Topic starter
12/06/2026 1:00 am
TL;DR: Audits must cover policy, access control, logging, offboarding, and compliance, according to Zluri’s IAM checklist, but its own examples show why non-human identities now sit inside the same governance perimeter as human access. The harder problem is not writing more checklist items, but proving that access is scoped, reviewed, and revoked consistently across service accounts, apps, and users.
Editorial analysis by NHI Mgmt Group, based on content published by Zluri: “7-Step Identity And Access Management Checklist”.
Key questions
Q: What should IAM teams do first when non-human identities are missing from audit scope?
A: Start by enumerating every identity type that can hold access, including service accounts, applications, third parties, and devices.
Q: Why do IAM audits fail when service accounts are treated differently from users?
A: Because the audit is no longer measuring the full control environment.
Q: How do security teams know whether offboarding is actually working?
A: Security teams should measure completion, not process start.
Practitioner guidance
- Expand audit populations beyond employees Include service accounts, third-party partners, applications, devices, and other non-human identities in every access review and certification cycle.
- Bind offboarding to the access-bearing identity Verify that deprovisioning reaches the identities that actually hold standing access, including app accounts and delegated access paths, rather than only the human record in HR or IT systems.
- Test revocation completeness during audits Sample recent removals and confirm access was actually withdrawn across systems, applications, and identity stores.
Bottom line: The article’s main governance point is that IAM audits cannot stay human-centric if service accounts, applications, and third parties can still hold access.
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This topic was modified 4 days ago by NHI Mgmt Group
12/06/2026 10:37 am
NHI scope is now part of IAM audit integrity: The article’s own assessment phases already acknowledge that access reviewers must evaluate service accounts, third-party partners, applications, and clients, not only employees. That means a human-only audit model is misaligned with the actual access surface. In governance terms, the scope of the audit is no longer a documentation choice. It is a control boundary, and practitioners should treat any narrower boundary as incomplete assurance.
A question worth separating out:
Q: How should organisations design audit checklists for both human and non-human access?
A: Use one lifecycle model and one evidence standard, but apply them to different actor types. The checklist should verify who can access what, why access exists, how it is monitored, and how it is revoked, regardless of whether the identity is a person, service account, or application.
👉 Read our full editorial: Identity and access management audit checklists need NHI scope
This post was modified 4 days ago by NHI Mgmt Group