What is Cloud Infrastructure Entitlement Management?

What is Cloud Infrastructure Competency Management (CIEM)?

Cloud Infrastructure Credential Management (CIEM) is a discipline for managing identities and privileges in cloud environments. As organizations have moved from on-premise computing and storage systems to cloud-based infrastructure accessed via the Internet, IT and security teams have developed this discipline – a set of practices and processes – to determine which users can access that cloud infrastructure and for what purposes.

CIEM enables organizations to enable and track which users have permission to access what in the organization’s cloud infrastructure, regardless of whether that cloud environment is with a single cloud provider or hosted in a multi-cloud environment.

The purpose of rights management is to understand and catalog the access rights that exist within the cloud environment so that an organization can provide users with the seamless and secure access to the cloud infrastructure they need to perform tasks, while at the same time preventing users from to access infrastructure they are not authorized to use. This is known as the principle of least privilege (POLP).

CIEM is one component of an organization’s identity access management (IAM) program, and it works with cloud security posture management (CSPM) tools.

CIEM also adheres to the zero-trust security model and as such fits within the organization’s security program.

CIEM tools, typically delivered via cloud as software as a service (SaaS), enable IT and security teams to manage user identities and enforce access rights. Several vendors sell software to support and automate an organization’s claims management program.

CIEM software is typically integrated into a cloud-native application protection platform (CNAPP), enabling IT and security teams to have a more holistic view of their security practices.

Why CIEM is important

As enterprise IT infrastructures become more complex and sprawling, many organizations use a mix of on-premises and cloud-based computing software and data storage systems. Consider the current state of cloud adoption, where 89% of organizations have adopted a multi-cloud strategy, according to the “2024 State of the Cloud Report” from IT management software maker Flexera. Meanwhile, according to the “Cloud Security 2024: Managing Complexity” report from research firm IDC, 56% of organizations reported that they have a more complex multi-cloud environment than expected.

A typical organization has a growing number of cloud deployments from a longer list of cloud providers. Organizations today may have workloads running in one or more of the hyperscalers—AWS, Microsoft, and Google—while likely using multiple SaaS products.

Greater use of cloud resources comes as the volume and velocity of cybersecurity threats increases. Consequences and costs associated with a data breach – whether as a result of a successful attack on an organization’s systems or as a result of human error – have increased significantly. The global average cost of a data breach in 2023 was $4.45 million, a 15% increase over three years, according to the “Cost of a Data Breach Report 2023” from Ponemon Institute and IBM Security.

Each of those factors on its own speaks to the need for an organization to effectively manage user access to its technology environment. And, when combined, these factors create an imperative for claims management to help prevent unauthorized users from accessing sensitive data.

Of course, CIEM is only part of a larger security program, with CIEM complementing the other components. CIEM addresses the specific claims management challenges associated with dynamic cloud environments with multiple providers in use.

A typical organization has thousands – sometimes even millions – of individual permissions granted to users, with users that are not only human, but on-premises and cloud-based systems. And those users are in almost constant flux. Individual roles in the organization change, systems undergo upgrades, and tasks users must perform to get work done are refined or replaced.

CIEM enables IT and security teams to effectively oversee claims even as elements change, making it a critical part of an organization’s security layer.

Without CIEM, organizations increase their risk of falling victim to a successful cyber attack or data breach and suffering the resulting financial, legal and reputational consequences.

Components of CIEM

A CIEM tool complements other security software, with a layer of capabilities that are included or as extensive as those required in other tools, such as CSPM, cloud workload protection platforms (CWPPs), and cloud access security brokers.

The components commonly found in CIEM products include the following:

Discovery. CIEM products generally have the ability to identify all cloud resources, all users – both human and machine – with permissions and account activity. In other words, a CIEM tool can identify which user has rights to which cloud resource. Analysis. A CIEM tool should give IT and security teams the ability to analyze claims, policies, rules and risks, enabling those teams to identify, for example, excessive permissions and help optimize claim policies. I AM. CIEM products provide centralized IAM across cloud resources. Management and maintenance. CIEM products also automate the enforcement of policies and rules, helping organizations effectively follow POLP. Anomaly detection. These products typically include user and entity behavior analysis (UEBA), as well as other analytics and machine learning (ML) capabilities to detect anomalous behavior that may indicate unauthorized access attempts. Management capabilities. A common feature of a CIEM product is a dashboard that provides a centralized view on user permissions throughout the organization’s cloud environment, as well as data on anomaly detection, management and compliance. Improved visibility and access control. CIEM systems increase visibility into cloud access rights and give IT and security teams more control over user permissions. It helps organizations strengthen their security posture and reduce risks. It can also help organizations increase agility and accelerate transformation, as they have more confidence that they can effectively manage permissions while adopting new applications as quickly as the business needs them.

How CIEM is used

CIEM products rely on advanced analytics and ML to identify user rights, analyze them against an organization’s rules and compliance requirements, and then align them with the organization’s own policies.

This enables a CIEM product to not only identify rights, but to also assess each user’s rights to determine if that user has the appropriate level of access rights. If this is not the case, the CIEM tool alerts administrators to each user with excess privileges so they can take action or – if an automatic response is enabled – the tool automatically adjusts a user’s access level.

In addition, CIEM products can perform this analysis across multiple cloud platforms and change as cloud resources change—for example, as an organization scales up and down, or provisions and withdraws based on needs.

Collectively, CIEM platforms enable administrators to efficiently monitor, manage and adjust permissions, even in large-scale cloud environments.

Advantages of CIEM

Developing an effective CIEM program and investing in a CIEM product brings significant benefits to an organization. Those benefits include the following:

Increased visibility. Better visibility into the organization’s cloud rights lets IT and security leaders, working with their business unit partners, know they are granting the right level of permissions to users. This means that users can perform necessary business tasks without receiving excessive permissions that can increase risks or being denied necessary access, which can slow down workflows. CIEM tools typically also have an audit function, which further increases visibility and accountability. More intelligence. With automation, ML and analytics enable administrators to operate at scale and speed up exponentially greater than manual processes allow. Higher levels of consistency. A CIEM tool’s automation and intelligence capabilities enable it to consistently enforce access control policies across cloud environments of all sizes. Greater agility. CIEM products are designed to deliver their capabilities and benefits in dynamic cloud environments so that IT, security and business teams can deploy, provision or withdraw as quickly as needed without being slowed down by manual access control management processes. Automated IAM and anomaly detection and response further increase agility. Improved security posture and compliance with privacy requirements. A CIEM program supported by a CIEM tool ultimately reduces risk by ensuring that claims are right-sized, aligned with the organization’s rules and policies, and appropriate.

CIEM vs. CNAPP

Like the cloud environment itself, practices, policies, and tools developed to manage and secure the cloud have expanded significantly.

As a result, a typical organization uses multiple approaches, including CSPM, and different technologies, such as CWPP, to bring order and improve the security of its cloud technology stack.

The different classes of technology have certain capabilities — or capabilities that they deliver better than others. Even so, they also tend to have overlapping abilities and benefits.

This is the case with CIEM and CNAPPs.

A CIEM is specific to claims management, while CNAPPs bring together the CIEM, CSPM, and CWPP capabilities to create a holistic, integrated set of security and compliance capabilities for cloud-native applications.

As such, CNAPPs deliver features that CIEM systems do not, such as capabilities to scan containers and infrastructure as code.