Identity Access Management Solutions for Apps and Extensions: SpinOne Leading the Way in 2025!

Article Summary:

SpinOne offers a next-gen Identity Access Management (IAM) solution tailored for SaaS applications and browser extensions, tackling modern security challenges that legacy IAM systems can’t handle. With AI-driven automation, continuous monitoring, and granular access controls, SpinOne ensures organizations can secure their digital ecosystems, manage shadow IT, and stay compliant in an evolving threat landscape.

Identity Access Management (IAM) Key Insights:

• Legacy IAM tools fall short in cloud-first and hybrid environments due to complexity, misconfigurations, and lack of visibility into SaaS and extensions.
• SpinOne addresses modern risks with real-time app/extension discovery, OAuth risk assessments, and AI-based automation.
• Supports Zero Trust architecture by enforcing least privilege access, 2FA, and adaptive authentication.
• Powerful visibility & control over user actions, app access, and potential threats with role-based access and automated audit trails.
• Best practices include: starting with app discovery, risk-based classification, continuous monitoring, and enforcing RBAC + least privilege policies.

SaaS applications and browser extensions are essential for modern businesses to operate, innovate, compete, and indeed, grow. But as organizations increasingly rely on these resources, the need for modern Identity Access Management (IAM) solutions has become more urgent than ever before.

IAM solutions enable companies to maintain detailed visibility into and proper oversight of all the applications and extensions connected to their IT environments. In doing so, they can identify unsanctioned – and potentially high-risk – apps and extensions and take appropriate action to reduce their security and compliance risks.

That said, traditional IAM solutions are inadequate to mitigate modern security risks.

What today’s organizations need are new-age IAM offerings that can fill in the gaps created by legacy solutions and effectively handle the security needs of modern cloud-first environments.

Enter SpinOne.

SpinOne is a next-gen IAM solution, designed specifically for the complexities of enterprise SaaS and cloud-native environments. The platform independently manages app access and OAuth permissions, continuously monitors shadow IT, and automatically enforces least-privilege policies. It thus gives enterprise IT and security teams the visibility and control needed to effectively secure their expanding digital ecosystem.

Read on to know more.

SaaS Applications and Browser Extensions: The Expanding Digital Landscape

 “SaaS-based applications have become a preferred choice for new and modernized deployments” worldwide.”

—Gartner

SaaS (Software as a Service) is a cloud-based software delivery model that allows users to access applications over the internet without having to purchase expensive licenses or install/maintain those applications locally.

Cloud service providers (CSPs) handle the application’s underlying infrastructure and updates. This allows organizations to access a whole universe of web-based applications and technologies in a cost-effective and scalable manner. The use of SaaS apps has exploded in recent years, which explains why 85% of all business applications are expected to be SaaS-based by 2025 – up from 70% in 2023.

Along with SaaS, the use of browser extensions has also increased. Now available for all major browsers, these small, user-friendly software applications are so popular that companies with 2,000+ employees use a whopping 1,454 extensions on average!

Unfortunately, this expanding digital environment has a big downside: increased cybersecurity risk.

Spin.AI’s research team recently found that over 75% of SaaS applications and browser extensions pose a medium or high-risk to enterprise data. That’s 3 out of 4 apps or extensions that increase a firm’s risk of a cyberattack!

A lot of this risk arises from the fact that these assets have high access levels and extensive OAuth permissions in enterprise environments, which allow them to execute many kinds of malicious activities. For example, they can run malicious JavaScript in order to, say, install malware or redirect a user to a malicious site. Some high-risk apps and extensions can delete user emails and Google Drive files, while others allow cyber-attackers to harvest sensitive user data without the knowledge of users or businesses.

To mitigate these risks, it’s crucial to implement proven SaaS security tools like IAM tools. However, traditional IAM tools pose numerous challenges that limit their usefulness in modern cloud-native and hybrid environments. SpinOne, an IAM solution for SaaS-first workplaces, eliminates these challenges with ease.

What is Identity and Access Management?

