A non-human identity (NHI) is any account or credential that software uses to authenticate, rather than a person: service accounts, API keys, OAuth tokens and app registrations, cloud workload roles, certificates, SSH keys, robotic process automation bots and the credentials AI agents use to reach other systems. In many organizations these identities outnumber human users, and they often carry broad, long-lived access with no clear owner. The term overlaps with “machine identity”, which some people use for the same thing and others reserve for certificates and keys. Managing them is a growing part of identity and access management (IAM).
At a glance
- Covers service accounts, API keys, tokens, certificates, workload identities, bots and AI agents.
- Often has broad permissions, credentials that rarely change and no named owner.
- Can’t be protected with MFA the way a person is, so scoping, rotation and monitoring matter more.
- Created quickly by developers, admins, SaaS integrations and AI tools, often outside central IT.
- Governed through inventory, ownership, least privilege, secrets management and lifecycle controls.
What problem it solves
Every integration, script, scheduled job and cloud workload needs a way to authenticate. Over years, organizations accumulate service accounts created for long-finished projects, API keys pasted into scripts and chat threads, SaaS-to-SaaS connections a user approved once, and certificates nobody tracks until one expires and an application goes down.
Attackers know this. A leaked API key or a token stolen from a compromised integration can give direct access without any password or MFA prompt, and the resulting activity can look like routine automation. Because these credentials are rarely tied to a person, offboarding doesn’t catch them, and reviews that focus on employees miss them. The rise of agentic AI, where software agents take actions across systems on someone’s behalf, adds a new and fast-growing population of identities with real permissions.
Treating non-human identities as identities, with owners, scoped permissions and a lifecycle, is how organizations bring this risk under control.
How it works
Discovery and inventory. Tools scan directories, cloud platforms, SaaS applications, code repositories and CI/CD pipelines to find service accounts, keys, tokens, app registrations and certificates, including ones created outside IT, a form of shadow IT.
Ownership. Each identity is assigned a human or team owner responsible for its purpose, permissions and retirement.
Least privilege. Permissions are narrowed to what the workload needs. Broad admin roles granted for convenience are a common finding.
Secrets management and rotation. Credentials are moved out of code and configuration files into a secrets vault, often through privileged access management (PAM) or dedicated secrets tools, and rotated or replaced with short-lived credentials where platforms support it. Certificates are tracked and renewed, often with public key infrastructure (PKI) tooling.
Monitoring and response. Usage is monitored for anomalies, such as a key used from a new location or a token calling unusual APIs. Identity threat detection and response (ITDR) tools increasingly cover non-human activity.
Lifecycle. Identities are retired when the project, integration or agent they serve ends.
When it matters for buyers
- When deploying AI agents or AI-powered integrations. Decide what each agent may access and under whose authority before granting credentials.
- When moving workloads to cloud. Cloud roles, keys and workload identities multiply quickly.
- After a breach involving a leaked key or compromised integration. These incidents often reveal how little is inventoried.
- When evaluating PAM, IAM or security posture tools. Coverage of non-human identities varies widely between products.
- When auditors ask about service accounts. Many frameworks expect them to be inventoried, owned and reviewed like other privileged access.
Questions to ask vendors
- Which systems can you discover non-human identities in: cloud platforms, SaaS apps, directories, code repositories, CI/CD?
- How do you identify an owner for each identity, and what happens when none exists?
- Can you rotate secrets automatically, and for which systems?
- How do you detect unusual use of a key, token or service account?
- How do you handle credentials used by AI agents and their permissions?
- What do you report on for auditors?
How it differs from human user accounts
Human accounts belong to a person, are created and removed through HR-driven processes, and are protected with passwords, MFA and device checks. Non-human identities are created by people or systems for software to use, can’t complete an MFA prompt, often authenticate with long-lived secrets or certificates, and are typically missed by joiner-mover-leaver processes. The same principles apply to both, including least privilege and regular review, but the controls differ: for non-human identities, ownership, secrets management, rotation and usage monitoring do much of the work MFA does for people. For governing AI agents and their access, see our artificial intelligence overview.