What term is used to describe the act of checking out a privileged account password...

The term “Break Glass” refers to an emergency access procedure that allows users to bypass normal security controls to gain access to a system or service during a critical situation. This method is analogous to breaking the glass of a fire alarm to handle an emergency. In the context of information security management, it is a controlled process that is typically documented, monitored, and audited to ensure it is used only during genuine emergencies. It is a part of an organization’s disaster recovery and business continuity planning, ensuring that critical systems can still be accessed when standard authentication methods fail or are unavailable due to various reasons such as service outages, DDoS attacks, or loss of access by the primary administrator12.

References :=

Microsoft Entra ID documentation on managing emergency access admin accounts3.

StrongDM’s blog explaining the need for “Break Glass” accounts for privileged access1.

SSH Academy’s definition of “Break Glass” access2.