We recently commissioned a study with Osterman Research to find out what organizations use Active Directory groups for. Part of it is selfish, we make Active Directory group management solutions, and it would be nice to know that the market is big enough. But the other, more important, factor is to make sure that we are evolving and innovating in the right direction.
So, to put it simply, Active Directory groups are used for security. Surprisingly, much more than for email. Securing resources accounted for the top two spots by a big margin. And security groups, rather than distribution lists, accounted for 4 of the top 5 spots. Take a look at this, according to the survey, the five most common uses for Active Directory groups are:
- Grant access to files and folders (93 percent)
- Grant permission to systems (78 percent)
- Applying Group Policy Objects at the group level (73 percent)
- Sending email to distribution groups (66 percent)
- Send email to mail-enabled security groups (43 percent)
Didn’t you expect to see email at the top somewhere near 100%? Keep in mind that the respondents are all Active Directory & Exchange users admins, they would know this stuff.
For Imanami, this is important news, many competitors are moving into the group management space in fits and starts but everyone seems to focus on distribution lists not security groups. We are ahead of the pack and will continue to be.
Check out more results from the study on user and group management. And let us know if you’d like to see a demo of how we can help manage the accuracy of your Active Directory security groups with GroupID.
Jonathan Blackwell
View ProfileSince 2012, Jonathan Blackwell, an engineer and innovator, has provided engineering leadership that has put GroupID at the forefront of group and user management for Active Directory and Azure AD environments. His experience in development, marketing, and sales allows Jonathan to fully understand the Identity market and how buyers think.