Topic starter
30/10/2025 9:49 am
TL;DR: Non-human identity attacks are increasingly used to compromise software supply chains, with examples including service account abuse, stolen tokens, exposed SAS keys, and OAuth phishing across major environments, according to Entro Security. Human IAM controls are necessary but insufficient when machine credentials carry broad, persistent access across build and deployment paths.
Editorial analysis by NHI Mgmt Group, based on content published by Entro Security: “Non-human identity attacks on the supply chain: the new attack path”.
Key questions
Q: What breaks when non-human identities are not governed in software supply chains?
A: When non-human identities are not governed, attackers can use tokens, service accounts, and secrets to reach build, release, and data systems that were never meant to be exposed together.
Q: Why do service accounts and tokens create more supply chain risk than human logins?
A: Service accounts and tokens are often long-lived, reusable, and embedded in automation, which means they can be copied and replayed without interactive challenge.
Q: How do security teams know if machine identity governance is working?
A: Look for fewer standing accounts, faster onboarding of automation workflows, auditable role approvals, and visible retention of access records after logout.
Practitioner guidance
- Inventory every production NHI Build a live inventory of service accounts, tokens, secrets, SAS keys and OAuth grants across build, support and deployment paths.
- Restrict credential reuse across workflows Assign one machine credential to one workflow or trust domain wherever possible.
- Rotate and revoke on lifecycle change Trigger credential rotation and revocation when a vendor relationship changes, an employee leaves a team, or a pipeline is retired.
Bottom line: Non-human identities have become a primary supply chain attack path because they carry the machine-to-machine trust that modern delivery pipelines depend on.
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This topic was modified 11 months ago 2 times by Abdelrahman
This topic was modified 6 days ago by NHI Mgmt Group
06/10/2026 5:24 pm
Supply chain security now depends on NHI governance, not just human IAM. Human MFA and SSO reduce account takeover, but they do not govern service accounts, tokens, SAS keys or delegated app grants that power delivery pipelines and vendor integrations. That shifts the control problem from login protection to machine credential lifecycle, scope and monitoring. Practitioners should treat NHI inventory and governance as part of supply chain resilience, not as a separate hygiene task.
A few things that frame the scale:
- 92% of organisations expose NHIs to third parties, raising concerns about supply chain security, according to the Ultimate Guide to NHIs.
A question worth separating out:
Q: What should teams do when a third-party NHI is no longer needed?
A: Revoke the credential, remove any linked permissions, and confirm that the identity cannot still reach build, support or deployment systems. If the offboarding step is skipped, the relationship may end on paper while the access path remains active in practice.
👉 Read our full editorial: Non-human identity attacks are reshaping supply chain security