Identity management continues to challenge businesses as 36 percent prioritize biometric MFA

Identity management poses at least one challenge to 92 percent of organizations, according to a survey from LastPass by LogMeIn, and 36 percent say implementing biometric multifactor authentication is a priority.

In a survey of 700 IT professionals at organizations ranging from 250 to 2,999 employees conducted by Vanson Bourne, 47 percent said balancing ease of use with security is the biggest challenge in identity and access management. Password problems take four hours of work each week to resolve, on average, with organizations receiving 96 password-related requests per month, and 82 percent say poor identity practices expose their business to risk.

“The Guide to Modern Identity” report also shows 80 percent of IT professionals believe SSO is not enough to secure businesses on its own, and 59 percent agree that strengthening user authentication with MFA is critical.

The average organization struggles with three identity-related challenges. To mitigate them, 98 percent see room for improvement in employee behavior, while 65 percent say upgrading identity and access management capabilities is a priority. MFA (55 percent), integration with current infrastructure (52 percent), a built-in password generator, support for legacy and cloud apps, and an integrated system for managing, monitoring and setting policies (44 percent each) are considered ideal features for an identity solution.

“When used individually, enterprise password management, SSO, and multi-factor authentication, all bring unique security and productivity benefits to a business,” says LogMeIn Identity and Access Management Business Unit General Manager John Bennett. “But when brought together under one solution, businesses have complete security and visibility into every user and access point in their business–something we found almost all of surveyed IT professionals (93 per cent) agreed with. With more limited resources, it’s particularly important for small-to-medium sized organisations to look for all-in-one solutions that combine the key components and maximise their investment in identity technology.”

LogMeIn expanded LastPass with its new LastPass MFA SSO technology in June to give small and medium-sized businesses adaptive biometrics-based authentication.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  enterprise  |  identity management  |  LastPass  |  multi-factor authentication  |  survey