‘Growing concerns of CSOs are well met with identity management’

Amit Jasuja joined Oracle in 2005 in the newly created identity management line of business and helped create the market leading product line. A security industry veteran, Jasuja spent 8 years at Oracle as a director of development for database security Currently, a senior vice-president of product development for Oracle’s identity management and security products, he is responsible for all aspects of technical strategy, product management, development, and partner and sales enablement. He spoke to Dataquest to discuss the growing importance of identity management for CSOs and Oracle’s plans in this line of business. Excerpts

How is identity management (IdM) becoming relevant for CSOs today?

When the IT of an organization becomes increasingly more complex, it is crucial to have effective security. Identity management is the perfect solution for the most important current security issues. It provides you with the tools to control the growing number of users of your IT systems and consistently controls the access management of these users according to your own guidelines. The growing concerns of CIO and CSO community are well met with identity management. For eg, the need for dealing with privileged accounts is a huge security concern. Having root password is a complex security issue for companies. Small companies are dealing with this root problem time and again. Right now, companies are using separate solutions for root protection and normal user protection. BYODs is another new concern. They need a single solution to help their mobile platforms as well as their regular platforms. All these reasons are fueling IdM’s relevance in IT security.

What role has Oracle played on this (IdM) front?

Oracle has a very large investment in IdM. In the last 5 years, we have re-engineered, re-architected, re-built and re-done these units (sub-segments of IdM) to build a cohesive integrated platform. We have invested in re-architecture of our products from scratch. So, we have brand new user interface, brand new JAVA architecture, more next generation support for social integration, mobile services etc.

What is your strategy for Indian market for IdM?

Indian customers are looking at first education of the product. They are looking at details. They are also extremely money conscious. IT budgets are still a constraint and hence they demand flexibility in the prices and for models.

So, our strategy for the Indian market is to be flexible in our products and pricing, customizing for our Indian customers based on their preference with regards to their budgets and also to educate them during the course about the current scenario and product’s relevance.

 

Which verticals are fast adopting IdM in India?

As far as integration and security is concerned, there is no skepticism. CIOs and CSOs understand the need and demand of this. Financial services, e-commerce, services, BPO, automobile manufacturing industry all of them are high on IdM adoption. Aadhar is the largest IdM project even on global level. So, the government is realizing the importance on big scale. Secondly, awareness is in the top tier of companies currently, but we are seeing next level of companies like government agencies among others also picking up interest in IdM. n