authentication Archives

Differences Between Authentication and Authorization in Enterprise Security Systems

Authentication and Authorization, often referred to by their shorthand names – authn and authz – serve distinctly different purposes. Understanding the difference between them is crucial for designing robust access control systems, enforcing Zero Trust architecture, and ensuring compliance in high-risk environments.

This blog breaks down the fundamentals of authentication and authorization, explores how they work independently and together, and highlights their real-world applications in enterprise IT. So, what are authentication and authorization? Which happens first: authorization or authentication? Let’s dive into these questions and more.

Understanding Authentication and Authorization

What is Authentication?

Authentication is the process of verifying the identity of a user or system. It answers one fundamental question: Are you who you say you are?

In practice, authentication involves credentials, like passwords, biometrics, OTPs, or cryptographic keys, used to confirm identity. It’s typically the first step in any access control process. Without authentication, no access decision can be trusted.

Examples include:

Entering a password to log into a laptop
Using fingerprint or facial recognition on a mobile device
Logging into a corporate application using SSO

What is Authorization?

Authorization comes after authentication and determines what resources or actions an authenticated user is allowed to access.

While authentication confirms identity, authorization confirms permissions. It defines roles, privileges, and access rights based on organizational policies.

Examples include:

A manager is permitted to access payroll records, while an intern cannot
A user is allowed to view a dashboard but not edit it
Admins have full access to the system, while standard users are restricted

In short, authentication proves who you are; authorization defines what you’re allowed to do.

Authn vs Authz: Key Differences Between Authentication and Authorization

1. Core Purpose and Functionality

Authentication: Verifies identity
Authorization: Grants or denies access rights

While authn and authz are closely linked, their core purposes are fundamentally different. One is about identity; the other, is about entitlement.

2. Workflow and Process Sequence

Authentication always happens first
Authorization only happens after successful authentication

Which happens first, authorization or authentication? The answer is that authentication is always first.

3. Types of Data Involved

Authentication uses identity data – usernames, passwords, tokens, biometrics
Authorization uses access control data – roles, permissions, group policies

Each process evaluates different layers of user information to make decisions.

4. Impact on User Experience

Authentication affects login experience – MFA prompts, password rules, SSO login time
Authorization affects access experience – what the user can see or do once logged in

Poor implementation of either can frustrate users or compromise security.

5. Operational Timing and Order

Authentication is a real-time gatekeeper at login
Authorization is ongoing and enforced with every resource or API request

Together, they ensure both the front door and every internal door are secure.

6. System and User Visibility

Authentication is often visible to users (e.g., login screens, 2FA)
Authorization is typically behind the scenes (e.g., access denied messages, greyed-out options)

This difference affects how security measures are perceived by users.

7. Interdependencies and Prerequisites

You cannot be authorized without first authenticating
But you can be authenticated without necessarily being authorized for anything beyond basic access

This interdependency is crucial for designing layered security systems.

8. Relevant Protocols and Industry Standards

Authentication protocols: SAML, OAuth 2.0 (authentication flows), OpenID Connect, LDAP, RADIUS
Authorization protocols: OAuth 2.0 (scopes and permissions), RBAC (Role-Based Access Control), ABAC (Attribute-Based Access Control)

Understanding protocol boundaries helps avoid configuration errors and security loopholes.

9. Practical Example Scenarios

Let’s bring it all together with a real-world example:

A user logs into their enterprise portal with their credentials → Authentication
The system checks their role and allows them to access only the HR dashboard, not Finance → Authorization

Another example:

A developer logs into GitHub → Authentication
They can push code only to repositories they’ve been given access to → Authorization

Despite their technical overlap, authentication and authorization play distinctly different roles in enterprise security. Confusing or conflating the two can lead to vulnerabilities, poor user experiences, and audit failures.

Understanding the difference between authentication and authorization is not just about semantics – it’s about building a security architecture that can scale with your business, adapt to modern threats, and maintain control in an increasingly complex digital environment.

