Attending Gartner 2024, as with other years, was insightful and inspiring. The event brings together practitioners, leaders, and innovators into one common place to discuss the evolution of our field as well as the challenges facing us today, and what lies ahead. Here are some of my main top takeaways:
Non-Human Identity Management
Managing non-human identities is no longer an optional focus. The number of secrets, credential, keys and other artifacts needed to secure has exploded, and is not showing any signs of letting down. To manage this increasing complexity decentralizing strategies, relying on guidance, and education is worth considering. IAM would be better positioned to focus on observability tools to address this complexity although maturity is still needed across the board.
Gen AI: A risk and an opportunity
AI dominated conversations highlighting its potential to transform IAM with assistance in threat detection, pattern and anit-pattern recognition, and agentic AI based solutions are starting to appear more and more frequently. The risks in AI are equally pressing, from deepfake concerns to gaps in access control in AI implementations. There is quite a bit of work to do to find the optimal balance between the AI innovation and maintaining a secure environment.
Passwordless Authentication
Passwordless authentication remains a solid strategy for IT organizations, phishing resistant methods although burdensome might be the only realistic path. FIDO2 authentication is expected to dominate within a few years. Interestingly enough, and counterintuitive to an extend is 0FA or frictionless authentication is not expected to be well received as users still prefer to have some intentionality to their start of a session.
Final thoughts
Many other amazing topics were covered in the conference, from resiliency design in IAM to the strategic importance of identity data. The conference reaffirmed that IAM is at the core of a robust and mature cyber security and risk strategy. As the landscape grows in scale and complexity the need for more forward thinking IAM practices has never been greater.
What were your takeaways? I'd love to chat and exchange notes!
Picture of the Gaylord Texan Resort where the conference took place.
Read more about the conference here!
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