As a market leader for open source software products, Red Hat is renowned for helping organizations address modern challenges to technology and cybersecurity trends through innovative solutions that meet evolving demands. Specifically, their perpetual dedication to robust security and authentication standards ensures users, enterprises and agencies can carefully monitor and regulate access to their environments in the face of often hostile conditions.
The company’s recent launch of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 9.4 continues this focus. This marks a significant advancement for its already robust user security capabilities by introducing passkey authentication and enabling a passwordless login experience using FIDO2-compatible devices. This method enhances security against phishing by utilizing strong cryptography with external device-bound passkeys, including the YubiKey.
With the release, Yubico and Red Hat have partnered together to combine the enterprise-ready stability and security focus of RHEL with the strong authentication power of the YubiKey. This marriage provides a comprehensive defense against cyber threats, leveraging an effective and efficient solution for both individuals and organizations of all sizes. Users that utilize this authentication approach can expect to see many benefits, including:
- Enhanced security
- YubiKey adds a layer of security that requires physical possession of the key for authentication.
- When combined with RHEL’s built-in security features such as Kerberos and SSSD, YubiKey helps to enhance both local and network security to better defend against cyber threats.
- Improved user experience
- YubiKeys are easy to use and integrate seamlessly with RHEL, providing a user-friendly solution that doesn’t compromise on security.
- Removing the reliance on passwords eliminates the need for time-exhaustive password resets, increasing the throughput of end users and IT teams.
- Decrease operating costs
- By reducing the risk of security breaches, this solution can save organizations significant costs associated with password management, data loss, and recovery from cyber attacks.
Amy Farley, a senior product manager within the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Identity, Security and Compliance team, detailed the significance of the news: “Security keeps marching forward to the drums of Zero Trust, and Red Hat and Yubico believe in providing ‘best practice’ security when it comes to passkeys. We will continue to work to improve features and make it easier for customers to ‘do it right’ from a security standpoint with the resources and knowledge they currently have. Working with Yubico has been great, and working with them with the strength of Open Source collaboration has been a joy.”
Advance your security with RHEL 9.4 and YubiKey
Modern Linux deployments contend with unique security challenges that require maintaining a balance of flexibility and scalability that are both required to keep systems ready and in good health. Managing access to multiple cloud platforms and applications, as well as legacy systems, requires a consistent ecosystem and secure authentication solution that works across different environments and devices. Best of all, deploying YubiKey with Red Hat is an easy, seamless experience since it is compatible with Red Hat Identity Management (IdM) and many existing security portfolios.
This synergy also offers a cost-effective approach to accessing and safeguarding valuable digital assets. The open-source nature of both solutions ensures flexibility, customization, and community-driven innovation to keep pushing the technology and incrementally enhance the user experience moving forward. Take a step towards improving security and usability for your systems, enterprise or government organization with this combined solution from Red Hat and Yubico. We invite you to learn more about how this solution can be tailored to meet your unique needs! To see how easily YubiKey can be deployed with existing Red Hat Enterprise Linux deployments check out the process in our video here as well as our video below. Schedule a demo today here, and let us guide you through the process of implementing YubiKey with Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
