Safeguards

Privileged access

How do you secure administrator accounts?

Privileged access means the accounts that may do everything: administrators, service accounts, the access of your IT provider. Whoever takes one of them over holds the business in their hands.

The first principle is separation. Anyone who reads email and browses the web every day should not do so with an account that carries administrator rights. A separate account for administration, used only for that, prevents one click on an attachment from opening the whole network.

The second principle is limitation. Rights are granted for the duration of the task and withdrawn afterwards. Permanent administrator rights held just in case are convenient and expensive.

The third principle concerns remote maintenance. Your provider's access is privileged access. It belongs behind a second factor, it belongs logged, and it belongs closed as soon as the co-operation ends.

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Related terms

Permission model and least privilege A permission model defines who may access which data. The principle of least privilege gives every account exactly the rights its… Zero trust Zero trust is a security model in which every request for access is verified on its own, including requests that come from inside… Insider threat An insider threat comes from people who already have access: employees, former employees, service providers. The access does not … Monitoring and logging Monitoring and logging mean that IT systems are watched continuously and that important events are written down, such as logins, …

All terms in the knowledge base

Note: This entry reflects the state of knowledge to the best of our understanding and serves as general orientation. It is not legal advice. What counts is always the version currently in force at the responsible body, for example dsb.gv.at, nis.gv.at or enisa.europa.eu.

From the term to practice

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