Announcing The Forrester Wave™: Workforce Identity Security Platforms, Q2 2026

2026-05-21 · Source: Featured Blogs - Forrester · Field: Technology & Digital — Cybersecurity & Data Privacy, Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning · Depth: Advanced, quick

Summary

Forrester has released "The Forrester Wave™: Workforce Identity Security Platforms, Q2 2026," an evaluation of providers in a category now recognized as a strategic pillar of modern cybersecurity. This shift is driven by the proliferation of nonhuman identities, advanced identity-based attacks, and the demands of Zero Trust, including AI-driven workloads. The report renames the category from "Workforce Identity Platforms" to "Workforce Identity Security Platforms," emphasizing its evolution into a comprehensive identity-centric security control plane for governing access, surfacing risk, detecting threats, and enforcing policies across human, machine, and AI agent identities. The evaluation highlights three key trends: a renewed focus on identity fundamentals like lifecycle management and phishing-resistant MFA; the operationalization of AI-powered identity intelligence into enforcement actions; and the critical need to support agentic AI architectures with capabilities such as native machine and AI agent identity governance and dynamic authorization. The report evaluates 10 providers.

Key takeaway

For Directors of AI/ML or AI Security Engineers modernizing IAM architecture, you must prioritize workforce identity security platforms that integrate AI-powered intelligence with robust enforcement. Ensure your chosen platform supports agentic AI architectures, offering native machine and AI agent identity governance, dynamic authorization, and continuous monitoring. Focus on foundational elements like phishing-resistant MFA and identity lifecycle management, as analytics alone cannot compensate for weak security postures. This approach will enhance organizational resilience against evolving identity-based threats.

Key insights

Workforce identity security is evolving into a comprehensive control plane, integrating AI-driven intelligence and agentic AI support.

Principles

• Identity security now encompasses ISPM and ITDR as core capabilities.
• Strong identity fundamentals are essential, not replaced by analytics.
• AI-powered identity intelligence requires operationalized enforcement paths.

In practice

• Implement phishing-resistant MFA and identity lifecycle management.
• Prioritize platforms operationalizing AI risk signals into enforcement.
• Plan for agentic AI support, including dynamic authorization.

Topics

• Workforce Identity Security
• Identity Security Posture Management
• Identity Threat Detection
• Agentic AI
• Zero Trust Architecture
• Phishing-Resistant MFA

Best for: CTO, VP of Engineering/Data, Executive, AI Security Engineer, Director of AI/ML, Consultant

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Editorial summary, takeaway, and curation by AIssential. Original article published by Featured Blogs - Forrester.