In the face of modern threats, identity has quietly become the primary attack surface for threat actors to target. Rather than needing to rely on high-skill hacking and exploits, the fastest way for an attacker to infiltrate is to gain access to credentials, tokens, and privileges. The growth of AI in recent years only accelerated this reality, adding non-human identities and autonomous abilities to an already complex identity landscape.
Why AI Changes the Identity Equation
Identity threats have always been a significant area of concern in cybersecurity, but technological advances are creating new and evolved issues with identity. The explosion of AI has created a landscape where attackers often rely on AI tools for automating and scaling attacks, and deepfake technology has made impersonation easier and more convincing than ever.
Beyond its usage by threat actors, AI also introduces notable identity risks when implemented by organizations. AI agents and automated workflows behave nothing like human users—they act continuously, chain actions together, and require credentials to operate. This makes static, human-centric identity and access management (IAM) models increasingly fragile. Traditional identity security is not effective at dealing with AI and non-human identities employed in enterprise environments.
What CrowdStrike Sees That the Market Is Catching Up To
Cybersecurity technology leader CrowdStrike has a perspective on the landscape that supports a convergence of endpoint, cloud, and identity telemetry. This viewpoint emphasizes that security cannot be effective against modern threats if decisions regarding identity are frozen in time while threats move at machine speed. It is crucial to ensure that identity security and management grow along with other technologies and attacks. This is the environment that led to CrowdStrike’s agreement to acquire Continuous Identity leader SGNL.
The Strategic Value of SGNL
SGNL is designed to handle modern and evolving identity management issues and account for both human and non-human identities. The platform carries out continuous authorization, real-time decisioning, and context-aware access that adapts as risk changes—not hours or days later, but instantly. This is an important addition to CrowdStrike’s abilities, enabling dynamic authorization across identities and systems.
Identity as a Living Control Plane
A significant factor in this acquisition and the evolution of identity is the shift from the “allow or deny” style of authorization to continuous verification. Identity is no longer a static point that can qualify or disqualify extensive access by one authentication at login. Rather, it is now something that must be evaluated at every moment in order to protect against rising threats and ensure security.
The shift in how identity works and the growth of related risks represent the importance of prioritizing and evolving identity security. “Digital transformation and remote work acted as major accelerants by exposing identity as a critical component of enterprise defense, and AI and autonomous agents are now amplifying that urgency by introducing a rapidly growing population of non-human identities,” says John Paul Cunningham, CISO, Silverfort. “This has expanded the identity attack surface far beyond traditional users and increased the stakes for getting identity security right.”
Beyond Tools: A Signal to CISOs
The acquisition of SGNL by CrowdStrike is not an industry outlier, but a market signal that reveals significant trends in the future of identity. Even with AI, zero trust, and next-gen platforms, the industry is still wrestling with the same fundamentals—credentials, privileges, and access sprawl. However, these factors are now moving and evolving at unprecedented speed, demanding a shift in how organizations manage age-old issues.
Leaders should pay attention to industry trends and acquisitions like this to inform their decisions moving forward. “We’re seeing a clear segmentation emerge: pure identity security players built specifically to protect identity end-to-end, hybrid vendors trying to bolt identity into existing products, and large platform companies like Palo Alto Networks and now CrowdStrike expanding as part of broader security ecosystems,” says Cunningham.
What This Means for the Future of Security Architecture
Keeping up with evolving trends in identity and threats requires adopting a forward-looking approach to security and following industry trends. Experts expect to see more convergence between identity, endpoint, and runtime security in the coming years as risk, technology, and strategy continue to evolve. In an era dominated by AI and identity, security strategies that can’t operate continuously will increasingly feel outmatched by those that can.
