Identity and access management (IAM) is one of today’s most important aspects of enterprise security. It’s also one of the most complex. In 2025, organizations aren't only managing access for full-time workers. They're managing contractors, vendors, freelancers, bots, and service accounts—many of which fall outside the scope of traditional IAM tools.
At the same time, security teams are facing hybrid work models, increasing regulatory demands, and a jumble of cloud platforms and SaaS apps. All of this makes it harder to maintain visibility, enforce consistent policies, and ensure the right individuals have the right access at the right time.
Without a clear strategy, identity sprawl and misconfigurations are risks that organizations may be faced with. This is one of the reasons as to why many organizations are shifting from reactive IAM procedures to more governance-driven approaches. But even with the right mindset, there are challenges.
This blog explores five of the biggest IAM challenges that companies are facing in 2025—and how smart identity governance, like secure vendor management solutions and lifecycle automation, can be used to mitigate them.
Hybrid work isn't going away. Employees now engage from different locations, devices, and networks—many of which aren't within IT's control. While this model provides flexibility, it also expands the organization's attack surface. The result is reduced visibility into who is accessing what, where, and under what circumstances.
At the same time, there has been more rapid adoption of collaboration and cloud software. Users often bypass the official IT processes, typically referred to as shadow IT, making it difficult to apply consistent identity and access policies.
Most legacy IAM products were not created with this context in mind. They apply static policies, are not aware of context, and are limited to pre-determined user types. These limitations create gaps—especially when employees, contractors, and partners are all using the same systems under different access models (learn more about managing non-employee identities in hybrid environments).
In order to satisfy this, companies need access management tools that do more than basic authentication. Today's identity governance requires constant monitoring of access, dynamically reviewing risk, and applying policies depending on behavior and context. That requires taking into account factors such as device posture, location, and time of access in order to make a decision on whether to permit, restrict, or mark a session for an audit.
idGenius, our in-house solution, closes these gaps by giving visibility to the entire user base—not just internal staff. It provides centralized access monitoring and governance that includes both workforce and non-employee identities. With customizable workflows and policy enforcement built in, organizations can dictate how access is to be granted, approved, and revoked.
By bringing identity governance into a single point, teams can reduce manual monitoring and respond more quickly to emerging threats. It also eliminates the blind spots that normally occur in hybrid work patterns where user context changes quickly and identities are not constantly monitored through standard HR or IT systems.
Third-party users—contractors, suppliers, freelancers, service accounts, and bots—are an integral part of everyday business processes. Having said this, they do introduce more and more identity risk as they often lie outside the control of traditional HR systems. If there isn't an equal framework to provision, monitor, or remove their access, their identities are, essentially, invisible to IT and security teams.
Unlike employees, third-party identities are frequently cached in spreadsheets, email threads, or legacy ticketing solutions. Access is provisioned quickly to suit business needs but is rarely re-reviewed. This causes accounts to still be active much longer than they should. In most cases, no one even knows who is supposed to manage the account—or why the account was created to begin with.
The risk is heightened when such external users are provided with excessive or permanent access. With cloud applications, it's not rare for temporary staff or vendors to have access to sensitive systems, data, or customer information. If those accounts get compromised or misused, the damage can be significant.
In order to address this, organizations need to adopt secure vendor management as an official identity strategy component. This includes having established onboarding processes, identity-proofing practices, policy-based access controls, and expiration or review triggers integrated into said strategy. Manual procedures are no longer adequate in keeping up with the scale and complexity of today's access environment.
idGenius was designed in particular to tackle this problem. It supports the full lifecycle of non-employee identities—starting with guided onboarding that verifies who the user is and why they're needed. From there, companies can set up roles, grant temporary permissions, and impose customized approval procedures based on the user's relationship to the company.
One of the key strengths of idGenius is its focus on visibility and accountability. Every third-party identity is traced in a centralized repository, including history, connected systems, and access level. The result is a more scalable, manageable, and secure third-party identity governance strategy that reduces risk while providing operational agility.
Most organizations today operate on more than a single platform—whether it be cloud infrastructure like AWS and Azure, SaaS applications like Salesforce and Workday, or even on-premises systems that still support core workflows. This is excellent for business growth but creates one of the biggest identity management challenges: fragmentation.
Each platform also has its own access controls, roles, and identity stores. Managing them separately leads to scattered policies, replicated identities, and blind spots. As a result, it is difficult to answer simple but important questions: Who has access to which systems? Are the permissions still valid? What happens if someone changes roles or leaves the firm?
