Hybrid Identity Security Risks
Running AD on-premises and Entra ID in the cloud? The hybrid seam is where attackers love to hide.
Top hybrid identity security risks
Issues we find most frequently in hybrid AD and Entra ID environments.
- Password hash synchronisation exposure — If AAD Connect syncs password hashes, a compromised on-premises account can pivot directly to cloud admin.
- Legacy authentication bypassing MFA — SMTP AUTH IMAP and POP3 do not support modern authentication. Conditional Access policies frequently leave gaps.
- Entra Connect account privilege — The Entra Connect sync account holds high privilege in both environments. It is a critical often overlooked attack surface.
- Writeback attack surface — Password writeback group writeback and device writeback each create a lateral movement path from cloud to on-premises.
- Hybrid join misconfiguration — Devices registered in both AD and Entra ID create duplicate identity objects with inconsistent policy enforcement.
- Admin account duplication — On-premises admins synced to Entra without proper tiering. Cloud Global Admin accounts should never be synchronised from AD.
- Stale AD accounts blocking Entra cleanup — AD-synchronised accounts cannot be deleted in Entra ID. You must clean Active Directory first. Stale accounts persist.
How IdentityFirstMRI™ covers hybrid estates
IdentityFirstMRI™ was built with hybrid environments as a first-class concern, not an afterthought.
- Covers both Active Directory and Entra ID simultaneously in a single assessment run
- Correlates identities across both identity planes to surface duplication and inconsistency
- Flags writeback-enabled accounts and surfaces the associated risk
- Identifies Entra Connect sync account privilege and highlights the blast radius
- Detects legacy authentication usage patterns from sign-in log data
- Surfaces stale synced accounts that must be remediated at source in AD
How to start
Three steps from discovery to remediation.
1. Assess
Book a demo and we’ll walk through your hybrid estate together. No agents. No infrastructure changes.
2. Prioritise
Receive a risk-weighted findings report. Tier-0 and Tier-1 findings are clearly separated from noise.
3. Remediate
Follow our step-by-step remediation roadmap. Each finding includes effort and impact scoring to help you plan the work.
Book a Hybrid Identity Assessment
AD and Entra ID. Read-only. No agents. Board-ready report in days.
Scoped engagement only. No free trial, and no public package claims beyond what we can deliver.