems Audit and Control Association). It provides a structured approach to managing and governing enterprise IT, focusing on aligning IT processes with business goals, ensuring value delivery, and mitigating IT-related risks.

Where to Learn More

Omada Identity Cloud is a next-generation IGA-as-a-service platform designed to help organizations manage and protect identities, ensure compliance with regulations, and mitigating risks related to access control within the context of widely used Security Frameworks. Get a demo.