Within the IAM world, Okta is the largest company worldwide in terms of number of customers, reaching 7,950 at the end of January 2020. Consulting firms such as Gartner and Forrester also place it in top positions in this field, so that Okta appears as a leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Access Management in the last five years and is recognized by Forrester with a first sword in Identity as a Service. Founded in San Francisco in 2009, Okta offers a platform focused on securing every identity of organizations, including the workforce and customers. The company’s differential value is to cover the entire cycle of access and identity management of organizations, that is, it allows the right employees to be securely connected with the right technologies, at the right time. Its platform, called Okta Identity Cloud, allows you to connect and assign to different people the services, devices and applications in the cloud corresponding to the role they play within an organization. Currently, Okta is able to integrate with more than 7,000 applications. Likewise, when this role changes – for example, an employee leaves the company – through Okta it is possible to change the role given to this user, without putting the security of the organization at risk. Additionally, one of the main characteristics of Okta is its flexibility that allows it to adapt to any place where the worker is, whether in the office itself or in a teleworking environment. In mid-2022, Okta completed the acquisition of Auth0. With the purchase of Auth0, Okta will shape the future of Internet identity. Product builders are key in building the next generation of customer experiences, and Auth0 has always focused squarely on the needs and requirements of developers. Auth0’s DNA is rooted in enabling application teams with identity and its focus has remained since on enabling product builders to innovate. Auth0’s deep expertise in developer identity will help Okta approach identity from all angles, both companies share a similar vision for the broader identity market, and identity is the most critical of cloud organizations. The two identity platforms – Okta and Auth0 – are comprehensive and complementary, and robust and flexible enough to serve the world’s most innovative developers as well as the world’s largest organizations. Together, they will build an identity cloud broad enough for each use case, adaptable for developers to build on, integrated into customer and trusted technologies with the highest standards of security, reliability, and scalability.

Okta Products

Okta’s platform has 7 modules such as Single Sign-On, Adaptive Multi-Factor Authentication, API Access Management, Universal Directory, Lifecycle Management, Advanced Server Access and Access Gateway.

Single Sign-On

Reliable single sign-on service that integrates with all customer web and mobile applications. An SSO application with a full-featured federation engine and a flexible access policy.

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Adaptive Multi-Factor Authentication

Secure multi-factor authentication solution because 80% of security breaches involve compromised passwords. It is a multi-factor authentication solution designed for employees, partners and customers who access applications, systems and devices. Administrators can easily implement multi-factor authentication, without impacting end-user productivity.

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Universal Directory

It is used to manage all your users, groups and devices, controlled in Okta or from any number of sources. The Universal Directory allows you to store an unlimited number of users and attributes of applications and sources such as AD or HR systems. Any type of attribute is supported, including linked objects, sensitive attributes, and predefined lists. All of this is accessible by all applications in Okta’s OIN catalog, via LDAP or via API.

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Lifecycle Management

Sophisticated control of identities at all stages of the lifecycle with automation through rules, policies, workflows, and APIs for complete customization: Automate all lifecycles with any business process for external and internal users.

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API Access Management

Your custom applications are becoming more modern with a back-end API. Secure enterprise data and enable developers to focus on the user experience. Easy configuration of access and authorization policies for API resources.

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Advanced Server Access

Identity and Zero Trust access management for cloud-native infrastructure. Extend secure privileged access and automate the lifecycle of server accounts and policies across dynamic fleets of infrastructure at any scale. Engineered Solution For elastic cloud infrastructure: Unified identity and centralized access controls across any hybrid or multi-cloud environment.

Secure server access on any cloud. Okta provides a central control plane such as SaaS to control access to Linux and Windows servers over AWS, GCP, Azure, or on-premises, abstracting the complexities of managing IAM at scale.

Access Gateway

Secure access to on-premises applications and protect your hybrid cloud without changing how your applications work.

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Yubico Integration

Okta and Yubico offer high-security authentication for organizations of any size or complexity.

What are the challenges of the market?

• Credential phishing is a common way attackers steal usernames and passwords to gain unauthorized access to your data.
• Passwords alone are not enough to protect data; Additional factors offer greater assurance of identity.
• Highly privileged roles, such as IT administrators and executives, need higher levels of security.
• Many organizations need to incorporate an additional security factor, without requiring a mobile device.

The solution: Okta + Yubico

Both vendors offer strong authentication that helps prevent and mitigate credential compromises, and allow secure and easy authentication to access any business application. Among its characteristics, the following stand out:

• High-security authentication thanks to the combination of security token, based on YubiKey Universal Second Factor (U2F) and the Okta Adaptive Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) policy framework.
• Better defense against phishing and man-in-the-middle attacks, while providing a simple and seamless user experience.
• Intelligent policies based on login context, such as user, device, location, and network information.
• Fallicity for organizations to incorporate strong authentication, regardless of device policy.
• Strong, phishing-resistant authentication, even for privileged roles. Protect all users, including administrators and executives with access to sensitive data, with a physical device as a second factor.
• Enhanced security via U2F. It adds an extra layer of security to all levels of the organization thanks to robust, hardware-based protection and touch functions integrated into YubiKey to Okta’s Adaptive MFA solution.
• MFA when a mobile device is not an option. The combination of Okta + YubiKey provides high-security authentication even for users who do not have access or privileges to use mobile devices at work.

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