This fragmentation increases the risk of misconfigured access, orphaned accounts, and compliance violations. It also slows down IT teams, which are forced to manage entitlements manually across disjointed tools. Without a single view, it's nearly impossible to enforce least-privilege access or respond effectively to audits.
To solve this, organizations need some way of drawing identity information from across their environment. Not only from structured sources like HR and IT systems, but from unstructured or siloed data spread across departments. The goal is to have a single source of truth for identity governance—regardless of where the user originates from or what applications they need to access.
idGenius supports this with out-of-the-box integrations that connect to cloud platforms, SaaS apps, and on-premise databases. It ingests identity data from a range of sources and builds one profile for each user, including vendors, contractors, and service accounts. This allows organizations to manage access policies centrally, apply consistent controls, and eliminate duplication or blind spots.
By orchestrating identity governance between systems, idGenius helps manage compliance and avoids mistakes that can lead to costly breaches. It also gives IT organizations the ability to monitor access at scale, make data-driven decisions, and maintain governance even as new apps and services come online.
As regulations change and audits are more common, identity and access management is more closely linked to compliance. Companies must show that they adhere to identity governance best practices—monitoring who has access, how they got it, and if it's still valid. However, too many teams find it difficult to generate this data quickly or even correctly when auditors request it.
Common issues involve missing documentation, non-standard access review processes, and a lack of centralized logs. These conditions usually result from manual processes and siloed systems. When it is not automated or not visible in one place, it is too easy for policies to become outdated or for users to be granted access longer than necessary.
For compliance teams, it means more time to chase down records, validate user roles, and patch audit holes. For security teams, it increases the risk that access by unauthorized staff may go undetected until too late.
What is needed is a way to enforce identity policies and build audit-compliant reports without the use of spreadsheets or ad-hoc utilities.
idGenius makes it possible for organizations to be prepared by centralizing compliance-related identity data. It has all the access history, provisioning tasks, and user lifecycle changes in one place. When a request for an audit comes in, teams can easily show that access decisions are tied to recorded business needs and policy directives.
By reducing the amount of manual work, idGenius offers compliance and IT teams more confidence in their operations. It makes it easier to stay in control, even as requirements continue to grow.
It can be said that identity lifecycle management is one of the most under-addressed areas in IAM initiatives. The majority of companies still rely on manual provisioning and deprovisioning, which often leads to delays, inconsistencies, and persistent access long after it is needed.
When identities are not updated as roles change—or deleted when users leave—systems become cluttered with risk. Orphaned accounts are a tempting target for attack. Excess permissions linger, in violation of least privilege principles. And IT administrators waste hours tracking access information across disconnected systems.
These problems accumulate when dealing with non-employees. Contractors may work on short-term projects with unclear timelines. Vendors may be granted access via email requests without an offboarding strategy. Bots and service accounts have a tendency to operate without clear ownership or expiration.
Solving this requires more than just ticketing workflows. Organizations need automated identity life cycle tools that manage access from onboarding through offboarding, with built-in review points along the way.
idGenius meets this challenge head-on by automating the entire life cycle of non-employee identities. When a new user is being onboarded—whether contractor, vendor, or bot—idGenius applies role-based access policies based on their role and relationship to the firm. These policies can include approval chains and access review triggers.
Throughout the lifecycle, idGenius records the minute-by-minute access history, ownership, and modification of the user. Automatic modification of the access can happen if the role of a user is altered. Automatic deprovisioning at the termination of the engagement would avoid residual access.
For organizations with escalating numbers of third-party identities, it simplifies admin work and reduces security exposure. It also provides greater visibility into what users can access, how long, and whether it is still active—all without relying on manual audit or follow-up.
Most IAM tools focus on employees. idGenius is built to manage the identities that traditional systems often overlook—vendors, contractors, bots, and other non-employees. It brings structure, automation, and visibility to every stage of the access lifecycle.
Here’s what sets it apart:
• Secure vendor management - Onboards vendors through policy-driven workflows, applies access limits, and tracks activity over time.
• Lifecycle automation - Handles onboarding, access assignments, reviews, and offboarding without manual effort.
• Centralized identity governance - Unifies identity data from HR, procurement, and IT systems to provide a complete view of non-employee access.
• Custom policies and workflows - Tailors access controls based on user type, role, or department—no one-size-fits-all approach.
• Built-in compliance support - Maintains audit trails, automates certifications, and reduces the time required to prepare for audits.
idGenius gives organizations a practical way to reduce risk and improve accountability, especially for third-party access that often slips through the cracks.
Explore the idGenius product overview or see how idGenius unifies identity governance for vendors, contractors, and bots.
Contact us at info@anomalix.com to see how idGenius can simplify secure vendor management and non-employee identity governance at scale.
