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Why Traditional PAM Falls Short—and How JIT Access Solves It

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Why Traditional PAM Falls Short—and How JIT Access Solves It

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Introduction

Privileged Access Management used to be simple.

Lock up the passwords. Monitor who logs in. Check the tapes when something goes wrong.

That was fine when everything lived in a server room. Now? Not so much.

Today’s IT doesn’t sit still. People move fast. Systems change daily. Teams spin up resources in cloud environments, kill them an hour later. SaaS admin panels pop up like mushrooms after rain.

And those standing admin rights? Still hanging around. Still creating holes.

That’s the problem. Static tools don’t keep up. A traditional privileged access management platform can’t handle this kind of movement.

That’s where just in time access comes in. Not a fancy extra. A fix to a broken system. You give people what they need, when they need it, and take it away right after. No more hanging privileges. No forgotten superuser accounts.

Let’s talk about how we got here, why it matters, and how just in time privileged access management isn’t just useful—it’s necessary.

2. The Old School: What Traditional PAM Does (and Doesn’t)

Let’s give it credit.

Old PAM tools do some good. They keep privileged passwords in vaults. They rotate them. They record sessions.

It’s useful. But it’s also stuck.

Because what they don’t do? Is move with the speed of modern IT.

They don’t know when someone changed roles and shouldn’t be an admin anymore.

They don’t scale easily to every SaaS tool you use.

And they definitely don’t handle just in time access. It’s not what they were built for.

They were made for a world that’s basically gone.

3. Where It Starts Breaking Down

Three big issues.

Standing privileges that never die
Some engineer gets elevated access for a project. Project ends. Access stays. Months go by. No one notices. It’s a ticking time bomb.

Manual access approvals
Need access? File a ticket. Wait. Maybe get approval from someone who doesn’t even know why you need it. Slow and frustrating.

SaaS and cloud roles? Invisible.
Most PAM tools barely see into cloud consoles or SaaS admin panels. These roles go unmanaged, unmonitored, unnoticed.

And that’s where the danger creeps in.

4. Enter Just in Time Access

Let’s answer the question directly.

What is just in time access?

It’s exactly what it sounds like. You request access. You get it—only when you need it. For a specific reason. Then it goes away.

Done. No lingering privileges. No waiting around for IT to approve a ticket. No standing rights that get forgotten.

Just in time access cuts the nonsense.

5. So How Does It Actually Work?

There are a few flavors.

You might request access through a system. Could be automated or routed to your manager. Could require risk scoring. Depends on policy.

Once it’s approved? You get your access. For an hour. A day. Whatever the rules say.

After that? It’s gone.

Every session gets logged. Every action’s traceable. If something weird happens, you’ve got the receipts.

That’s just in time privileged access management at work.

6. Why JIT Beats Traditional PAM

Let’s keep it simple.

  • Better security
    No standing privileges = less risk. That’s the whole point. 
  • Faster work
    DevOps doesn’t want to wait. Engineers don’t want delays. JIT lets them move fast and stay secure. 
  • Cleaner audits
    Every access session is tied to a request. No mystery. No messy logs to sort through. 
  • Scales with your tech
    JIT works across cloud, SaaS, hybrid. Doesn’t matter where the privilege lives. 

Old PAM can’t compete.

7. Examples That Hit Home

Let’s look at a few real situations. Compare how traditional PAM handles them vs JIT.

Scenario Traditional PAM JIT Access
On-call engineer File a ticket, wait, hope it gets seen Request, auto-approve, expire in 2 hours
New contractor onboard Gets full access for 3 months straight Scoped access for 1 week, auto-revoked
SaaS admin rights No logging, no review Auto-approved, session recorded, time-limited
DevOps escalation Wait in queue, slow deployment API-triggered access for 30 minutes

In every case, just in time access saves time and cuts risk. No drama. No extra steps.

8. How SecurEnds Handles It

SecurEnds doesn’t treat JIT like a bolt-on.

It’s baked in.

This isn’t a separate privileged access management platform you need to bolt together with duct tape. It’s all one system—governance, requests, access reviews, audit logs.

  • Policy-based requests
    You decide who gets access, how long, and under what rules. 
  • Approvals in real time
    Approve access via email, Teams, Slack—whatever your team actually uses. 
  • Auto-removal
    No one forgets to revoke anything. It’s automatic. No cleanup needed. 
  • Tied into access reviews
    You see the whole picture. Not just one type of account. 

It works. And it works where legacy tools can’t.

9. Making the Switch

JIT access sounds great. But how do you get there?

Not all at once. Step by step.

Step 1: Find your privileged roles
List every account with elevated access. AD, AWS, Salesforce, wherever. You need to know where the keys are.

Step 2: Define access policies
Decide who gets access, how long it lasts, and who approves it. Don’t overthink it. Start with the basics.

Step 3: Automate
Use your platform to trigger JIT access without human bottlenecks. Let policies do the work.

Step 4: Keep improving
Check how long people really need access. Tighten windows. Add alerts. Make it better as you go.

This isn’t rip-and-replace. It’s replace-and-improve.

10. Final Word

The old way—vaults, tickets, static rules—it got us this far. But it’s not enough anymore.

Standing access is a liability. Manual approvals are a hassle. And most tools still can’t see into the places where risk hides today.

Just in time privileged access management flips that. You don’t hand out admin rights “just in case.” You give them just in time.

That’s where everything’s heading. Fast, flexible, auditable.

And platforms like SecurEnds? They’re already there. They don’t treat JIT access like a luxury. It’s the baseline.

So if you’re still relying on old-school PAM?

Might be time to ask yourself why.