Centrify Announces Release of Cross-Platform Access Rights Control Solution

Centrify Corporation announced on Tuesday the release of its Centrify Suite 2013 security solution. The company develops security and compliance software for enterprise environments, including Unified Identity Services, which makes it possible to apply the same login to multiple OS environments within the same organization.

Centrify Suite 2013 is another cross-platform solution that goes beyond what Unified Identity Services provides. User privileges in different environments like Windows, UNIX and Linux, are typically managed separately within each operating system. With the new suite, authentication, access control, privilege management, policy enforcement and compliance can all be managed in one place and applied to all operating systems.

One key Windows-specific component in the suite is DirectAuthorize, which replaces uncontrolled access to admin functions with more granularly defined and secure access rights.

Secure delegation of privileged administration for Windows servers is one of DirectAuthorize's main features. It eliminates wide-open access to admin capabilities, placing limits on an adminstrator's rights that are in line with that person's job and roles. There is no need to have an admin password or re-enter passwords when changing user access rights.

Time-limited rights and restricting access at the system, service or application level are a couple of DirectAuthorize's features not available in Windows. Its granular delegation and flexibility also go beyond what the operating system provides on its own.

DirectAuthorize can also capture the content of user sessions and be configured to automatically record a session based on user, system, role or privilege elevation. These sessions can easily be searched or played back.

UNIX and Linux privilege management is also a part of Centrify Suite 2013. Centralized authorization simplifies sudo migration and centralizes enforcement of access rights. Auditing sessions can be triggered based on user, workstation or roles. The suite also supports the different variations of Linux including Fedora, Red Hat and Ubuntu (News - Alert).

The licensing costs are $385 per server and $65 per workstation.

If Centrify Suite 2013 lives up to its claims, then it truly is a valuable solution for cross-platform user access control. It would save IT departments time, because you would only need to configure a user or admin’s access rights one time for the whole enterprise, instead of one time for each operating system the company uses. It provides better and more granular control of user access than any native operating system, and the auditing and user session capture is “a must” for compliance and internal security. For companies that need tighter control on access to data and computer resources, this could be the ideal solution.