IdentityandAccessManagement

Identity and Access Management (IAM) is a framework of policies, processes, and technologies that manage digital identities and regulate user access to information systems and resources across an organization, including both on-premises and cloud environments. IAM encompasses identity lifecycle management, authentication, authorization, and access governance to support secure operations and compliance.

Core components include identity lifecycle management (provisioning, updates, deprovisioning), authentication methods (passwords, multi-factor authentication, biometrics), authorization and access control (RBAC and ABAC, least-privilege access), and access governance (policy enforcement, access reviews, auditing). Privileged access management (PAM) addresses elevated-privilege accounts.

IAM relies on identity providers (IdP) and service providers (SP) in federated setups to enable single sign-on and cross-domain access. It uses standards and protocols such as SAML, OAuth 2.0, and OpenID Connect for authentication and authorization, and SCIM for automated provisioning. Deployment models include on-premises systems, cloud-based identity services, and hybrid architectures.

Governance and security considerations include policy creation, regulatory compliance, continuous monitoring, log management, anomaly detection, and risk-based or adaptive authentication. Best practices emphasize least privilege, just-in-time access, automated provisioning and deprovisioning, regular access reviews, and ongoing audits to maintain security and compliance.