IT/OT convergence is exposing identity gaps in manufacturing

At a glance

What this is: NHI Mgmt Group's analysis, drawing on Imprivata's blog post: IT/OT convergence in manufacturing creates identity control gaps where legacy systems, shared accounts, vendor access and fragmented visibility undermine secure access governance.

Why it matters: It matters because IAM teams supporting manufacturing cannot treat plant access like corporate access, and weak identity governance can turn convergence into a larger operational and security blast radius.

By the numbers:

• 46% cite security concerns as the #1 issue in IT/OT convergence, according to IDC research cited by Imprivata.
• Legacy OT assets are 15+ years old in ~50% of manufacturers, according to IDC research cited by Imprivata.
• Only 30% of manufacturers can deliver real-time data to frontline workers, according to IDC research cited by Imprivata.
• Only 15% of manufacturers have robust cybersecurity practices, according to IDC research cited by Imprivata.

Context

Manufacturing IT/OT convergence means connecting enterprise systems with industrial operations so data, workflows and access flow across both environments. The security gap appears when identity controls built for corporate IT are stretched into plant systems that were never designed for modern authentication, centralized policy or detailed accountability.

That mismatch matters because manufacturers are no longer dealing with two isolated worlds. Production data, remote vendor access, shared workstations and cloud dashboards now form one operating surface, which means inconsistent identity governance can move risk from a local access issue to an enterprise-wide exposure.

The article’s starting point is typical for modern manufacturing: convergence is already in place, but access management has not caught up.

Key questions

Q: Why does IT/OT convergence increase identity risk in manufacturing?

A: IT/OT convergence increases identity risk because it connects environments that were never built around the same authentication, authorization or audit model. Legacy OT systems, shared accounts and remote vendor access create inconsistent control points, so the weakest identity practice can extend from office IT into production operations.

Q: Why do shared accounts increase risk in retail and manufacturing systems?

A: Shared accounts increase risk because multiple people use the same credentials across fast handovers, so security teams cannot reliably attribute activity or enforce per-user controls. That creates a larger attack surface for exposed passwords, privilege escalation, and unauthorized access. If one account is compromised, attackers can often move across systems with less resistance and less visibility than with named user access.

Q: How should manufacturers govern third-party access in converged IT/OT environments?

A: Treat vendor access as task-scoped access, not a standing support pathway. Limit it to the specific system, short duration and approved session needed for the job, then monitor activity and remove access when the task ends. This reduces the chance that remote support becomes an uncontrolled route into production.

Q: What does identity-driven access control change for manufacturing security teams?

A: It shifts convergence from a networking question to a governance question. Security teams must decide how access is issued, reviewed, monitored and revoked across IT, OT and third parties, rather than assuming one corporate IAM model can simply be extended everywhere without adjustment.

Technical breakdown

Why shared accounts break identity accountability in OT

Shared accounts in OT environments remove the link between a person, a session and a specific action. That matters because auditability depends on knowing which identity requested access, which device used it and what changed during the session. In manufacturing, generic credentials are often tolerated to keep production moving, but they undermine traceability as soon as IT and OT data are unified. Once identity becomes pooled, access reviews, incident investigations and least-privilege enforcement all lose precision. The control problem is not just convenience, but the collapse of attribution across critical systems.

Practical implication: replace shared OT credentials with named access and session-level accountability on shared endpoints.

How legacy OT systems frustrate modern authentication

Many industrial systems were built before central identity policy was a standard requirement. As a result, they may not support modern authentication methods, policy inheritance or consistent authorization checks across plant and enterprise zones. That creates a split control plane where some users authenticate centrally while others rely on local exceptions, bypasses or static trust relationships. When access rules differ by environment, security teams cannot enforce one coherent model for MFA, role assignment or revocation. The technical issue is not simply age, but the inability of older OT assets to participate in a unified identity architecture.

Practical implication: inventory which OT assets cannot enforce modern authentication before extending enterprise access policies into plant operations.

Why vendor access needs segmentation and session control

Third-party maintenance access becomes risky when it is broader than the task requires. In converged environments, vendor connections can cross from support into production if they are not segmented, time-bound and monitored at the session level. Remote access tools and VPN-style entry points are especially dangerous when they inherit broad privileges instead of a narrow, task-specific scope. The security issue is not vendor presence itself, but the loss of boundaries once external access is treated like ordinary remote connectivity. In manufacturing, that boundary loss can expose both IT and OT domains through a single credential path.

Practical implication: scope third-party access to specific systems and monitor every privileged vendor session end to end.

Breaches seen in the wild

• Schneider Electric Jira breach 2024: Credentials linked to a Lumma infostealer infection gave Hellcat access to Schneider Electric's Jira; 40GB and 400,000 user rows claimed.
• Poland ArcGIS password leak 2023: An ArcGIS login emailed in 2020 was published from stolen mail in 2023 and still worked, exposing Polish military and infrastructure maps.

