Machine Identity Security
Take control of every machine account
Machine Identity Security brings order to the chaos—helping you discover, govern, and secure service accounts, bots, RPAs, and other non-human accounts across your environment.
Challenge & solution
Why machine accounts need governance
Machine accounts are growing fast—and so is the risk. Without visibility, ownership, or lifecycle controls, these accounts can expose your organization to critical security, audit, and operational gaps.
A growing identity blind spot
Service accounts, bots, and RPAs often outnumber human identities
Many are orphaned, over-permissioned, or unknown
Managed through manual, inconsistent processes
Rarely reviewed or certified during access audits
Attackers exploit these accounts as easy entry points
Purpose-built governance for machines
Discover and classify machine accounts across your environment
Assign ownership and group accounts by application or service
Automate lifecycle controls to ensure each machine account is properly managed
Certify access regularly to stay compliant and reduce risk
Manage human and machine identities in one platform, one UI, one consistent experience
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Uncover what’s hiding in your environment
Machine identities often go untracked, unowned, and over-permissioned. Watch how SailPoint’s AI-powered discovery identifies and classifies hidden machine accounts—giving you the visibility needed to secure your environment.
Use cases
What you can do with Machine Identity Security
Machine Identity Security helps you take control by bringing visibility, ownership, and governance to service accounts, bots, RPAs, and more.
Find every machine account—no matter where it’s hiding
You can’t secure what you can’t see. With Machine Identity Security, you can automatically discover machine accounts scattered across your environment—including service accounts, bots, and RPAs created outside formal provisioning workflows. No more relying on institutional knowledge, incomplete reports, or manual exports. Discovery is fast, comprehensive, and built to expose the blind spots attackers love to target.
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Take a self-guided tour of SailPoint's identity security platform
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Dig deeper into Machine Identity Security
Article series
Demystifying machine identity: A three-part exploration
Start with the basics—what a machine identity is and why it matters—then dive deeper with articles on its historical evolution and where traditional security practices fall short. This series unpacks the complexities and stakes of governing machine identities today.
Suites
Start your identity security journey today
SailPoint Identity Security Cloud enables organization to manage and secure real-time access to critical data and applications for every enterprise identity with an intelligent and unified approach.
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Take your identity security solution even further
The SailPoint Identity Security Cloud delivers the essentials for most organizations. SailPoint also offers advanced capabilities for specific needs.
INDUSTRY INSIGHTS
Where machine identity security matters most
Industries with complex IT environments and high automation levels face the greatest machine identity risks. Here’s how Machine Identity Security helps organizations take back control.
Healthcare
In a high-risk, highly regulated environment, unmanaged machine accounts can expose patient data and disrupt care. Machine Identity Security helps you stay compliant and secure as healthcare operations grow more connected and automated.
Learn moreFinancial services
From fraud prevention to real-time transactions, financial services rely on automation at scale. Machine Identity Security ensures the machine accounts powering your operations don’t become hidden points of failure.
Learn moreManufacturing
Identify and manage machine accounts embedded in supply chains, production systems, and partner integrations to reduce downtime and risk.
Learn morefaq
Machine Identity Security: What to know
What is a machine identity?
A machine identity represents a non-human entity—such as a service account, bot, RPA, or API—that needs access to systems, data, or applications to perform automated tasks. Each machine identity is composed of one or more machine accounts that operate across environments like Active Directory, cloud platforms, and applications. These identities are essential to keeping business processes running, but without governance, they can become invisible entry points for attackers.
How are machine identities different from human identities?
Human identities are linked to employees or contractors and come with contextual data like job role, manager, and employment status. Machine identities, on the other hand, lack that structure. They don’t go through HR processes, don’t have obvious owners, and are rarely reviewed after creation. This makes them harder to govern—and easier for attackers to exploit.
Why do machine identities pose such a big security risk?
Machine identities are frequently created outside formal provisioning processes, granted broad access, and left running indefinitely. Many are untracked, unowned, or forgotten entirely—creating blind spots in your security posture. Attackers increasingly exploit these accounts to gain access, escalate privileges, and move through environments undetected.
How does Machine Identity Security discover hidden machine identities?
Machine Identity Security uses AI-driven discovery to scan identity sources like Active Directory, Entra, and cloud environments. It identifies machine accounts—including those created manually or inherited from legacy systems—and brings them into view. This helps organizations uncover unmanaged or orphaned accounts that would otherwise go unnoticed.
How does ownership work for machine identities?
Machine Identity Security allows you to assign and document ownership for each machine identity—something most organizations struggle to do today. Identities can be grouped by application, team, or business service, then tied to a responsible person or team. This ownership data is maintained for audit purposes and succession planning, so that when an owner changes roles or leaves the company, ownership can be quickly reassigned without losing visibility or control.
Can Machine Identity Security manage machine and human identities together?
Yes. Machine Identity Security is part of the SailPoint Identity Security Cloud, built on the Atlas platform. That means you can govern both human and machine identities within one unified experience—enabling consistent policy enforcement, streamlined certifications, and full lifecycle control through a single governance platform. This integrated approach reduces complexity, closes security gaps, and simplifies compliance across all identity types.
What’s the difference between a machine identity and a machine account?
A machine identity is a broader concept, as it represents the purpose or function behind one or more related machine accounts. For example, a bot that interacts with multiple systems may have accounts in Active Directory, a cloud platform, and an application. Machine Identity Security allows you to group those accounts under a single identity, making it easier to manage ownership, access, and governance as a whole.
How long does it take to get started with Machine Identity Security?
Machine Identity Security is designed for rapid deployment. Most organizations can begin discovering unmanaged machine accounts in days—not weeks. With AI-driven discovery, intuitive workflows, and a familiar UI, teams can quickly gain visibility and start governing machine identities with minimal disruption.