Identity and Access Management is the cybersecurity practice of managing access to enterprise resources in order to ensure that:

• the right users can access what they need to do their jobs, and
• the wrong people, such as hackers, cyber-extortionists, and scammers, are blocked.

In meeting these goals, IAM systems help safeguard organizations and their assets from cyber-threats, while ensuring that legitimate users are not disrupted from accessing those assets for valid, legitimate purposes.

IAM tools manage and control access by assigning every user and device in an enterprise IT environment a unique “digital identity”. These identities, which specify who each user is and what permissions they have within the company’s IT environment, are stored in the tool’s database. Every time a user (or device) attempts to access an enterprise system, the tool checks the database to authenticate the user, verify their permissions and authorize access.

IAM is not limited to simply authenticating users with usernames and passwords. It is also crucial to track users and their access privileges, monitor user activity, and control access to various digital resources. These include SaaS apps, services, and browser extensions.

The Drawbacks of Traditional IAM Tools

In an expanding threat landscape, IAM is an indispensable element of modern-day enterprise cybersecurity. IAM allows organizations to protect their IT assets from threats while ensuring that they remain accessible to legitimate users. With IAM tools, cybersecurity teams can control who can access the organization’s resources. They can restrict access to sensitive resources and assign permissions based on user roles. In addition, they can minimize barriers to user productivity using techniques like passwordless authentication, multi-factor authentication (MFA), and single sign-on (SSO).

That said, traditional, on-premises IAM systems pose numerous challenges that prevent businesses from mitigating the threats posed by SaaS apps and browser extensions. These challenges include:

#1: Not Built for Modern, “Cloud-first” Environments

Organizations with hybrid, cloud-first environments and remote teams need IAM solutions that can ensure seamless access control across the entire environment. The solutions must track various users and their permissions for all resources, regardless of whether the resources are on-premises or in the cloud. Traditional IAM tools struggle to meet these requirements, resulting in poor access control and creating serious security risks for the organization.

#2: Operational Complexity

Legacy IAM systems often require manual patching, updates, and maintenance to keep them up-to-date and effective. Cybersecurity teams may also have to handle many IAM tasks manually, such as access reviews, user onboarding/offboarding, and identity updates. These tasks can be time-consuming and increase operational complexity. They also prevent security personnel from focusing on other higher-value security tasks, such as implementing a zero trust architecture (ZTA) or modernizing the incident response plan.

#3: Misconfigurations and Lack of Adaptive Controls Increase Security Risks

Many older IAM tools require comprehensive manual configurations to function effectively. Such reliance on human input often results in misconfigurations that can create serious security problems for the organization.

For example, some users may accidentally get too much access to sensitive information, exposing it to malicious threats from both outside and inside the organization. IAM misconfigurations may also prevent legitimate users from accessing systems, affecting their productivity.

Another problem with older tools is that they cannot continuously monitor access behaviors. Many also lack adaptive risk-based access controls and real-time analytics. Due to these limitations, they cannot proactively identify behavioral anomalies or mitigate emerging security threats.

#4: The Rise of Shadow IT and Shadow AI

Shadow IT is a growing problem for organizations everywhere. Every time a user signs up for a free cloud storage service, uses a personal device for work (BYOD), or forwards emails to a free email service, it creates significant security risks for an organization.

Traditional IAM tools struggle with Shadow IT prevention. They cannot keep track of all unauthorized devices or applications operating in the IT environment. When security teams don’t know about these resources, they cannot enforce security rules to safeguard the organization from security breaches and data losses.

#5: Poor Visibility into SaaS Apps, Browser-Based Tool Usage, and Extension Permissions

Organizations must know which SaaS apps, browser-based tools, and extensions are part of the IT environment in order to assess their risks and allow (or block) access to them. However, legacy IAM tools provide limited visibility into these resources, making it hard for security teams to identify their vulnerabilities and mitigate their security and compliance risks.

SpinOne for IAM: Resolving Traditional IAM Challenges with Automation, Risk Assessments, and AI

SpinOne is a next-gen IAM solution that effortlessly eliminates the challenges of traditional IAM tools. Built for modern-day, hybrid IT environments, SpinOne provides advanced app access control, seamless SaaS identity management, and comprehensive browser extension security.

