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25/06/2026 3:04 pm
TL;DR: Certificate lifecycle management is no longer just about issuance and renewal. As identity estates spread across cloud, hybrid, and AI-driven workloads, Akeyless argues that CLM works best when it sits alongside secrets management and key control rather than in a separate silo.
NHIMG editorial — based on content published by Akeyless: Choosing the Right Platform for Certificate Lifecycle Management
Questions worth separating out
Q: How should teams govern certificate lifecycle management in multi-cloud environments?
A: Teams should govern CLM as part of the broader machine identity stack, not as a standalone certificate tool.
Q: Why do standalone certificate tools create governance gaps?
A: Standalone certificate tools create gaps when they cannot see or control the secrets and keys that depend on the same identity flow.
Q: How do security teams know if certificate automation is actually working?
A: Certificate automation is working when renewal, revocation, and discovery stay synchronized and old credentials stop being trusted as soon as replacements are active.
Practitioner guidance
- Map certificate ownership to the broader machine identity model Inventory which systems issue certificates, which systems consume them, and which teams own the associated secrets and keys.
- Test whether renewal and revocation are synchronized Validate that automated renewal does not create stale trust by checking revocation, discovery, and deployment timing across AWS, Azure, and GCP.
- Challenge provider trust assumptions for key material Review whether your platform architecture allows the provider to reconstruct secret or key material, and document where customer control is preserved.
What's in the full article
Akeyless's full analysis covers the operational detail this post intentionally leaves for the source:
- Platform-specific discussion of CLM, secrets management, and key management operating together in one SaaS control plane.
- Details on native cloud integrations and automation paths across AWS, Azure, and GCP that implementation teams would need to evaluate.
- Explanation of the zero-knowledge and distributed fragment model used to protect customer-controlled key material.
- Post-quantum readiness specifics, including the supported cryptographic direction and deployment context.
👉 Read Akeyless's comparison of certificate lifecycle management platforms →
Certificate lifecycle management: what it means for identity teams?
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25/06/2026 4:21 pm
Certificate lifecycle management is no longer a standalone discipline. The article reflects a broader shift in which CLM, secrets, and key management are being pulled into the same governance conversation. That is the correct direction for identity teams because machine identities rarely fail in isolation, they fail across credential types and operational handoffs. The practical conclusion is that CLM strategy should be evaluated as part of a unified identity control plane.
A few things that frame the scale:
- 62% of all secrets are duplicated and stored in multiple locations, causing unnecessary redundancy and increasing the risk of accidental exposure, according to The 2025 State of NHIs and Secrets in Cybersecurity.
- 91% of former employee tokens remain active after offboarding, leaving organisations vulnerable to potential security breaches, according to The 2025 State of NHIs and Secrets in Cybersecurity.
A question worth separating out:
Q: What should organisations look for in a unified machine identity platform?
A: Organisations should look for one control plane that connects certificates, secrets, and key management with consistent policy and audit visibility. That reduces lifecycle fragmentation and makes it easier to govern credentials across hybrid infrastructure without depending on brittle integrations.
👉 Read our full editorial: Certificate lifecycle management is becoming identity infrastructure