Take the Next Step: Secure Your Organization with Akku

In a world where identities are the new security perimeter, your access control strategy must go beyond basic authentication and fragmented authorization rules.

Akku offers a unified, scalable, enterprise-grade platform to manage both authentication and authorization policies. From enforcing multi-factor authentication and adaptive access controls to defining fine-grained user permissions, Akku helps you take control where it matters most.

Explore how Akku can modernize your security architecture.

Contact us today!

Passwordless Authentication: Why you need it, how it works, and how Akku takes it further

How do you strengthen your identity verification processes? Most organizations go the route of stronger password policies and tight password management. However, did you know that passwords are inherently among the most vulnerable components of your organization’s cybersecurity environment?

The risks of password-based login

When you use passwords as the primary key to your secure assets and data, you open up your systems to certain risks: weak password policies, improperly shared access, database hacks, credential stuffing and social engineering.

Weak passwords due to improper policies

Poor policies could permit the use of very weak passwords. On the other hand, very stringent rules result in employees hunting for workarounds. If you’re using password-based authentication, prioritize a password policy management module in your IAM.

Database breaches

Since user credentials are stored in a single centralized database, the database is naturally under some risk of hacking. Passwordless authentication does away with this risk, since there’s no centralized database of passwords to be breached.

Credential stuffing attacks

It’s common for employees to use the same password on multiple websites, from the local movie theater’s online booking system to your business applications. If the movie theater happens to get hacked, your business-critical assets are suddenly vulnerable.

Social engineering attacks

When creating a password, users gravitate towards names and dates of personal importance. These details aren’t public, but they can be discovered! Malicious actors can learn such data from in-person social interactions or from social media, and crack the user’s login.

Enter passwordless authentication

How do you avoid passwords in your identity verification process? Passwordless authentication is a zero-trust login method that works well with modern applications and systems. It entirely does away with credentials based on the username-password dynamic. Instead, passwordless authentication is typically device-centric, where a previously approved action needs to be taken on a verified device (smartphone, personal computer or hard token) to authenticate a user.

The credentials are non-shareable and are not stored centrally. No passwords are shared with users, and they cannot be inappropriately shared or compromised, meaning unauthorized individuals cannot access your business-critical assets even if they were to obtain a user’s credentials. Credential stuffing, social engineering and hacking attacks are not just unlikely; they’re impossible. As a system administrator, you don’t need to worry about the strength of your users’ passwords or the frequency with which they’re updating them.

The benefits of passwordless authentication

As discussed above, it strengthens the security of identity credentials
It improves user experience for administrators, business management and users too
It simplifies the login experience for the user
It reduces long-term IT costs, as fewer support tickets are raised

How does passwordless authentication work?

You could use a number of techniques to enable passwordless authentication. These include hard tokens, OTPs, private keys, magic links, push notifications and QR codes.

Passwordless authentication is based entirely on a device or object that the user already possesses.

QR codes can be scanned by a specific application downloaded on the user’s mobile phone.
Hard tokens are physical devices that provide users with direct access to specific software.
OTPs, push notifications and magic links could be connected to mobile devices, a phone number or an email address.
Private keys are stored on the user’s approved devices; these alphanumeric strings are used in association with a public key to verify the user’s identity.

Akku and blockchain-based identity management

Akku’s upcoming blockchain-based identity management method has added a new layer of security to the customizable IAM solution. Using a private distributed ledger, the Akku blockchain-based IAM is virtually unhackable and extremely secure. At the same time, this revolutionary technology is user-friendly and accessible.

Using the new system, your administrator would provision new users exactly as they did earlier on the original Akku system. Each user would be provided with credentials consisting of a public key stored on the blockchain servers, and a private key pushed to the user. Blockchain credentials are created based on the decentralized identifier that your organization chooses. This could be an email ID, employee ID, or any other unique identifier.

Once their access has been provisioned, employees download the Akku app and enter their decentralized credentials. On the Akku login page, they will see a QR code which needs to be scanned through the Akku application. They will then receive a private key, and their access is activated.