The platform handles user access and identity management through RBAC, allowing administrators to easily define roles with specific permissions, assign them to users based on their responsibilities and job roles, and enforce access policies. They can also block high-risk apps/extensions to prevent security breaches. Furthermore, SpinOne leverages AI-driven automation and adaptive security controls to minimize role sprawl – a common problem with traditional IAM tools.

SpinOne also simplifies user provisioning. Admins can easily add new users, grant them access to relevant resources, and revoke access when necessary. They can also enforce least privilege access and adaptive authentication mechanisms as part of a broader ZTA strategy to minimize the attack surface and boost cyber-resilience.

SpinOne has powerful monitoring capabilities. It continuously monitors user activity across the entire IT environment to detect and prevent suspicious behaviors. Administrators can see user actions in real-time, and take fast, proactive action to mitigate risk. Additionally, SpinOne provides real-time threat detection that’s tied to identity access, minimizing the potential for a threat to escalate into a serious breach.

With AI-powered risk scoring for apps, SpinOne streamlines compliance audits and also allows admins to determine whether to retain or revoke access rights for specific users. Also, automated audit trails, detailed logs of app usage and access activity, and compliance reports enable IT teams to easily detect IAM gaps (e.g., excessive privileges) and maintain continuous regulatory compliance.

Some other features that make SpinOne a stand-out IAM solution for modern IT environments:

• Automated app discovery: SpinOne instantly identifies all connected SaaS apps and extensions, eliminating the need for manual asset searches and inventorying.
• OAuth risk assessments: SpinOne performs real-time risk assessments and ranks apps by risk level so organizations can implement dynamic, adaptive, and more effective access controls.
• Extension control: It’s easy to whitelist or block browser extensions by security policy with SpinOne.
• Granular admin control: Admins can control OAuth scopes and data-sharing permissions at any scale, limiting applications’ access to authorized accounts.
• 2-Factor Authentication (2FA) support: SpinOne supports 2FA, thus strengthening security and reducing the probability of unauthorized/malicious access.

Best Practices for IAM Success

SpinOne is engineered to ease IAM complexities for security-aware organizations. Business leaders can further streamline their IAM strategy and strengthen the firm’s security posture by adopting these IAM best practices:

Start with App and Extension Discovery

Security starts with visibility. A real-time inventory of extensions and SaaS applications with access to the IT environment can help clarify the operational, security, privacy, and compliance risks of each of these resources.

Classify Apps by Risk and Usage

Most organizations don’t have the resources needed to mitigate the risk of every SaaS app and browser extension in their IT environment. This is why the next-best risk mitigation strategy is to identify the highest-risk and most frequently-used resources. This strategic approach allows businesses to establish and enforce IAM controls that are most likely to effectively mitigate risk protect the organization from internal and external threats.

Apply RBAC and Least Privilege Principles

RBAC and the principle of least privilege are two effective ways to strengthen IAM and improve security. RBAC involves assigning permissions based on roles, which reduces the risk of unauthorized access and also simplifies user and permissions management. Similarly, the lease privilege principle also enhances security and reduces the size of the enterprise attack surface.

Continuously Monitor and Optimize Access Policies

Organizations are constantly evolving – and so are their threat environments. New connections, devices, technologies, and users create new security threats that must be identified, assessed, and addressed. It’s also vital to continuously monitor and optimize all IAM policies and controls in order to safeguard the business and its assets from these risks.

Secure Your SaaS Stack with SpinOne IAM

SpinOne’s Identity Access Management solution is purpose-built to protect organizations from the risks posed by SaaS apps and browser extensions. This powerful, all-in-one platform combines control, visibility, and automation, as well as inventory, risk assessment, access management, and incident response for all your cloud services, SaaS apps, and browser extensions. Plus, it integrates with your existing IdP (Google Workspace, Microsoft 365) to enhance security, streamline user management, and simplify compliance.

Want to future-proof your IAM strategy?Explore SpinOne’s intelligent IAM approach. Contact us to get started.