A way of representing a user through statements the application can read during a session, such as name, email, or custom attributes. In ASP.NET Core, those claims become the basis for access checks, which means their accuracy and freshness directly affect authorisation outcomes.
Expanded Definition
Claims-based identity is an identity model where an application relies on issued claims, such as subject, role, email, tenant, device posture, or custom attributes, rather than inferring identity from a single directory lookup. In practice, the claims are carried in tokens or session artifacts and are evaluated by the relying application at authorisation time. The model is common in federated IAM, API gateways, and modern app frameworks because it supports portable identity context across services.
In NHI and agentic systems, claims-based identity often extends beyond human users to service principals, workloads, and AI agents that need bounded execution authority. That makes claim quality crucial: the application is only as reliable as the issuer, freshness, and verification process behind each claim. Guidance varies across vendors on how much trust should be placed in embedded claims versus live policy checks, so implementation should separate identity proofing from runtime authorisation. The most common misapplication is treating stale or unsigned claims as authoritative, which occurs when teams accept token contents without validating issuer trust, expiry, or revocation conditions.
For a broader NHI context, see Ultimate Guide to NHIs and the discussion of identity lifecycle risk in Top 10 NHI Issues. For standards context, NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0 frames identity assurance and access control as core governance outcomes.
External reference: NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0
Examples and Use Cases
Implementing claims-based identity rigorously often introduces validation and token-refresh overhead, requiring organisations to weigh portability and reduced directory lookups against the cost of tighter verification.
- A web app receives a signed token containing a user’s department and clearance level, then grants access to specific records only when those claims match policy.
- An internal API uses workload claims to distinguish approved service identities from unknown callers, reducing dependency on shared secrets and hard-coded API keys.
- An AI agent presents claims about its operator, task scope, and environment, allowing the platform to constrain tool use and data access within a bounded session.
- A federated workforce app maps external identity provider claims into local RBAC decisions, but only after checking issuer trust and token freshness.
- A regulated workflow retains a short-lived claim for transaction approval, then revalidates the identity context before high-impact actions are executed.
These patterns become easier to reason about when compared with real-world NHI failures documented in DeepSeek breach and JetBrains GitHub plugin token exposure, where exposed credentials or weak trust boundaries turned identity artefacts into attack paths. For implementation guidance on claims and identity tokens, the external reference point is NIST Cybersecurity Framework 2.0.
Why It Matters in NHI Security
Claims-based identity matters because claims often become the machine-readable proof that a workload, agent, or user is allowed to act. If those claims are forged, stale, over-broad, or not rechecked against current policy, NHI security controls can fail quietly at the exact point where automation has the most authority. This is especially important in environments where service accounts, delegated agents, and API-driven workflows operate faster than human review cycles.
NHIMG research on secrets and credential abuse shows how fast attackers move once identity material is exposed. In the LLMjacking research, attackers attempted access to exposed AWS credentials within an average of 17 minutes. That speed means identity assertions must be validated as continuously as possible, not assumed safe because they were once issued. The same logic applies to claims embedded in tokens that outlive the context they were created for, especially when workloads and agents shift roles dynamically. The most reliable operational posture is to pair claims with issuer verification, short lifetimes, and policy checks at the point of use.
Organisations typically encounter claims-related failure only after a token replay, privilege misuse, or unexpected agent action, at which point claims-based identity becomes operationally unavoidable to address.
Additional NHIMG reading includes 52 NHI Breaches Analysis and The State of Secrets in AppSec, which contextualise how identity and secrets failures intersect in real incidents.
Standards & Framework Alignment
This section maps relevant standards and security frameworks to the operational risks and controls described in this guidance.
OWASP Non-Human Identity Top 10 and OWASP Agentic AI Top 10 address the attack and risk surface, while NIST CSF 2.0, NIST Zero Trust (SP 800-207) and NIST SP 800-63 set the governance and control requirements practitioners need to meet.
| Framework | Control / Reference | Relevance |
|---|---|---|
| NIST CSF 2.0 | PR.AC | Identity claims support access control decisions and identity verification in CSF. |
| NIST Zero Trust (SP 800-207) | PL-identity | Zero Trust relies on continuous identity and context verification, not static trust. |
| NIST SP 800-63 | Digital identity guidance informs assurance, federation, and assertion handling. | |
| OWASP Non-Human Identity Top 10 | NHI-01 | NHI guidance covers identity lifecycle and trust boundaries for machine identities. |
| OWASP Agentic AI Top 10 | A-03 | Agentic controls address delegated authority and tool-use claims for autonomous systems. |
Map non-human claims to least-privilege identity lifecycle controls and short-lived credentials.
