Chances are you can remember when SaaS was considered something new and revolutionary. Now it’s the status quo – not just in business but in our personal lives, from socializing to banking to catching up with friends and family. How dominant is SaaS adoption? One recent study reports it hit 49 billion in 2015 – a figure that will grow to 67 billion by 2018.
Organizations everywhere are getting dependent on SaaS benefits. By balancing on-premise models with SaaS, teams find they can deploy new capabilities faster than ever while reducing budget for staffing and IT expenditures. Then there’s the fact that these apps can offer the kind of anywhere/ any time/any device access that skyrockets productivity while appealing to users. Customers love their seamless access, employees get more done, and the IT team enjoys a new level of operational agility, rapid deployment, innovation and cost savings. Who can argue with that?
Security experts can, as it turns out – not by dismissing the benefits SaaS apps can offer but by confronting the unavoidable reality of the security challenges that come with them.
Consider these common dynamics:
- Users juggle far more usernames and passwords than they can remember. Often they use the same passwords for many apps, meaning that one successful credential theft opens multiple doors.
- Other times those users forget their passwords. They lose hours of productivity and drive up support costs with their frequent calls to help desks.
- They become annoyed when asked to create yet another new password for another app and wonder why the business can’t make things easier for them.
- Leaders and departments download their own SaaS applications independently of IT oversight, creating security vulnerabilities across the organization.
Savvy IT teams are aware of these risks, which is why they typically turn to multifactor authentication. This isn’t a perfect solution, though. Often the multifactor solution disrupts the user’s routines and workflows, can be expensive, and not all multi-factor authentication methods are created equal. Then there’s the fact that plenty of SaaS applications don’t even natively support it.
In addition to the security vulnerabilities identified above, administrators typically have to manually create individual accounts with each new employee or role change for each individual SaaS application. When employees leave, removing their access rights from every single application they were using is a Herculean task – especially since Shadow IT makes it that much harder to identify those apps.
Which brings us to SecureAuth Cloud Access.
Partnering SaaS Adoption with Strong Security
SecureAuth Cloud Access is an Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS) offering that lets you have your SaaS cake and eat it too. Seamless secure single sign-on with minimal user disruption? Absolutely. Sophisticated security uses multiple layers of advanced technology to stop malicious actors in their tracks? Of course. Cost savings and reduced IT administration? Yes, that too.
Cloud Access lets you enjoy all those great SaaS benefits and smoothly adapt to enterprise complexity – securely.
Let’s go over what Cloud Access delivers:
Secure single sign-on (SSO) to over 8000+ applications, including the most popular everyday apps. Dropbox, Facebook, Webex, Google apps: Cloud Access works with them all, with more apps added every day. We even allow users to add their own personal apps (e.g. banking, social media, reward programs, etc…) Once users sign in with their standard corporate credentials, they don’t have to re-enter passwords to access those additional applications. Instead they enjoy a safe and centralized SSO experience for all apps. No more passwords on sticky notes or other bad habits; instead the easy Cloud Access experience drives higher adoption rates.
Multi-factor authentication that’s convenient for users because it utilizes mediums used daily. Cloud Access offers lots of options here, including one time passcodes via SMS/text, email, and telephony, timed passcodes and other choices via a secure mobile app, all aiming to make MFA less intrusive for users.
An identity-based security perimeter that uses adaptive, risk-based authentication to better identify and block cyber-attacks – without burdening users. Device recognition, geolocation and geofencing and known threat lists all weigh in when it comes to authenticating users. Best of all, users remain oblivious to these behind-the-scene calculations; their access feels seamless. Additional multi-factor authentication steps are only triggered when risks are present.
A radically lighter administrative burden – and related cost savings. Your typical SaaS application is not directory-integrated, forcing IT admins to manually add, modify and delete accounts. That adds up fast in a medium-sized organization; in an enterprise where thousands of employees might use a dozen apps each, it quickly becomes an expensive, time-consuming burden. But Cloud Access integrates to existing directories and offers a centralized console with visibility into application use, password strength, and compliance. Application access is managed and controlled automatically based on directory group membership and we offer delegated administration, so IT can distribute management. And since it’s a cloud-based service, it can deploy in minutes – not weeks or months.
There’s no doubt that SaaS adoption will keep growing. Now organizations can innovate and adopt new apps without suffering through the complexity, management and security gaps that come with them. From simplified administration to stronger security to a disruption free user experience, SecureAuth Cloud Access is the key to safe and efficient SaaS adoption. Sign up for your free trial – and a demo tailored to your needs – today.
