The Explosion of Apps: 27% are Risky

Traditionally, Shadow IT refers to any application employees utilize without IT approval. And with nearly infinite apps at their disposal, Shadow IT is expanding exponentially. However, as more and more organizations adopt cloud platforms, new Shadow IT risk vectors are coming into play in the form of connected third-party apps. These apps are authorized using corporate credentials, demand extensive permission sets, and communicate with corporate SaaS platforms via OAuth connections. 

An organization may embrace its employees' 'shadow' exploration of innovative technology solutions and sanction a subset of these apps as Productivity IT. But it's important to closely monitor the connected third-party apps, as authorizing them gives them programmatic (API) access to corporate data on multiple Saas platforms. Because these apps (and by extension, their vendors) are able to view, delete, externalize and store corporate data, a malicious individual leveraging these connections can act on.