Organizations today are constantly onboarding and offboarding employees, interns, contractors and more. IT departments need to ensure that each of those users promptly has access to the data, applications, and other on-prem and cloud IT resources they need to do their job; that their permissions remain complete and accurate at every stage of their tenure with the organization; and that all access rights are removed promptly when the user leaves.
This article explains the core processes involved in effective user lifecycle management (ULM) and the native options for performing them. It explains why manual methods are not just slow and tedious but highly prone to error, and offers a solution that automates user lifecycle management to improve both productivity and security.
Tasks and Challenges in User Lifecycle Management (ULM)
User lifecycle management comprises five key functions:
- Provisioning
- User management
- Communication management
- User activity monitoring
- Deprovisioning
Provisioning
Provisioning new users with appropriate access to your information systems is a key part of the onboarding process. It involves creating a new user account in Active Directory (AD) and granting it the appropriate access rights.
To create a single user identity, administrators can simply use Active Directory Users and Computers (ADUC), which includes a wizard that makes it easy create a user account with basic properties like first and last name, user ID, and password.
But suppose your HR department provides a list of multiple new employees each week. Creating their AD user accounts manually one by one will take a great deal of time and the process is prone to human errors. Administrators can turn to Windows PowerShell to streamline the work — provided they have the right knowledge of PowerShell cmdlets and proper experience with scripting.
User management
Both IT environments and business functions are constantly in motion: Data and applications are added and retired; users are assigned new projects or change teams altogether; offices move to new locations; and users change their names or other attributes.
To ensure that user access remains accurate and secure, IT administrators to need to actively manage user properties and permissions in Active Directory. That can be a big job. For example, IT admins often use organizational units (OUs) in AD to group users so they can be governed similarly using tools like Active Directory Group Policy. When an employee changes roles or departments, their AD account must be moved from one OU to another so that they can access the data and apps they need for their new responsibilities, but not any of the resources they no longer require. Failure to keep everything right at all times puts security and compliance at risk.
Communication Management
Organizations also need to ensure that each user gets exactly the information they need. Let’s say you need to send an update regarding a new project to all 100 members of the Marketing department. Sending an email that CCs each person individually would take a great deal of time, and it would be easy to accidentally exclude current team members who need the information, as well as to include former team members who should not see the email.
A better way to manage communications is through distribution groups (also called distribution lists). You create a distribution list with all the Marketing department members and make it available for use by anyone who needs to email that team. Accordingly, user lifecycle management includes the work of creating those distribution groups, keeping them up to date and deleting them when they are no longer needed.
User Activity Monitoring
Closely monitoring activity in your IT environment is also essential to user lifecycle management. In particular, by analyzing this data, you can identify user accounts that are accessing resources they should not be using. That activity could indicate a problem with your provisioning processes, or perhaps an adversary has compromised the account and escalated its permissions to gain access to sensitive data and critical systems.
The security log tracks much of the information you need for analytics, including:
- The action attempted
- The user who attempted the action
- The date and time the action was attempted
- Whether the attempt was successful
Deprovisioning
When an employee or contractor leaves the company, their user account should be disabled. A best practice is to move it to an OU where it will not have any access or permissions due to Group Policy. Relying on manual processes for deprovisioning can leave inactive accounts in your directory, which are ripe for takeover by attackers.
Benefits of a User Lifecycle Management Solution
With the right solution, organizations can simplify all of these user lifecycle management tasks. Key benefits include:
- Enhanced user productivity — With manual processes, getting a new employee provisioned with all the IT access they need can take up to three days. With an effective user lifecycle management solution, you can get it done in under 10 minutes, so new hires can be productive from Day 1. Similarly, when an employee changes roles, they can be re-provisioned quickly so they can get right to work.
- Reduced costs — The right ULM tool will also slash IT workload and costs. Moreover, minimizing the effort required for provisioning and managing user accounts, distribution lists, and so on frees up your valuable IT resources for more strategic tasks.
- Stronger security and compliance — Automating user lifecycle management tasks reduces the risk of errors, so user rights and distribution lists remain accurate. As a result, users are far less likely to retain access rights they no longer need, which limits the reach an attacker or malware that takes over the account. Similarly, there is less risk of an email with sensitive data being sent to someone who is not authorized to have it.
Streamlining User Lifecycle Management with Netwrix GroupID
Netwrix GroupID streamlines and automates a wide range of user lifecycle management tasks to enable better productivity among both business users and IT teams, and stronger security and easier compliance. Here are some of its key capabilities.
Provision user accounts in bulk and keep them up to date
Netwrix GroupID enables IT teams to easily create user accounts in bulk so new hires can start their work and the IT team has more time to focus on other important tasks. It can connect to a source (such as a database, directory or file) that contains a list of users and synchronize the information with your Active Directory to keep your user accounts up to date automatically.
Keep user information current
User data and properties change over time. The challenge is to reflect the changes as soon as possible to keep the information up to date in the directory. The Netwrix GroupID self-service portal enables users to update their profiles quickly and accurately.
Delegate tasks to business users
Netwrix GroupID includes a web-based self-service portal that enables users to manage their own profiles, groups, passwords and accounts.
Delegate tasks to business managers
Netwrix GroupID allows you to assign primary managers to users. You can also specify additional managers and have them added and removed automatically on specified dates.
Managers can easily update the profiles of direct reports, control their group membership, transfer and terminate them, and disable or delete user accounts
Track changes to your directory
Netwrix GroupID tracks changes made to the directory. You can view a complete list of changes or the history of a particular user or group. In addition, users can leave a comment on an action to make it easy to understand its purpose and impact later.
Automatically disable inactive users
Inactive user accounts are a top target for adversaries because they can be used to blend into normal network activity. To help you reduce this risk, Netwrix GroupID enables you to require users to regularly validate their profiles. If a user fails to do so, their access rights will be suspended automatically, rendering the account useless to an attacker.
You can also deprovision AD users in bulk by synchronizing information from your HR database or another data source.
Conclusion
Effective user lifecycle management is vital for user and IT productivity as well as security and compliance. To get the job done right, consider investing in an automated solution like Netwrix GroupID.
FAQ
What is user lifecycle management (ULM)?
ULM is a strategic approach to managing users in an organization. It includes:
- User provisioning
- User management
- Communication management
- Analytics
- User deprovisioning
What is the user account management lifecycle?
The user account management lifecycle refers to the stages a user account goes through, from creation (onboarding) to modification (management) and ultimately to deactivation or removal (offboarding). The goal is to ensure efficient and secure access management throughout each user’s tenure.
