8 RPA facts - It mitigates risks and ensures a secure environment

Expected reading time: 3 mins

A primary concern which comes to mind when considering a product for Robotic Process Automation or RPA is how safe is my data with it? And yes, rightly so! Entrusting your data to a technology platform, which can copy data between systems, is more than eerie than it seems!

The facts that RPA does not require IT intervention for installation and operation, presence of privilege role accounts, existence of non-privileged members in the ecosystem, etc., are enough to give butterflies in the stomach of a layman.

Here are a set of 8 RPA facts that help you rest assured that your data remains safe with a bot:

1. Separate credentials for bots and human operators: With each bot having its own individual identity, they can be assigned separate login ids and passwords so that it becomes amply clear whether a bot executed a pre-programmed action or a human operator executed a task. RPA audit logs record the minutest details of transactions performed by either a human or a bot operator.
   
   
2. Credentials vault: By not hard coding credentials in scripts, the RPA product ensures maximum safety. The credentials can be stored in an encrypted format in a secure database such that they are accessed by the bot each time it requires to execute a job. The credentials can be separately updated on a daily basis to achieve maximum security.
   
   
3. Separate lines of duties: Ensuring that the bot designers (script programmers) and the bot executers don’t have access to each other’s role is a major inhibitor of fraud perpetration. Going a step ahead, by not only inhibiting logical access but also separating the physical locations of designers and executers and veiling bot credentials from power users / administrators adds an extra wall of security.
   
   
4. Privilege management: Power user roles exist to manage day-to-day emergencies. An extra supervisory layer that monitors power users / administrators and automatically raises alerts on any suspicious activity dissuades any malpractice.
   
   
5. Role-based Access (RBA) for each bot: Pre-programming the level of access and the activity of each bot helps in eliminating fraudulent activities. Further, the bot executing the RPA script always has a read only and not write access to a script.
   
   
6. Complete audit logs: Detailed log of each transactional activity along with the user’s identity provides a double check for all unattended and attended bot operations. The logs can be stored securely in a separate system and can be accessed only for forensic examinations.
   
   
7. Each bot job secured and bolted: Embedded security checks in each bot job ensure that each bot job and the entire RPA effort becomes fraud proof.
   
   
8. IT audits: IT teams can conduct random audits for RPA automated processes, resolve doubts if any and thus add an extra layer of security.

In summary:

The above 8 facts substantiate that RPA eliminates the possibilities of occurrence of any fraud. RPA also helps streamline the operational processes across a multi-tier architecture and offers a highly secure operating environment.