Identity Security | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

The world of identity security is in constant motion. What was once a straightforward matter of usernames and passwords has evolved into a complex ecosystem of biometrics, hardware tokens, and zero-trust architectures. As we look toward 2026, the pace of change is only accelerating. The lines between our digital and physical identities are blurring, and the threat landscape is becoming more sophisticated. Chief Information Security Officers spend their days on the front lines of this evolution. Staying ahead isn't just about reacting to threats; it's about anticipating them to reduce risk. Based on the trends I'm seeing today, here are 9 identity security predictions for where we'll be in 2026. 1. AI will become the primary identity governance tool. Manual access reviews and role-based access control (RBAC) models are already showing their age. By 2026, AI-driven identity governance and administration (IGA) will be standard. These systems will continuously analyze u...

AI-powered browsers are changing how we use the web, but they're also creating some serious new security risks. Tools like Perplexity's Comet and Opera's Neon can summarize pages and automate tasks for you. The problem is that researchers have found these agentic copilots can be hijacked by malicious prompts hidden in ordinary webpages, essentially turning your browser against you. In August 2025, Brave's security team disclosed an indirect prompt injection against Perplexity's Comet using hidden instructions in a Reddit spoiler tag, leading Comet to extract an email address and a one-time passcode. No memory corruption, no code execution exploit. The browser simply followed instructions it couldn't distinguish from legitimate user intent. In this post, we'll look at how these attacks work, why they slip past traditional defenses, and what security teams can do to keep data safe from compromised AI agents. AI Browsers: Powerful, But a New Target AI-ena...

A 2024 Gartner® survey of 162 large enterprises shows organizations running an average of 45 cybersecurity tools. It's no surprise, then, that 52% of executives cite complexity as the biggest barrier to effective security operations. While mid-market organizations typically run fewer tools, smaller IT and security teams mean they often face equal—or greater—operational complexity. Why Security Platforms Emerged The industry's answer to tool sprawl has been the security platform: a consolidated approach designed to reduce complexity by replacing multiple point products. In principle, platforms promise tighter integration, improved visibility across the attack surface, better alert correlation, and faster response. Research supports this direction. The 2025 IBM Institute for Business Value report notes that organizations with higher security platform maturity identify and contain incidents more quickly. Consolidation Doesn't Always Equal a Platform Vendor consolidation is accelera...

AI is everywhere. What began as machine learning and evolved into novelty technology applications has rapidly progressed into a significant component of daily life and enterprise strategy. It influences how our businesses plan, code, implement, and protect our most sensitive assets. Among its most transformative applications is its growing role in identity and access management (IAM) . The Expanding Influence of AI in Identity Security Within identity security, AI is reshaping how we define a mature IAM program. What once required manual reviews, repetitive decision-making, and active triage is now increasingly supported by intelligent automation. AI streamlines operations, reduces human bottlenecks and errors, and strengthens security postures through robust, context-driven assistance and automation. The Strength of Predictive AI Modern identity programs lean heavily on predictive analytics—AI capabilities that run continuously in the background to analyze behaviors, support auto...

The Perfect Recipe for Endpoint Security Calls for Privilege Control Today's most effective ransomware attacks don't require malware; they require a login. Modern threat actors don't need to break in. They can leverage legitimate identities and their privileges to gain a foothold, then continue to capitalize on them, moving laterally to probe for more opportunities and manipulate vulnerabilities and exploits to spread ransomware and spyware. A vulnerable identity or account tied to an endpoint can quickly become an attacker's ticket to your most valuable assets and controls.  With legitimate identities being used as the initial foothold in more attacks, we're seeing less 'anomalous' activity and far more seemingly normal actions performed by a trusted, privileged user. And attackers are keenly aware of how easily they can 'hide' behind these legitimate user accounts.  This is why Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) is really only one piece of the endpoint protection puzz...

Your identity environment holds the keys to your most critical data in the form of privileged accounts. Industry consolidation and a desire for company growth both often lead to mergers or acquisitions which, if not managed closely, can wreak havoc on an identity landscape. Mergers of identity environments create a glut of identities and identity accounts to manage, some of which may be redundant. They also introduce new 3rd parties, contractors and non-human identities like service accounts, bots etc.... into the equation. In addition, a merger or acquisition could hybridize the identity landscape, adding Cloud applications to on-prem resources, and vice versa. All of this increases the attack surface if not managed properly. As the two companies determine how to best work together, there is a level of uncertainty that can result in temporary measures as a stop-gap. Temporary access is often granted to provide employee, contractor and third party access to applications and privile...

Identity Is the New Perimeter—And It's Fractured In 2025, identity isn't just a security issue—it's the battleground. And too many organizations are getting caught flat-footed. Organizations today must reckon with complex hybrid environments that contain interconnected endpoints, servers, cloud services, DevOps systems, identity infrastructure, and much more. And with enterprise systems no longer fitting neatly into a single network perimeter, the identities used to interact with these systems have become the new perimeter.  A strong cybersecurity foundation starts with clear visibility that puts risk in content. Identity security is no different. However, in practice, identity management systems are anything but centralized. Building IDs and access to physical offices are handled by one system. Logins to Windows machines are generally managed with Windows domains and Active Directory—but what about Macs and Linux machines? Companies use Okta, Ping Identity, or the equivalent ...

Many of the day-to-day digital operations of businesses, governments, and critical infrastructure have one thing in common: Microsoft. From the Microsoft Windows operating systems powering endpoints and servers, to Azure's rapidly growing cloud services, Microsoft's products are everywhere, making the company and its products attractive targets for threat actors seeking to exploit vulnerabilities at scale.  With more than 1.4 billion Windows users around the globe and the adoption of platforms like Microsoft 365, Active Directory, and Azure surging, a single exploitable vulnerability in a Microsoft product can open the door to privilege escalation, lateral movement, or ransomware deployments that impact tens of thousands of interconnected systems. Whether nation state or financially motivated, modern cyber-crime syndicates will consistently take the path of least resistance, and vulnerable assets are a reliable attack vector. For twelve years, the Microsoft Vulnerabilities Repor...