What is employee access control and permissions

Last updated: 2023-09-07
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Employee access control

Employee access control is a restriction of access to data or property. Depending on the job position every employee has been given different access rights or other rights. It means the right to access different parts of the company, workplace, places, rooms, parts of a building, or other properties. It also refers to access to information, systems, applications, or part of it. Access control prevents people from breaking in, helps you keep track of your valuables, and overall enables you to keep an eye on your workplace.

  • every workplace needs access control
  • every company software, application, or cloud service needs access control 

What is employee access control and why should you care?

  • unauthorized physical access can lead to theft of property, destruction, vandalism, and bodily harm to employees or stolen data
  • unauthorized access could also lead to safety threats and fines if an organization deals with sensitive data, equipment or chemicals, equipment
  • with wrong access employees could easily harm themselves, damage equipment, or get and share information they should not have
  • understanding who has access to the property is important to prevent various threats  
  • in emergency situations you can count the number of people to ensure that everyone has evacuated 

How to control employee access

Employee access control is the process of determining and enforcing who has access to different parts of the property: buildings, rooms, facilities, equipment, systems and sensitive areas. 

  • maintaining information on keys issued, access/entry cards
  • maintaining information on rights and authorizations (e.g. power of attorney, stamp)
  • maintaining information on access rights to systems, software, applications and cloud services
  • automation of access to applications using IDM systems (identity management systems) LDAP, AD
  • security of workplace, rooms or buildings

Employee access management covers the entire employee lifecycle in a company, i.e. it is a natural part of employee onboarding, job changes and departures. 

  • At onboarding, the correct permissions and access must be issued so that the employee can perform their job correctly
  • Job changes are among the most challenging, as new authorizations need to be issued and old ones removed
  • When leaving (offboarding), all permissions and access must be removed so that the employee does not have access after leaving. Particularly with cloud services, there is a big risk because they can be accessed from anywhere