Read and download The State of NHI & AI Agent Breach Report 2026, covering 150+ breaches impacting Non-Human Identities including AI Agents.

NHI Mgmt Group analysis

Identity fragmentation is the real convergence risk. IT/OT convergence does not fail because systems connect. It fails because identity control remains split between enterprise governance and plant-floor exception handling. When access policy differs by environment, security teams lose a single source of truth for who can enter, what they can do and when that permission ends. The practical conclusion is that convergence requires one governed identity model, not two loosely coupled ones.

Legacy OT compatibility is a governance constraint, not just a technical debt issue. Older industrial assets often cannot participate in the same authentication and authorization patterns that enterprise IAM assumes. That means policy consistency, revocation discipline and role-based enforcement are structurally limited unless the environment is redesigned around those constraints. Practitioners should treat unsupported OT identity behaviour as a boundary on the programme, not a temporary exception.

Vendor access without lifecycle discipline expands blast radius across manufacturing operations. Third-party access is often introduced for support, then left to drift beyond its original purpose. As convergence increases connectivity between plant and enterprise systems, that drift becomes harder to notice and more expensive to unwind. The implication is that third-party governance must be tied to task scope, session visibility and offboarding, not informal support practice.

Visibility is the missing control plane for converged manufacturing identity. Only a small share of organisations can see access behaviour clearly enough to govern it in real time, and converged environments need more than periodic review. The naming of a new concept matters here: convergence identity blind spots are the gaps that appear when IT sees one set of access events and OT sees another, but no team sees the whole path. Practitioners should treat unified visibility as a prerequisite for policy, not a reporting feature.

Manufacturing convergence is moving identity governance from perimeter control to operational resilience. The question is no longer whether access exists, but whether it can be constrained across IT, OT and third parties without slowing production. That shifts identity from a compliance function to a resilience function. Practitioners need programmes that can survive mixed trust models, older assets and remote support without creating uncontrolled access corridors.

From our research library:

• 92% of organisations expose NHIs to third parties, raising concerns about supply chain security, according to the Ultimate Guide to NHIs.
• Only 5.7% of organisations have full visibility into their service accounts, according to the Ultimate Guide to NHIs.
• Read next: Ultimate Guide to NHIs — Key Challenges and Risks

What this signals

Convergence identity blind spots: manufacturing programmes now need one visibility layer for IT, OT and third-party access, because separate views create separate risk decisions. When one team can see corporate identities but not plant sessions, access review becomes incomplete and incident response becomes slower.

Security teams should expect legacy OT compatibility to remain a hard boundary, not a temporary inconvenience. The real programme risk is assuming the same authentication and revocation model can be imposed everywhere without redesigning for older equipment and operational constraints.

Vendor access must be treated as a lifecycle problem, not just a connectivity problem. Ultimate Guide to NHIs research shows that 92% of organisations expose NHIs to third parties, and manufacturing converged access can create the same exposure pattern if task scope and offboarding are weak.

For practitioners

• Map OT systems that cannot enforce modern identity controls Identify PLCs, robotics platforms and plant applications that do not support central authentication or policy inheritance. Use that inventory to define where compensating controls, segmentation or brokered access are required before extending enterprise IAM into OT.
• Replace shared credentials with named operator access Move away from generic accounts on shared workstations and plant endpoints. Give each operator a named identity, preserve session attribution and align access reviews to individual activity rather than pooled logins.
• Segment third-party access by system and task Limit vendor connectivity to the exact assets and time window needed for maintenance or diagnostics. Add session monitoring and remove standing paths that allow support access to drift into broader network reach.
• Centralise visibility across IT and OT access events Correlate identity, session and device activity across corporate and plant systems so teams can answer who accessed what, when and from where. Without that unified view, convergence produces more surface area than control.

Key takeaways

• Manufacturing IT/OT convergence creates identity risk when old OT systems, shared accounts and third-party access are connected without a unified governance model.
• The strongest evidence in the article is the combination of legacy assets, limited real-time data delivery and low cybersecurity maturity across manufacturers.
• Identity-first access control, segmentation and session visibility are the controls that reduce the blast radius of converged plant and enterprise environments.

Key terms

• IT/OT Convergence: The integration of enterprise information systems with industrial operations so data, users and workflows move across both environments. In manufacturing, convergence improves visibility and efficiency, but it also forces identity controls to work across systems that were historically governed very differently.
• Shared Account: An account used by more than one person or process, often for convenience in operational environments. In identity governance, shared accounts weaken attribution, complicate auditing and make it difficult to prove who performed an action during production or maintenance activity.
• Third-Party Access: Third-party access is access granted to vendors, contractors, or support partners who are not direct employees of the organisation. It is higher risk than internal access because accountability, device assurance, and access duration are harder to control, so it usually requires tighter time limits and stronger auditability.
• Identity Governance: Identity governance is the set of controls that defines who approves access, who owns it, how it is reviewed, and when it is removed. In practice, it turns identity management from a deployment task into a durable control system that can withstand audits, organisational change, and operational growth.

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