Identity management and identity governance might feel straightforward – until things go terribly wrong. This Halloween, we’re sharing five bone-chilling tales that IT teams everywhere can relate to. From ghosts in the system to a zombie outbreak of lingering access permissions, these stories reveal just how quickly things can spiral when situations take a dark turn. Each story brings a new nightmare, and each one shows how it was solved.
Ready to explore the dark side of identity governance and administration? Grab a flashlight, and let’s get started!
The Halloween Horror Stories:
The Messaging Nightmare
Ghosts in the System
The Transition Chaos
The Configuration Catastrophe
The Zombie Access Apocalypse
The Messaging Nightmare
In a small, tech-forward organization, the IT team decided to embrace messaging for identity provisioning, believing it would revolutionize their system with instant updates. Everything seemed flawless at first, with changes being picked up and processed immediately. However, during a large bulk upload of user updates, one message silently failed to process.
Chaos soon followed, as random issues emerged across the system. Identifying the source of the problem was nearly impossible, and the team’s attempts to resolve the issue failed. Unless everything including the root cause was found and fixed, new problems would appear, as the processing of other messages was contingent on the unprocessed one. The system, originally designed to save time, had become a logistical nightmare.
With its live synchronization and self-healing capabilities, midPoint saved the day. It processed other changes while intelligently retrying the failed message, ensuring consistency across the board. Unlike the fragile messaging system, midPoint prioritized reliability, keeping identity management and governance intact even amid errors.
The IT team realized that while messaging promised speed, midPoint’s connectors ensured both speed and, more importantly, the consistency that identity governance and administration truly requires. The nightmare ended, and midPoint became the silent hero, keeping the system running smoothly in the background.
Ghosts in the System
In a bustling corporation, the IT team was facing permission challenges. Without business roles, each employee’s access to critical systems had to be recertified manually. For every individual, every system permission needed to be verified. This was an endless web of checks that grew exponentially with each change. The workload had become a nightmare, creating a ticking time bomb for errors, missed revocations, and compliance violations.
One dark night, the unthinkable happened. A former employee, still with active permissions due to an unnoticed oversight, wreaked havoc while leaking sensitive data, compromising systems, and leaving the company’s reputation in ruins. An investigation after the incident swiftly revealed the disgraceful truth: the responsible people were not able to follow the recertification process because they were swamped with an unmanageable amount of permissions they needed to evaluate. The nightmare they feared had come to life.
Then, midPoint emerged from the shadows with its role mining capabilities. It quickly analyzed the tangled permissions and grouped them into clean business roles. The engineering team, for instance, was now unified under a single role with access to emails and all the necessary systems. With a simplified role model, it was easier to set up automated processes for access management, and the recertification campaigns could be run more frequently without putting an unbearable load on responsible users. The nightmare of endless and inefficient checks was over.
With midPoint’s automated role mining, the organization was restored stronger than before. The horror of access mismanagement had ended, and midPoint saved the day, ensuring no such disaster would haunt them again.
The Transition Chaos
It was a dark and stormy night, and the IT team was on edge. The organization had been preparing for a massive transition: roles, permissions, and everything was set to change. They had tested the system for weeks and felt ready to flip the switch. But as midnight approached, nerves began to fray.
They gathered in the room, and with a shared glance, they pressed the button. Moments later, dread spread across their faces. Something had gone wrong. Despite their thorough preparations, they quickly realized that the deployment had failed. Instead of settling in for a peaceful night, they found themselves trying to restore permissions to their previous state to ensure that employees could work in the morning.
Determined not to repeat the same mistake, they took a modern approach for the next attempt. This time, they utilized midPoint’s simulations feature, allowing them to analyze the final state without any risk. They iterated over improving configuration and simulated the results until all the issues were resolved.
When the fateful hour arrived again, the team was confident and prepared. As midnight approached, they executed the deployment smoothly, without panic or chaos. Thanks to their new strategy, the transition was a success, and the employees could start their day without a hitch.
The Configuration Catastrophe
In a gloomily lit office, an IT team set out to integrate an organization’s new system. They navigated a labyrinth of settings, creating a complex configuration that strayed far from best practices. Perhaps it was their inexperience, or maybe the system was just too intricate, but they pressed on, blissfully unaware of the impending doom.
As the testing began, a dark cloud loomed overhead. The few users in the testing environment failed to notice that the system was slow. Performance tests were abandoned in favor of faster results, leaving a concealed disaster of inefficiency hidden beneath the surface.
When the time came to transition to production, the nightmare unfolded. As the team began loading data, the performance issues exploded into view. The system ground to a halt, and panic set in. The deadline was quickly approaching, and chaos reigned as the project was in danger, sending shivers down everyone’s spine.
Just as despair began to creep in, midPoint and the Evolveum team emerged like heroes from the shadows. Armed with their expertise, they quickly diagnosed the configuration errors and applied their midPoint platform’s powerful capabilities. With precision and speed, they rectified the issues, restoring the system to its intended glory. The deadline was met, and the day was saved!
The Zombie Access Apocalypse
It was Halloween night, and the office was unnaturally quiet. A security officer sat frozen in his chair, staring at the screen. For years, the company had been negligent about its role-based access control. Employees requested access, someone approved it, and they were granted access. No one questioned it. But that was before the regulations and standards like ISO27001 and NIS2 came knocking, demanding the “least privilege” principle and the removal of unused access.
Suddenly, the security officer’s monitor flickered with a warning: “Unauthorized access detected.” An avalanche of horror appeared as the long-forgotten, unused access permissions started rising from their graves. Thousands of ghostly credentials hovered over his screen, turning into grotesque zombies. The security officer’s task was impossible: recertify these undead permissions before midnight. Each minute he delayed, they multiplied. He was alone, or so he thought.
Then, midPoint appeared in his thoughts like a digital exorcist. It was a beacon of hope in the chaos, delegating certification to multiple managers. Each manager took a portion of the burden, lifting the weight off the officer’s shoulders.
By dawn, the zombie horde had been reduced to a manageable few, all thanks to midPoint. Furthermore, midPoint’s policy-driven RBAC and micro-certifications enabled access reviews to be distributed throughout the year, triggered by situations such as job changes. This meant no more Halloween apocalypses for the IT team!
Avoid similar nightmares and strengten your infrastructure with a tried and trusted open source identity governance and administration platform midPoint. Start today by exploring it further.
