SECURITY

Idira launches as Palo Alto Networks extends CyberArk tech to machine and agentic identities

Palo Alto Networks Inc. today launched Idira, a new identity security platform designed to manage human, machine and artificial intelligence agent identities across the enterprise under a single privileged access management framework.

Idira incorporates technology from CyberArk Software Ltd., the privileged access management specialist Palo Alto Networks acquired in February for $25 billion and extends those controls to machine and agentic identities.

The new offering is targeting a problem that has expanded sharply with the spread of generative AI inside corporate environments. Machine and AI identities now outnumber human identities by 109 to 1, according to figures cited by Palo Alto Networks and 61% of privileged access requests are fulfilled with standing privilege rather than granted on demand. The company’s research also indicated that nine in 10 organizations experienced an identity-related breach over the past year.

Idira is built around three functions. It uses AI to continuously surface identities, entitlements and access paths across an enterprise and flag risk. It applies dynamic controls in place of static access, enforcing zero standing privilege and just-in-time access for every identity and it automates governance and compliance across the identity lifecycle using AI-driven policy.

Existing CyberArk software-as-a-service customers will receive different upgrade paths depending on their current licenses.

Traditional privileged access management customers will get discovery and user experience improvements automatically and can purchase add-ons for zero standing privilege and agentic and machine identity protections. Modern privileged access management customers on the IT Enterprise and Dev tiers will gain discovery, zero standing privilege and user experience enhancements at no additional cost. Workforce Access customers will see immediate user experience improvements and can upgrade to add full zero standing privilege and machine protections. Secrets and Workload license holders can now add traditional privileged access management to consolidate on the Idira platform.

“Identity has become the new battleground of the AI enterprise,” said Peretz Regev, chief product and technology officer for Idira at Palo Alto Networks. “With adversaries now logging in rather than breaking in, every identity has become a target.”

The company noted that Idira is intended to give security teams a single control plane across what has become a fragmented identity landscape, replacing point tools that were designed when elevated access was reserved for a small group of administrators.

The platform is generally available today, with additional features slated for release later this year.

Photo: Robert Hof/SiliconANGLE