← ClaudeAtlas

auditing-break-glass-account-trustlisted

Audit emergency break-glass and privileged-access accounts for the ways their standing power outlives the emergency they exist for: a break-glass account with a static, shared, or never-rotated credential that is a permanent superuser login rather than a sealed last resort, an emergency account excluded from the MFA, conditional-access, or logging controls covering other admins so its use is easy and invisible, a just-in-time elevation that grants more than the task needs or is not revoked when the task ends, an emergency-access path with no approval, time bound, or alerting so it is used routinely, and a break-glass use that triggers no review afterward. Use when a standing emergency identity or an elevation path holds power beyond ordinary admins and the controls around when and how it is used are the boundary. The break-glass credential or elevation request is the source, the unbounded or unaudited privileged access is the sink, and the missing rotation, control coverage, or use-time alerting is the bug.
UnboundCompute/security-agent-skills · ★ 5 · AI & Automation · score 80
Install: claude install-skill UnboundCompute/security-agent-skills
# Auditing break-glass account trust: the last-resort key must be sealed, watched, and rare A break-glass account exists for the emergency where normal admin access is broken, the identity provider is down, everyone is locked out, so it holds the highest privilege and, by design, bypasses some of the controls that gate everyone else. That combination, maximum power plus fewer gates, is precisely why it is dangerous when its own controls are loose. The account is supposed to be a sealed last resort: strong unique credential, rotated after each use, covered by logging and alerting, used rarely and reviewed every time. The failures are where it stops being sealed. A static, shared, or never-rotated credential turns the emergency key into a permanent superuser login anyone who once saw it can use. An emergency account excluded from the multi-factor, conditional-access, and logging controls that cover other admins is both easy to use and invisible when used. A just-in-time or privileged-access-management elevation that grants more than the task needs, or is not revoked when the task ends, leaves standing privilege behind a temporary label. An emergency path with no approval, no time bound, and no alerting gets used routinely instead of exceptionally. And a break-glass use that triggers no review means the one time it mattered, nobody looked. The audit checks that the emergency identity is sealed, watched, minimally scoped, and reviewed, so its power is available in a real emergen