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08/06/2026 4:09 pm
TL;DR: Passwordless and Zero Trust programmes stall when enterprises cover human users but leave machines, devices, and interactions with inconsistent authentication and lifecycle controls, while SCIM-based integration is meant to streamline user changes across the identity stack, according to Axiad. The practical issue is not password removal alone, but whether identity governance can actually extend across every credential type and every non-human endpoint.
NHIMG editorial — based on content published by Axiad: Ping Identity & Axiad: What the identity-first partnership means for your business
Questions worth separating out
Q: How should security teams govern passwordless across both users and machines?
A: They should design passwordless as a multi-actor governance model, not a single login replacement.
Q: Why do machine identities complicate Zero Trust programmes?
A: Machine identities complicate Zero Trust because they expand the trust surface beyond human sign-in into devices, certificates, and automated interactions.
Q: What breaks when certificate governance is treated as a one-time setup?
A: A one-time setup leaves renewal, revocation, and inventory drift unresolved, which means stale certificates can continue to assert trust long after the underlying device or relationship has changed.
Practitioner guidance
- Inventory every non-human identity path Map where machines, devices, certificates, and signed interactions authenticate into the environment, then identify which of those paths are outside the normal IAM governance process.
- Bind certificate lifecycle to asset lifecycle Make certificate issuance, renewal, and revocation follow the same onboarding, change, and retirement events used for endpoints and other managed assets.
- Use SCIM for provisioning, not as a complete control model Keep SCIM for identity updates, but add separate controls for revocation, certificate rotation, and non-human authentication coverage where SCIM does not reach.
What's in the full article
Axiad's full announcement covers the operational detail this post intentionally leaves for the source:
- How the Ping Identity and Axiad Cloud integration maps to specific IAM workflows and deployment scenarios
- The certificate and authentication device capabilities described for machine, device, and interaction use cases
- The SCIM-based provisioning flow used to automate add, modify, and delete actions across connected systems
- The platform-level packaging of MFA, PKI, and device management that the source article describes
👉 Read Axiad's announcement on identity-first passwordless and machine trust →
Passwordless IAM for users and machines: what changes now?
Explore further
08/06/2026 5:37 pm
Identity-first passwordless is really a governance problem, not an authentication feature. Enterprises often frame passwordless as a user-experience upgrade, but the real test is whether governance can extend across every identity type that can reach systems and data. If machines, devices, and interactions remain outside the same lifecycle and trust model, passwordless becomes partial coverage rather than security change.
A few things that frame the scale:
- NHIs outnumber human identities by 25x to 50x in modern enterprises, according to Ultimate Guide to NHIs.
- Only 5.7% of organisations have full visibility into their service accounts, which is why machine-side identity coverage remains structurally weak.
A question worth separating out:
Q: How do teams know whether identity-first passwordless is actually working?
A: They should look for complete coverage across users, devices, and machine interactions, plus measurable reduction in unmanaged exceptions. If the organisation still relies on ad hoc approvals, manual certificate handling, or unsupported identity types, the programme is only partially working.
👉 Read our full editorial: Identity-first passwordless depends on covering users and machines
