Identity and Access Management. Gain agility through IAM.

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1 Identity and Access Management. Gain agility through IAM.

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3 From safeguarding individual business processes to shaping complex supply chains. 2 3 Flexible and efficient business processes set benchmarks for the IT infrastructures of modern companies. After all, today s business life frequently revolves around the electronic exchange of information. The user and his or her secure access to data, applications, and other resources now play a key role when designing electronic business processes within companies and complex value chains. User identities and all the necessary attributes form the basis for authentication and authorization, and thus represent the foundation for effective IT-supported business processes. The management of digital identities across an entire life cycle, from their generation through updating and use to deletion, represents a major challenge for any company. Project-related collaboration, company mergers, sales of corporate divisions, and other reorganizations, as well as changing service and supply relationships, require flexibility and effectiveness in user administration and user access options. All this makes an effective system for user administration indispensable. Competitive advantages can only be attained when individual systems are interlinked and processes are coordinated. Modern identity management systems are also enabling new business models to be created.

4 IAM is more than just an IT project. The identity life cycle. While access control mechanisms are per se protective, the objective, however, is to provide employees, customers, and partners easy and flexible access to IT resources. In this process, companies must clearly identify which tools are the right ones to attain these business objectives in a fast, secure, and cost-effective manner. T-Systems solutions for Identity and Access Management (IAM) are designed to help users work more effectively towards achieving business goals. At the same time, the solutions fulfill security requirements. Errors in identity management can directly compromise system security, posing a major risk. User accounts which cannot be reliably assigned to specific users are particularly dangerous. This is why defined processes are needed to manage digital identities and all related attributes. Identity life cycle management encompasses processes and technologies for the provisioning, temporary revocation, modification, and retirement of digital identities. The processes are closely connected with human resource management in a company. But not all decisions are met by human resources. Normally, the external users of partners are not supervised by the personnel department. And many user attributes, particularly specific rights for internal users, are only defined on an organization, process, or project-related basis. T-Systems ensures that these procedures are linked with those involved in IT administration. The corporate security and revision departments are also included in this process, and employee representation requirements as well as data protection regulations are followed. For identity management to be successful, collaborations between decision makers and IT administrators must be precisely defined, particularly when the former cannot assign identities, roles, and rights themselves. Further definitions include whether and if the user authorizations and assigned rights can be transferred (delegation). All these aspects and requirements are highly influenced by your type of business, and must be specifically adapted to your company s organization. Our experts will design and implement the appropriate solutions for you. For IAM is more than just an IT project. Authentication techniques. From password to organizational aid. The user is identified and registered when establishing a digital identity. Additionally, one or several credentials are defined, which the user can then utilize for authentication (i.e. to prove his or her identity) in one or more systems. These credentials can have different characteristics. Each of the authentication mechanisms has specific advantages and disadvantages, and numerous variations and implementation forms are possible. Security can be increased by combining several authentication attributes (multifactor authentication). After all, the use of simple passwords is not always enough to meet the terms of today s security and compliance requirements. Beyond system costs and the desired level of security, an essential factor in selecting the proper authentication procedure is the question at which level (application, network, physical realm) an authentication service is required. And this depends on the resources that need to be protected. T-Systems experts will advise you in selecting the proper technologies. We offer in-house solutions and integrate those of other manufacturers. If hardware tokens, such as smart cards, are integrated as an authentication medium, applications can be developed which go beyond mere access to IT resources. Timekeeping and payment applications, for example, may be included. In addition, smart cards can also be given corpo- rate identity card functions. In this case, they are used for (electronic) access control to buildings and other business premises. Accordingly, token management must be connected to the IT systems and processes used by facility management and building security services. Only a few service providers are able to integrate this physical realm into Identity and Access Management (IAM) and provide end-to-end solutions.

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6 Applications and architectures. From the login interface to the background system. Frequently, the IT infrastructures of companies are heterogeneous. In many legacy systems, authentication methods are firmly integrated within the software, for example. Enterprise single signon (ESSO) solutions allow a central login for all company applications. At the same time, this solution relieves the user from keeping track of numerous passwords. As a result, employee productivity can be significantly increased. When business processes reach beyond the boundaries of an individual enterprise, the nature of security requirements changes. Identity management between different organizational units and business partners can be carried out through a federation of identities. This concept is based on business and technical agreements, as well as regulations drawn up between the companies concerned. T-Systems consultants would be glad to advise you on which architecture best supports your business and how it can be optimally realized. A company normally maintains various directories/databases for various services, including user administration, personnel data maintenance, or customer service. These structures often grow over time, and represent a complex problem for large enterprises. In addition to resources in a company s own corporate network, applications now utilize the Internet, for example, or the resources of project partners. As a result of these ever-increasing interdependencies, most networks contain different, specialized directories with partially redundant information. Frequently, it is difficult to use these various directories in a consolidated manner. T-Systems will help you reduce this complexity step by step, creating streamlined and effective architectures.

7 IAM. Security that really pays off. Identity and Access Management (IAM) is much more than just an isolated IT project. The functions included in IAM systems must efficiently support IT parameters so that business targets can be reached. IAM must be planned, conceived, implemented, integrated, and operated but also lived. After all, identity management deeply meshes with various business processes and plays a significant role in their design. Due to the complexity of this topic spanning from networks through systems and applications to business processes, both technically and in the plan-build-run concept support from external consultants and system integrators is frequently required. They not only have broad project experience, but also provide the decisive advantage of vendor independence. T-Systems has comprehensive expertise in the area of identity management, which it has gained from carrying out numerous projects. Identity management procedures are tested and analyzed in the context of studies, risk and requirement analyses, IT security concepts, and implementation projects, and their practical realization is evaluated under the aspect of IT security. T-Systems develops and operates solutions for identity management, as well as authentication services for systems and applications. It has integrated and standardized identity administration on a corporate-wide basis for the Deutsche Telekom Group and many other prominent clients. T-Systems also designs, develops, and operates federation, central authentication, and single sign-on solutions.

8 Published by T-Systems Enterprise Services GmbH Corporate Marketing Mainzer Landstraße Frankfurt am Main Germany ICT-Security L2-1.1 Stand 1/2009 Änderungen und Irrtümer vorbehalten Sv Contact T-Systems Enterprise Services GmbH Corporate Customers, ICT Security Rabinstraße Bonn Germany info.ict-security@t-systems.com Internet: