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Sun powers forward on Identity Management as Oracle's takeover waits

Graham Titterington

Sun powers forward on Identity Management as Oracle's takeover waits

Sun Microsystems has announced advances to its Identity Management suite, particularly in its support for role management. However, enterprise customers will want to know what Oracle's plans are in this area before committing to further investment.

Identity management is a major investment for an enterprise

Enterprise identity management is expensive to implement. Despite its many benefits in the fields of enhanced security and increased productivity, most companies have yet to leap into full-scale deployment. The biggest challenge is to configure the system to reflect the correct access rights for each user, and to maintain these in a current state going forward. The benefit of identity management is that it brings visibility and order to this same question. The cost of the technology is secondary to the cost of deploying it. Compliance requirements have given a new urgency to getting visibility and control of these issues, but ad-hoc responses are still common.

Enterprises need confidence in the stability and continuity of their supplier when large investments are involved. Confidence in the identity management sector was badly shaken when HP, one of the leading providers, announced that it was leaving the sector in 2008. The fact that Novell took over its products only partially assuaged enterprises' fears.

Oracle's plans to acquire Sun have thrown another spanner in the works. The acquisition has been approved by both stock holders and the US Department of Justice. EC approval is still required and this could take months to obtain. Indeed, a recent Ovum report (Oracle-Sun Merger on Hold Pending EC Approval) examined the issues and the possibility that the deal could yet be derailed. In the meantime the two companies have to carry on independently. This creates a difficult situation for both the companies and their customers, and particularly for Sun's customers.

Sun has a strong offering in Identity Management, which is now enhanced

Despite this uncertainty, the strength of the Sun offering in the large enterprise identity management space has caused it to perform well over the last year. Sun's strength comes from its high-end directory expertise and its acquisition of Waveset in 2003, which brought in the identity management application layer.

Sun's capability in the role management sector was substantially improved by its acquisition of Vaau in late 2007. In large measure this has provided the technology that has gone into the new Role Manager 5.0 product.

Roles have long been suggested as a concept that can reduce the administrative burden of deploying identity management. However, experience has shown that it is difficult to achieve a role model that is simple enough to significantly rationalise the burden of assigning access rights, and focused enough to define precise permissions. Vendors need to support a core role model with a capability for refining it, using rules and exceptions for individual cases.

Sun is trying to make its products easier to use for both administrators and end users. It has moved to a task-based approach. There is tighter integration of its Identity Manager and Role Manager products, for example to deliver automated remediation of access policy violations.

One of the major benefits of Role Manager 5 is its ability to report on the access permissions enjoyed by users and compare these with corporate policies. In future Sun plans to add integration with SIEM products to report on actual usage by employees with particular roles.

Oracle was a late starter in identity management

Oracle's approach to identity management was more tactical than strategic and did not show a broad perspective until it acquired Bridgestream in 2007. Prior to this Oracle's major acquisitions in the identity management space were Oblix in March 2005 and Thor Technologies in November 2005. If the merger does go ahead there will have to be a rationalisation of the two competing suites of products. Migrating customers to the combined offering will require skill and support. It will not be sufficient to simply 'end of life' products and leave major customers with worthless investments.

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