This QR code based passwordless authentication method is enabled by the use of blockchain credentials with each user’s public key being stored on the blockchain, and their private key being stored in a blockchain wallet on their approved device – in this case the wallet being the Akku app.

The use of the QR code based passwordless authentication method eliminates some of the risks associated with other forms of passwordless authentication. This includes as SIM swapping or cloning in the case of OTP based methods, and biometric hacks in the case of fingerprint or retina scan methods.

Do reach out to our team to learn more about the blockchain and its use in identity and access management. Get in touch with us today.

Flexible Identity: IAM solutions need to bend… a little at least!

In the world of Identity and Access Management (IAM), flexibility is the key to stability. While IAMs are not new, the threats that they are helping to protect against and the environment in which they are operating are constantly evolving. Adaptability is more critical than ever.

Negotiating this ever-transforming environment, enterprises need both flexibility and fit in terms of their identity and access management strategy. This means finding an ideal IAM solution that adapts and grows with your business, customers, workforce, tools, processes, and market trends. Your IAM needs to balance user-friendliness and security, or users tend to get frustrated and search for workarounds that can open up security vulnerabilities.

Rushing into a decision about your IAM without a fully-formed strategy can result in a solution that is so rigid it doesn’t solve your problems! An inflexible IAM that does not support your identity and access management needs, can negatively impact user experience and decrease productivity. Technology should enhance security goals, not compromise them. Opt for a flexible IAM solution.

What do we mean by flexibility? It is the ability to use the IAM in the way that you want, without being constrained by its own features.

Flexibility in authentication methods

A flexible IAM offers a wide range of strong and centralized authentication mechanisms that cover cloud and mobile assets, permitting you to set password policies with multiple multifactor authentication (MFA) options. Modern MFA solutions provide users with multiple options depending on the circumstances (for instance, a hard OTP token may be used when working offline). This ensures that while security is the priority, productivity is not compromised.

Flexibility in integration

Your identity provider (IdP) must integrate with your IAM. Identity providers, such as Azure AD, are third-party service providers that store and manage digital identities. Choose the IAM that integrates seamlessly with your IdP, and which integrates with and provides access to a large list of cloud, on-prem, SaaS, licensed, and custom apps. This gives you the flexibility to use any IdP and app, based on the merits, without being tied down by your IAM.

Flexibility in access management

A flexible IAM allows you to define proper access privileges and set custom device restriction rules, in order to balance security with usability. A central directory, for instance, can help to manage access rights by automatically matching employee job titles to locations and relevant privilege levels. Further, a flexible IAM system can be used to establish groups with privileges for specific roles thereby uniformly and securely assigning access rights. By making it easy to define access privileges, your IAM becomes more flexible and user-friendly.

Customization

With IAM solutions, one size does not fit all. Look for a solution that allows you to customize everything from number of users to MFA options to report customization and content restriction. The more you customize the IAM to suit your needs, the better the digital experience your company can provide to its workforce – and the greater the impact on the business and the bottom-line.

Akku is a cloud-based powerful identity and access management solution that is designed with SME/MMEs in mind and their ever-changing needs. Contact us today for a consultation.

Authentication, Authorization, Auditing: the Three Pillars of IAM

In an earlier article, we explored the 3 pillars of a Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB), with Identity and Access Management (IAM) being one of these pillars. In this blog, we dive deeper into IAM, and the key concepts on which it is built.

2021 saw the average cost of a data breach rising from US$3.86 million to US$4.24 million on an annual basis, according to the IBM Cost of a Data Breach Report 2021.

Data breaches are increasing. And your Identity and Access Management solution, or IAM, is your first line of defense. IAM secures, measures, monitors, and improves the security of access through a standardized process.

How does an IAM improve security? It offers three pillars of support: Authentication, Authorization, and Auditing.

Authentication

How do you map the correct users to gain access to the correct content, at the correct times?

