The Context
Privileged Access Management is quintessentially important for protecting data, but are we doing enough?
While recapitulating and evaluating the IT incidents in 2024, ARCON found three major IT incidents that could have been avoided if ARCON’s Privileged Access Management (PAM) had been deployed.
Such breaches are caused by inadequate access control measures or credential abuse, and the most significant vulnerability remains the mismanagement of privileged access.
It is important to remember that enterprise data security can only be achieved if organizations adopt an identity-centric security approach. IT environments are increasingly digitalized, decentralized, and distributed, and cyberattacks are more sophisticated. The consequences of security breaches are becoming increasingly severe.
This blog highlights some notable IT security breaches in 2024, where the lack of effective PAM implementation contributed to the attack, and how these incidents could have been prevented with ARCON | PAM solution.
1. Healthcare Data Breach
In early 2024, a leading healthcare service provider from the USA fell victim to a massive cyberattack that exposed millions of patients’ personal health information (PHI). The breach occurred when a hacker accessed a privileged account held by an employee in the IT department. After successful access, the attacker was able to navigate the internal network, compromise the system, and steal sensitive data.
How ARCON | PAM Could Have Prevented It: The healthcare service provider failed to enforce strict access controls around privileged accounts. With ARCON | PAM, the company could have implemented the following:
- Access and Command Control: A robust access control module ensures the deepest level of granular control. It helps the admins to control and manage which user has access to which service/ application or resources. They can even restrict or elevate specific processes or commands that can be executed and generate reports on privileged user activities.
- Just-In-Time (JIT) Access: ARCON | PAM enforces a just-in-time approach that allows time-bound access to privileged users to reduce the surface of privileged account attacks because privileged rights are revoked immediately after the pre-defined period is over. It denies “always-on” privileges and enforces “Least Privilege” principle. As privileges are granted on-demand, organizations can ensure a strict access control policy and maintain a robust security posture. Moreover, with JIT access on-cloud with ephemeral credentials, it grants/ generates rules to provide access only on a “need-to-know” and “need-to-do” basis.
- Multi-factor Authentication: ARCON | PAM supports several MFA options, including the ARCON Authenticator App, Email OTP, SMS OTP, hardware tokens, biometric authentication, facial recognition, and many more. Organizations can select the best and relevant option that meets their security needs while seamlessly integrating with their existing IT infrastructure.
By enforcing ARCON | PAM best practices, the Healthcare service provider could have reduced the likelihood of a successful attack and better protected sensitive patient data.
2. Fintech Data Breach
In November 2024, a significant cyberattack targeted one of the leading financial technology firms serving major banks. The breach revealed that attackers had infiltrated the system in October, stealing almost 400 gigabytes of sensitive data. The compromised data was subsequently offered for sale on darknet forums.
The breach was attributed to compromised credentials, highlighting vulnerabilities in access management. Implementing a robust Privileged Access Management (PAM) solution could have mitigated this risk by enforcing strict controls over privileged accounts, monitoring access, and promptly detecting unauthorized activities.
How ARCON | PAM Could Have Prevented It: The organization’s lack of effective PAM controls allowed malicious actors to go undetected. With ARCON | PAM, the organization could have implemented the following safeguards:
- Credential Vaulting: Storing and securing administrative credentials in the ARCON | PAM vault would prevent unauthorized users from obtaining privileged credentials. It enables organizations to generate complex, randomized passwords for privileged accounts that cannot be easily interpreted. It also enforces password policies to ensure that the passwords are updated regularly and meet security standards. In the above incident, ARCON PAM’s credentials vaulting would have lowered the risk of credential misuse and eliminated the need for privileged users to remember and share passwords – lowering the risk of any misuse.
- Audit Trails and Alerts: Continuous logging and real-time alerts would have notified IT security teams of any suspicious use of privileged credentials, allowing them to respond quickly before data was compromised.
- Granular Level Access: With the capability of granular-level access control, the organization could manage every user’s access based on their roles, responsibilities, and tasks. It could have enabled the organization to define and enforce precise access policies for every user, reducing the risk of unauthorized access and misuse of sensitive systems and data.
Implementing these PAM policies would have given the Fintech organization greater visibility and control over privileged access, preventing data breach.
3. Air Traffic Control Attack
A state-owned agency responsible for air traffic control in one of the biggest economies in Europe confirmed that it was the target of a cyber-attack that disrupted its official communications. It affected the organization’s administrative IT infrastructure, that is, air traffic control.
How ARCON | PAM Could Have Prevented It: The breach happened due to lack of oversight on critical accounts at the aviation office. By deploying ARCON | PAM, they could have had:
- ITDR (Identity Threat Detection and Response): ITDR helps to build a proactive security posture against probable threats and is widely discussed in the current IT security context. Since ARCON supports ITDR approach towards security with the help of a unified range of identity security suites, including Privileged Access Management, this incident could have been prevented by timely detection of unusual and abnormal user behaviour with the help of AI/ML-based authentication algorithms. Any kind of IT oversight, unauthorized access, or malicious attempts at account takeovers are detected in real-time.
- Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) and Policy-Based Access Control (PBAC): Limiting access based on roles within the organization could have ensured that the admin only had access to the systems needed for their specific duties, preventing the breach of customer data. It has been observed that unrestricted endpoints and no controls over endpoint privileges also result in breaches. ARCON EPM, which has strong integrations with PAM, provides PBAC capability, which ensures access rights and permissions based on policies, especially around the endpoints. This could have prevented the malicious actor from disrupting the official communication.
With ARCON | PAM, the air traffic Control board could have put stronger controls in place to prevent both insider threats and targeted attacks.
Conclusion: The Growing Need for PAM in 2025
The IT security breaches of 2024 highlight a critical fact – the security of an organization’s critical data assets depends largely on how the privileged access environment is managed. In each of these cases, a robust PAM solution could have minimized or even completely prevented the attack by building robust access control mechanism, stringent monitoring, and mandatory policies for privileged accounts.
As cyber threats continue to evolve, businesses must prioritize managing privileged access as part of their overall security strategy. PAM isn’t just a tool; it’s a critical safeguard that can protect an organization from the dreadful consequences of IT security breaches.
