They should combine application posture checks with identity discovery, ownership mapping, and revocation workflows. SSPM can show whether an app is configured safely, but it cannot by itself prove who still has access, which accounts are shared, or whether offboarding actually removed every path into the service.
Why This Matters for Security Teams
SSPM is useful, but it only answers part of the governance question. It can show whether a SaaS app is misconfigured, yet still miss who can sign in, which OAuth grants remain active, whether service accounts are shared, and whether offboarding actually removed every path back into the tenant. That gap matters because identity compromise is often the real control failure, not the app setting itself. NHI research from The State of Non-Human Identity Security shows that only 1.5 out of 10 organisations are highly confident in their ability to secure NHIs, and Ultimate Guide to NHIs highlights how service-account visibility remains poor in many enterprises. For governance, that means the team needs a system of record for access, ownership, and revocation, not just a scan report. The practical benchmark is whether access can be answered and removed quickly, not whether a dashboard is green. In practice, many security teams encounter hidden SaaS access only after a former owner, shared token, or dormant integration has already been used.
