Too Little, Just Enough, Too Much

About this interactive

Least privilege is the idea that users, applications and systems should be granted the least access rights that let them do their job. The lesson's Juan needed one file in a share. Because he was trusted, he was given the whole folder, full of private information. Then his account was compromised, and the attacker, not Juan, could read everything the account could. Trust in the person does not protect the account. The same rule applies to an application's database account, a service account, a contractor and a tool. Measure each grant against the task: if the task cannot be done, the grant is too little; if it allows more than the task (write when it only reads, a whole share for one file, admin for one function, access that outlives the project), it is too much. Just enough is the target.

What you'll learn

Judge an access grant against the task it is for: too little to do the job, just enough (least privilege), or more than the job needs
Apply least privilege to users, applications and systems alike, and explain why a trusted user still gets only the access the job needs, since it is the account that gets compromised

Aligned to

CompTIA Security+

2.5 Explain the purpose of mitigation techniques used to secure the enterprise.

4.6 Given a scenario, implement and maintain identity and access management.

1.2 Summarize fundamental security concepts.

Key terms

Least Privilege: A security principle that grants users and systems only the minimum access rights needed to perform their functions.
Access Control: A security mechanism that restricts access to resources based on policies, roles, or identity.
Authorization: The process of determining what actions or resources an authenticated user is permitted to access.
Privilege Escalation: An attack that exploits vulnerabilities to gain higher-level access than originally authorized.
Role-Based Access Control: An access control model that assigns permissions based on a user's role within an organization.

Topics

Least Privilege Access Control Authorization Interactive Categorize

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