A recent analysis by Wing Security indicated that 63% of firms may have former employees with access to organizational data, and that automating SaaS Security can assist decrease offboarding concerns.
Employee offboarding is often considered as a regular administrative job, but it can represent considerable security threats, if not managed effectively. Failing to rapidly and properly remove access for departing employees creates substantial insider threats, leaving a company open to numerous sorts of hazards, such as data breaches, intellectual property theft, and regulatory non-compliance.
Today, since SaaS services are easily onboarded and are routinely utilized by users within and beyond the business, appropriate offboarding procedures are non-negotiable to prevent instances of data leaks and other cybersecurity risks. Let's study insider risk management and user offboarding in greater detail, looking at their security threats and discussing best practices for establishing a secure organization.
Firstly, The Security Risks of Mass Layoffs#
In the first half of 2024, a wave of huge layoffs persisted, affecting approximately 80,000 tech personnel. When layoffs happen this quickly and at scale, it can be much challenging to offboard and successfully remove access, especially considering that the average employee uses 29 different SaaS apps.
Offboarding is frequently a team operation involving IT, HR, and other departmental management. Without clear responsibilities and consistent processes, mistakes can slip through the cracks, leaving firms susceptible to having their sensitive information leaked or exploited. Considering the pace and regularity of workforce turnover, offboarding will remain a priority for security teams as they manage risk and compliance.
Time Wasted on Manual Offboarding#
Revoking access manually across various platforms and apps can be a time-consuming chore. That's why automating SaaS security has become vital. When it comes to access checks for assuring and proving that only relevant individuals have proper file and data access, the complexity and time necessary to manually execute this procedure can burden businesses. Without streamlined systems or automated SaaS security tools in place, firms remain susceptible to a degree of insider dangers while also trying to substantiate their compliance efforts.
Four Risks of Poor Offboarding Practices#
Proper offboarding is critical for managing the lifespan of employees and avoiding insider risk, whether from carelessness or ill intentions. It ensures that when employees leave the organization, they no longer have access to company assets. Failing to appropriately offboard personnel who are leaving the firm can lead to major dangers.
1 - Data Breaches# If former employees or contractors are not swiftly removed from the company's systems, apps, and networks, they might maintain access to sensitive data. This poses substantial dangers to the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of such data. Disgruntled ex-employees or those who accidentally maintain access could reveal, change, or erase key corporate data, customer information, financial records, or trade secrets. For example, a former mobile payment business employee obtained reports including the personal information of U.S. consumers, possibly affecting 8 million people. Such accidents can lead to considerable financial losses, reputational damage, and legal concerns for the company.
2 - Compliance Violations# Weak or manual offboarding processes can also lead to compliance violations, especially in regulated areas like healthcare, finance, and government. These industries have tight laws about data privacy, information security, and access control. Not removing access privileges and ex-employees from approved user lists might result in not satisfying these regulations - resulting in huge fines, penalties, legal challenges, and harm to reputation and credibility.
Financial industry companies doing business with New York consumers are subject to severe restrictions surrounding data protection. In the event of a data breach that exposes Non-Public Information (NPI), these organizations must not only identify the issue, but also notify the New York Department of Financial Services (NY-DFS) within 72 hours of discovery, as stipulated by NY-DFS Cybersecurity Requirements. A prominent title insurance firm in the U.S. was found breaking NY-DFS rules by failing to establish sufficient access controls and security measures, resulting in a $1 million penalty and an agreement to take remedial steps for securing consumer data.
3 - Insider Threats# When personnel are not properly offboarded, they represent potential insider threats, whether willful or inadvertent. Former employees maintaining access to sensitive systems and data could strive to disrupt operations, steal information, or harm corporate processes, as shown by the instance of two Tesla ex-employees who disclosed data of 75,000 users to a German media outlet. Even when unintended, continuing access after leave can inadvertently expose important information or create problems. Detecting and mitigating insider threats is tough, underlining the significance of proper offboarding procedures and attentive monitoring of suspicious activities around an employee's departure.
4 - Intellectual Property Theft# Wing Security study sadly finds that 43% of firms may have ex-employees who can still access organizational code repositories on GitHub or GitLab. Poor offboarding can potentially lead to code disclosure and intellectual property theft. If ex-employees aren't immediately removed from systems and repositories while possessing access to proprietary knowledge, trade secrets, source code, or sensitive research and other firm data, they might still access and misuse this valuable intellectual property. This could lead to large financial losses, competitive disadvantages, and legal troubles for the company.
Automation Best Practices# Using automation in SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) is a simple and effective way for consistent and thorough offboarding. Automation not only makes it easy to revoke access across various SaaS apps, but also saves a lot of time, frees up resources, and decreases the risks of manual mistakes and oversights.
Automation also helps streamline the tracking of rights and data sharing, which may be extremely challenging, especially when finding out all the access given before an employee leaves, rapidly. Knowing what data has been shared by whom, and with what permissions, is critical for keeping data secure.
A critical access hospital in Colorado paid $111,400 for a HIPAA violation after a former employee retained access to a scheduling calendar with 557 patients' protected health information long after termination. Had automated mechanisms been in place to detect and revoke the ex-employee's access promptly upon separation, this inappropriate access and compliance penalty may have potentially been avoided.
Automation also lowers the heavy administration normally necessary for frequent audits and compliance reporting. The potential of unknown lingering access, after someone leaves, is such a worrying hazard that policies require measures in place to identify it. Continuous monitoring and a few simple automations can swiftly discover and remove access after offboarding, to adopt best practices.
By not having solid offboarding practices, firms expose themselves vulnerable to a range of hazards that can have major ramifications for their operations, reputation, and finances. Proper offboarding policies are necessary to mitigate these risks and secure the company's critical assets and information.
To understand more about how Wing employs automation to speed up and ease Insider Risk Management, read more here.