Authentication takes place whenever a user attempts to access the organization’s network or assets. Verified credentials serve as a passport that allows users to access data, systems, applications, and resources.

With data breaches becoming more common, user authentication is vital to security. Organizations are prioritizing advanced security through sophisticated additional authentication methods. For instance, your IAM would secure your access management with two-factor or multi-factor authentication by pairing a username and password with a key card or OTP token, a fingerprint, or facial recognition. Every user has unique credentials, and IAM authenticates the user data to confirm that the user is a member of the organization.

Using a strong password policy can also improve authentication security. Verifying whether your IAM allows you to configure and customize your password policy is essential in providing a comprehensive authentication process.

Authorization

While authentication verifies the users’ identity, the authorization aspect of IAM is what grants the user access to data based on their identity and defined access rules. While the two are related, they are not interchangeable.

In a sense, authorization is the second step to authentication – think of a night club, where the bouncer allows you entry after checking your ticket stamp (authentication), following which another staffer inside decides if your stamp allows you access to every area of the club or restricts you to select areas (authorization).

In organizations, users are granted authorizations according to their roles. Proper authorization is important to prevent data breaches.

For secure authorization, follow the zero trust principle and provide minimum possible access to each active user and immediately deprovision ex-employees. These two steps ensure that the risk of data breaches caused by improper authorization or disgruntled employees is reduced.

Auditing

Auditing security configurations helps weed out redundancies within the IAM system, such as IAM users, roles, and policies that are not required, and make sure that all users are authorized and authenticated. It also helps secure the system by regularly monitoring who has access to critical enterprise assets.

Audits ensure that compliance requirements are met, incidents are responded to and taken care of within a defined period of time, procedures are streamlined, responsibilities are segregated, transparency and documentation are maintained.

Audits can also help to understand employee or user contributions on a particular app or data sheet. This can also be used in version control. Knowing who last logged on to the document gives usable information in cases where data has been breached.

Chinks in authentication, authorization, or auditing can result in a compromised system. Opt for a trusted IAM solution such as Akku, a major emerging player in the APAC region. Akku offers a plethora of customizable options to improve data security, standards compliance, efficiency, and productivity.

Why is multi-factor authentication indispensable?

Ever heard of the butterfly theory? A single flap of a butterfly’s wings in Australia has the potential to cause a tsunami in Indonesia. Similarly, a minor tweak in your IT infrastructure has the potential to make every node of your network vulnerable to serious attacks, irrespective of their relationship. To ensure that network security remains as streamlined as possible through any number of changes to your IT systems, it is crucial to add a virtually unhackable component to your network security.

Continue reading Why is multi-factor authentication indispensable?

Secure and Efficient Certificate-Based Authentication

Security and privacy of user data are crucial for any organization and is also a major area of risk. So a Secure and Efficient Authentication (SEA) is very important.

How do you make authentication secure and efficient? Let me share some insights on how this can be achieved through certificate-based authentication…

In general, a certificate is a means of creating evidence. In the domain of identity and access management, a certificate creates evidence in the form of a digital signature to verify the identity of an individual, a company, or other entity, and associates that identity with a public key.

Like a driver’s license or passport, a certificate provides a generally recognized proof of a person’s identity. Certificates have one main purpose: to establish trust.

Authentication is the process that verifies that a user is who they say they are. So a certificate makes authentication more efficient because the identity cannot be changed.

By enabling the certificate-based authentication, it is possible to reliably evaluate the user’s right to access the requested resource.

How does it work?

First, the user enters their private password.
The client receives the private key, and creates an evidence – in this case, in the form of a certificate or digital signature.
Now, the client sends the evidence through a secured connection across the network.
The server uses the evidence to authenticate the user identity.
Finally, the server authorizes the evidence and allows access.

This brings us to the question of how to implement a certificate-based authentication in your organization.

Akku by CloudNow is a powerful and secure identity and access management solution that uses certificate-based authentication to control user identity and secure access to your environment. Learn more at www.akku.work