The Covid19 pandemic has accelerated the move to the cloud where identity is a security perimeter. This has made managing cloud infrastructure entitlements more critical than ever before. Previously, the only way to manage access permissions was manually, using limited-functionality service provider tools proprietary to each cloud platform. On average, enterprises use more than one cloud platform, so enabled permissions can extend into the millions, with up to 90% being risky, unused and excessive. Just one misconfigured cloud entitlement can bring down an entire application or lead to a devastating breach. In AWS alone, there are 2500+ permission settings for users, devices, applications and services, making it virtually impossible to assess the risks manually.
This year, Gartner introduced a cloud security category called Cloud Infrastructure Entitlement Management (CIEM) to describe a new approach for managing access and enforcing least privilege in the public cloud. Ermetic is a pioneer of CIEM technology that governs identities, access entitlements and enforces least-privilege access policies across multiple cloud provider platforms.
The Ermetic Cloud Security Platform automates the detection and remediation of dangerous or excessive permissions in the cloud that should be modified or revoked. It centralizes the enforcement of least-privilege policies on a continuous basis across multi-cloud infrastructures including Amazon, Google and Microsoft.
Ermetic’s disruptive CIEM technology addresses the complexity and sheer magnitude of cloud infrastructure entitlement management. It automatically discovers and analyzes all human and machine identities and entitlements in AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud. It is the first cloud-native security solution to provide full-stack insight into access entitlements across IAM policies, network configurations, storage and secrets assets. Ermetic’s unique, contextual capabilities expose overprivileged, unused and risky entitlements, and enforce least privilege access in multi-cloud environments.
How we are different
- Ermetic addresses one of today’s top cloud security challenges by bringing order to the chaos created by the massive amounts of loosely implemented entitlements dynamically associated with people and machines in multi-cloud environments. Gartner estimates, “by 2023, 75% of security failures will result from inadequate management of identities, access, and privileges, up from 50% in 2020.” It was only this year that Gartner defined a market for CIEM, but Ermetic’s founders had identified the business need and founded the company in 2019 to fulfill this unmet need in cloud security. Ermetic is already growing rapidly, and the CIEM market is expected to grow exponentially over the next several years.
- Ermetic’s advanced CIEM technology, unique full stack visibility and continuous lifecycle approach performs a deep, continuous assessment of cloud infrastructure entitlements that automates the discovery and control of complex access rights. The proprietary identity, access and entitlement management tools provided by each cloud service provider do not allow for least privilege enforcement, automated risk assessment, prioritization or remediation for multi-cloud environments at scale. Ermetic addresses gaps in other cloud security approaches like CASB, which doesn’t provide granular visibility and management of IAM/permissions at the user, application and resource level in cloud infrastructure environments; and CSPM which focuses on policy compliance and violations, but lacks the specialized analytics required to identify access risks and enforce least privilege.
- The Ermetic platform automates the discovery of identities and entitlements across multi-cloud environments, including third party access and federated users, to provide full-spectrum visibility, anomaly detection, least privilege enforcement and risk remediation at scale. It eliminates the risk of misconfigured entitlements in cloud infrastructures without sacrificing cost, agility, speed and scale. Ermetic ensures that developers, IT, security and DevOps can securely access public cloud infrastructures with only the entitlements required
About this category: Cloud Infrastructure Entitlements Management (CIEM)
This Cybersecurity Excellence Awards category covers products that manage permissions in cloud infrastructure. New nominations in this area are entered in Cloud Privileged Access Management or Cloud-Native Application Protection Platform (CNAPP).
An independent jury of security practitioners, analysts and CISOs scores each nomination on leadership, innovation and impact. Each nomination competes in its category against organizations of similar size and region. Entry packages, sponsorship and public votes do not affect the jury's scores.
Community Choice voting for the 2021 season closed on July 10, 2021.
What is the Community Choice Award?
A separate award decided by public vote, independent of the jury awards. Each completed share of a profile on LinkedIn, Facebook or X counted as one vote.
2027 award season
Nominations closeFebruary 27, 2027
Jury winners announcedWeek of March 22
Community Choice voting closesJuly 10, 2027
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Cast your vote by sharing this nominee’s profile on LinkedIn, Facebook, or X, using the buttons above. Each completed social share adds one Community Choice vote.
Votes cast by July 10, 2027 will determine the Community Choice winners (independent of the jury awards). Winners will be announced before Black Hat USA.
What is the Community Choice Award? →
Community Choice is a separate award track from the jury-selected Cybersecurity Excellence Awards. Jury winners are chosen by expert judges, while Community Choice winners are determined by public voting. A nominee may be honored by the jury, the community, or both.
2021 winners in Cloud Infrastructure Entitlements Management (CIEM)
To keep judging fair, each entry is judged against peers in its segment, so a category can have more than one Gold winner.
