IAM is not just “users and passwords”. It is the control layer that defines who can do what in your cloud environment, and in practice, it often decides whether your cloud will be stable or one misstep away from disaster.
In many teams, the biggest risk is not a new vulnerability. It is excessive permissions. A high-privilege account created “just to move fast” usually stays forever, and over time it becomes silent security debt. When incidents happen, the pattern is common: too much access and not enough visibility into who did what.
A solid IAM approach is built on simple principles. Avoid shared accounts because accountability matters. Use least privilege and grant only what each role truly needs. Prefer safer authentication and temporary access since leaked credentials happen more often than people expect. And combine IAM with visibility because security without logs and monitoring is not control, it is hope.
If you want to grow in cloud the right way, treat IAM as priority number one. It is the foundation that supports everything else, from services and automation to governance and reliability.
Full article on my Hashnode blog:
IAM First on Hashnode
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