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Microsoft Commercially Releases Entra Workload Identities

Microsoft announced on Monday that its Entra Workload Identities service is now available as a commercial product offering, having reached the "general availability" stage.

By workload identities, Microsoft means the identities that are used by applications, containers, virtual machines and services. These non-human identities are typically used in some process, such as gaining access to other services, like the Microsoft Graph or Azure Storage. Workload identities have become greater targets for attackers as the security for human identities has improved, Microsoft's announcement argued.

Microsoft Entra Workload Identities lets organizations set Conditional Access policies, such as blocking compromised apps or services and access attempts from nontrusted locations. There's also an Identity Protection capability for things like "compromised credentials, anomalous sign-ins, and suspicious changes to accounts." An Access Reviews capability permits overall assessments of workload identity permissions, too. These three capabilities all reached the general availability stage back in June.

The cost to use Microsoft Entra Workload Identities is priced at $3 per workload identity per month. There's also a free 90-day trail available through the Microsoft Azure Portal.

Microsoft is planning to add a new features to the product. One new feature that's expected to arrive by the "end of November" in preview form will allow organizations to detect "unused apps, expiring credentials and unused credentials." When it's available, this preview will be known as "App Health Recommendations in Azure AD Recommendations," the announcement indicated.

Workload Identities is yet another addition to the Microsoft Entra product line. Microsoft rebranded its identity services with the "Entra" label back in May. Other Microsoft Entra products include Azure Active Directory, Permissions Management and Verified ID.

About the Author

Kurt Mackie is senior news producer for 1105 Media's Converge360 group.

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