IBM has bolstered its risk management portfolio with the announcement of new security software designed to help clients manage user access to sensitive company information and simplify the process of compliance management. IBM advances its identity management software with the availability of IBM Tivoli Identity Manager Version 5.0.

According to the release, new features and enhancements to IBM Tivoli Identity Manager are intended to improve management of business policy compliance, accelerate and simplify set-up and deployment, and enhance productivity of identity management business users and IT administrators.

IBM Tivoli Identity Manager automates for enterprises the manual process of setting up new accounts and passwords for its employees and customers. The software also can identify unauthoried and malicious changes that would give users access to more applications than necessary to do their jobs, remove the illegitimate access, and alert designated business leaders as these events occur.

According to Venkat Raghavan, director of strategy, IBM Tivoli security and storage software, "IBM Tivoli Identity Manager helps clients automate compliance controls around user access to company information and makes it easier for them to address audit needs when linked with audit and compliance management software, such as IBM Tivoli Compliance Insight Manager. The new software also helps reduce the time and cost to manage clients' business compliance process."

To support compliance needs, the software helps enterprises easily demonstrate who has access to what information and why that access is business appropriate. It provides centralised reports on security policy, access rights and audit events to quickly respond to internal audits and regulatory mandates.

The new software also handles the process of automatically correcting and removing non-compliant access rights through periodic management review and sign-off.