How does MFA support privileged access management?

Privileged accounts, which hold elevated access to critical systems, are a high-value target for attackers, making strong MFA a standard control within privileged access management (PAM) programs rather than an optional add-on.

Why privileged accounts warrant special MFA treatment:

• Higher potential impact: A compromised privileged account can affect far more systems and data than a standard user account.
• Frequent attacker targeting: Attackers specifically seek out privileged credentials because of the access they unlock.
• Justification for stronger factors: Privileged sessions are a natural place to require phishing-resistant methods even if standard user access uses lighter-weight factors.
• Session-level controls: MFA for privileged access is often combined with additional controls such as just-in-time access or session recording.

Requiring phishing-resistant factors specifically for privileged sessions, rather than relying on the same authentication level used for standard user access, adds an additional layer of protection around the accounts that would cause the most damage if compromised.