Baylor University Case Study
“We’ve been able to achieve our security and IAM-related goals and SLAs, plus accelerate the introduction of new services to our constituents due to the operational efficiencies afforded by Fischer.”
Discover how Baylor University transformed its IAM system in this case study developed in collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Fischer Identity – published by The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Many higher-education leaders recognize the rising stakes of
cybersecurity.
Attackers frequently target higher-education institutions because these institutions serve so many personas, including faculty, students, staff, and guests — and because these institutions capture so much data across these personas. Government bodies have recognized this threat too: Title IV funding requires colleges to implement a range of cybersecurity measures, and due to a 2018 policy mandate, every single data breach must be reported to the U.S. Department of Education.
However, the higher education sector remains a popular target, and the costs of data breaches continue to rise. IBM research shows that the average data breach at a higher-education institution in 2023 costs $4.5 million — an increase of 15.3 percent from 2020.
According to Jon Allen, Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) at Baylor University, in Waco, Texas, a potentially pivotal change is sweeping through many technical leaders: A reconsideration of identity and its centrality in cybersecurity.
Allen says identity was not a hot topic in higher education a decade ago. But higher education leaders increasingly recognize that “Identity is really the matrix interconnecting it all.”
People touch an institution’s identity system whenever a prospective student applies, a faculty member is hired, or a visiting researcher needs a guest account. They make contact frequently as they create accounts, reset passwords, and request access to a website, file, or application. And every time a student graduates or a professor departs, the identity system must take all that access back.
That’s why Allen partnered with Fischer Identity, a leading provider of Identity & Access Management (IAM) solutions, to build an identity system that could manage all the personas Baylor served and, in the process, provide a system that could scale as Baylor grows. In addition, the Fischer suite of products is based on ease-of-use configuration rather than complicated custom code development to enable long-term sustainability.
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