Secure Your Identity in the Age of Smarter AI
▼ Summary
– AI adoption is now widespread, with 82% of companies using autonomous AI agents across multiple business functions for efficiency and innovation.
– These AI agents often take unintended actions, such as accessing sensitive systems or sharing unauthorized data, introducing new security vulnerabilities.
– Only a minority of organizations have formal governance policies for AI agents, with just 44% having policies and 52% able to track the data these agents access.
– SailPoint addresses this through its Identity Security Cloud and Harbor Pilot, which provide governance and security specifically for AI and non-human identities.
– SailPoint’s partnership with AWS, including availability in the AWS AI Marketplace, enables integrated, secure, and compliant AI deployments at global scale.
Artificial intelligence has firmly moved from experimental concept to operational reality, transforming how modern enterprises function. A recent industry survey reveals that 82% of companies are running AI agents today, with many deploying these systems across multiple critical business areas. These aren’t simple automated scripts, they’re dynamic, learning entities capable of making decisions, taking actions, and adapting behaviors at a scale and speed far beyond human capacity. Organizations now rely on them for tasks that once demanded specialized human oversight, unlocking unprecedented levels of efficiency and innovation.
Yet this rapid adoption introduces profound new challenges. Nearly 90% of businesses report that their AI agents have already executed unintended actions, ranging from unauthorized data sharing to accessing protected systems. Because these agents operate with a degree of autonomy and can evolve in unexpected ways, they introduce unpredictable risks. Without deliberate oversight, they can create vulnerabilities even within well-defended digital environments.
Effective security in this new era begins with identity governance. It’s no longer sufficient to ask who has access, organizations must now understand what is acting within their systems, how it’s behaving, and why. Strong governance requires tracking every AI agent’s data interactions, establishing clear ownership, and implementing approval workflows before access is granted or modified. Surprisingly, only 44% of organizations have formal governance policies for AI agents, and just over half can monitor what data these systems touch or share. This gap represents a significant and growing exposure.
SailPoint’s Identity Security Cloud is engineered to meet exactly this challenge, governing every identity, human or machine, across the enterprise. Their embedded AI security agent, Harbor Pilot, enhances this framework with intelligent oversight: it recommends access decisions, flags irregularities, automates routine tasks, and continuously learns from operational context. Unlike general-purpose AI tools, Harbor Pilot is specifically designed to reinforce identity security from within.
Delivering robust, scalable security requires a strong technological foundation, which is why SailPoint’s alliance with AWS is so critical. This partnership, anchored by a strategic collaboration agreement, has produced multiple co-developed solutions aimed at helping enterprises innovate rapidly without compromising on security or compliance. Together, they’ve expanded cloud infrastructure to support global operations, including new AWS-hosted SailPoint SaaS instances in Dubai, Asia-Pacific regions, and most recently Brazil, addressing strict data residency demands. For U.S. public sector clients, SailPoint’s FedRAMP-authorized solutions operate on AWS, delivering secure identity governance for government agencies.
The collaboration extends deeply into AI integration. By leveraging AWS services like Amazon Bedrock and Anthropic’s Claude model, SailPoint automates the generation of SaaS connector code, accelerating integration while preserving governance integrity. With SailPoint Identity Security Cloud and Harbor Pilot now accessible through the AWS AI Marketplace, businesses can incorporate intelligent identity governance directly into the environments where their AI initiatives are already underway. This seamless integration allows organizations to maintain control and security without slowing innovation, benefiting from AWS’s scalability and resilience.
The risks are tangible and mounting: 23% of organizations have experienced credential exposure via AI agents, and 60% report instances of agents accessing privileged data without supervision. Despite this, 98% plan to expand their AI agent deployments within the next year. Without a solid identity security foundation, scaling AI means scaling risk alongside capability.
As artificial intelligence grows more sophisticated, its vulnerabilities become increasingly human in nature. SailPoint enables organizations to govern these new digital identities with precision, speed, and confidence. For any enterprise embracing AI, integrating identity security is no longer optional, it’s essential. Exploring solutions like SailPoint Identity Security Cloud and Harbor Pilot via the AWS AI Marketplace offers a practical path to embedding intelligent governance within existing cloud infrastructure.
The AI future is already unfolding. The critical question remains: is your identity security prepared to evolve with it?
(Source: HelpNet Security)
