Yandex Grapples with IDM Scaling Challenges
The implementation of an Identity and Access Management (IDM) system at Yandex was initially conceived to bring order to a chaotic landscape of access rights. Prior to its introduction, there was no centralized repository to determine who possessed which permissions, who granted them, and the underlying reasons. The IDM system was intended to serve as this singular source of truth.
Growth Pains and System Overload
However, as is common with rapidly expanding infrastructures, the IDM system quickly encountered its own set of scaling difficulties. Despite its primary objective of combating disarray, the tool itself became a source of new complications. Key challenges included:
- Demand Exceeding Capacity: The backlog for integrating new systems into the IDM began to significantly outpace the number of systems already connected. This created a bottleneck effect, hindering the swift onboarding of new services.
- Accumulation of Feature Requests: Development teams and users actively submitted requests for new functionalities (feature requests), which accumulated faster than the IDM team could process them. This led to user dissatisfaction and slowed down functional development.
Consequently, the very instrument designed to streamline processes found itself under immense pressure from the escalating demands of Yandex’s vast ecosystem, which encompasses up to 1500 distinct systems requiring meticulous access management.
This article really resonates with my experience. We’re running a similar IDM solution, and the scaling issues, especially with feature requests piling up, are a constant battle. We found that aggressively prioritizing integrations and building out a self-service portal for common access requests helped a bit, but the backlog still feels insurmountable sometimes. My tip would be to invest heavily in robust API integrations from day one, it makes a huge difference down the line for automating system onboarding.