Authentication Trends 2026

What Security Leaders Need to Know

Authentication used to answer a relatively straightforward question: Is this person who they claim to be?

In 2026, that question is getting tougher.

AI can make impersonation more convincing. AI agents are beginning to access systems and take actions on behalf of people. Meanwhile, organizations are managing a growing mix of employees, customers, partners, applications, service accounts, and machines that all need the right access without exposing sensitive data.

The underlying concept is the same, but the methods are shifting.

Key Facts for 2026

A few numbers show how quickly authentication is changing:

• 93% of IT leaders surveyed by Thales are deploying generative AI, while only 23% of consumers trust companies using AI to handle their data.

• 69% of consumers say multi-factor authentication increases their trust in an organization, and 68% say the same about passkeys.

• 87% of IT leaders say offering passkeys is important, but only 49% currently offer them.

• FIDO Alliance reports that 5 billion passkeys are now in active use globally, and 68% of surveyed organizations are deploying, piloting, or rolling out passkeys for employees.

• A 2026 Cloud Security Alliance survey found that 78% of organizations lacked documented, formally adopted policies for creating or removing AI identities.

These numbers point to a broader trend. Authentication is no longer just about passwords and MFA. Security leaders increasingly need to manage trust across people, machines, and AI while keeping access practical for the business.

Here are five authentication trends worth watching.

Trend 1: Authentication Is Expanding Beyond Human Identity

AI agents change a basic assumption behind traditional identity and access management.

Historically, an authenticated identity usually represented a person, application, or predictable automated process. AI agents can operate with greater autonomy. They can make decisions, call other systems, retrieve data, and act on a user's behalf.

That creates a new set of questions:

• Who authorized the agent?

• What systems and data can it access?

• What actions is it permitted to take?

• How long should that authority last?

• Can its actions be traced back to the person who authorized them?

• Can access be revoked immediately?

Security leaders should start treating AI-agent identity and delegated authority as part of their authentication strategy, not as a separate AI project.

Trend 2: Passkeys Are Moving From Experimentation to Execution

The passwordless conversation has changed.

For many organizations, the question is no longer whether passkeys and phishing-resistant authentication will become mainstream. The harder question is how to deploy them across a complex organization.

Employees, administrators, customers, contractors, partners, shared devices, legacy applications, and regulated systems can have very different assurance requirements.

That makes passwordless authentication an architecture and risk decision rather than a simple credential replacement project.

Security teams should determine which users and systems warrant the strongest phishing-resistant authentication first, then build a migration strategy around risk, usability, existing technology, and cost.

For security leaders under pressure to make every investment count, this matters. Replacing passwords everywhere at once may not be the best use of budget. Prioritizing the identities and access paths that create the greatest business risk usually makes more sense.

Trend 3: AI Is Making Human Verification More Difficult

Attackers do not always need to defeat authentication technology directly.

They may be able to convince another person to bypass it.

Generative AI can make phishing, impersonation, and social engineering more convincing. Voice cloning adds another challenge for help desks and other teams responsible for verifying users remotely.

That means security leaders need to look beyond the login screen.

Password resets, MFA recovery, account enrollment, help desk procedures, and other recovery processes should receive the same scrutiny as the primary authentication method.

A phishing-resistant credential provides limited protection if an attacker can convince someone to reset it.

Trend 4: Non-Human Identities Need the Same Discipline as Human Identities

Applications, APIs, workloads, service accounts, automation, and AI agents all need credentials and permissions.

The difference is scale.

As organizations adopt more cloud services and AI, the number of non-human identities can grow quickly. Ownership is often unclear, credentials can remain active longer than necessary, and permissions may exceed what the workload actually needs.

As security leaders, we can’t just ask how many identities exist. We must understand which identities can reach the data that matters most.

Organizations should be able to identify the owner of a non-human identity, understand what it can access, limit its permissions, monitor its activity, rotate or replace credentials, and remove access when it is no longer required.

Trend 5: Authentication Is Becoming a Business Trust Decision

Stronger authentication does not have to mean creating inconvenience.

If you’re applying the appropriate level of assurance to the risk, users are much more likely to accept the authentication controls.

Thales' 2026 Digital Trust Index shows that consumers place greater trust in organizations that use controls such as MFA and passkeys. At the same time, complicated login and access experiences can create friction for customers and employees.

Authentication strategy therefore has to balance three things:

• Security

• User experience

• Business risk

The right answer will not be identical for every user, application, or transaction.

Risk-based authentication, passkeys, stronger identity verification, and centralized policy can help organizations apply stronger controls where they matter without adding unnecessary friction everywhere else.

Matching Authentication Strength to Risk

The Thales Authentication Assurance Model below remains a useful way to think about human authentication.

Rather than treating every login the same, the framework helps organizations select an appropriate level of assurance based on factors such as risk, user type, and context.

That risk-based approach becomes even more important in 2026.

Organizations now need to apply similar discipline beyond human users. AI agents, service accounts, workloads, and applications should also receive only the access and authority their role requires, with controls that reflect the sensitivity of the systems and data they can reach.

The model is a useful starting point. The authentication strategy around it now needs to cover a broader set of identities.

What This Means for Security Leaders

Authentication strategy is no longer just about replacing passwords.

Security leaders now need visibility across human identities, machine identities, and emerging AI agents. They need to understand which identities can reach sensitive data, how those identities prove who or what they are, and whether the permissions granted still make sense.

Before adding another authentication technology, start with the risk:

What are we protecting, who or what can access it, and how confident are we that access is legitimate?

That creates a much clearer basis for deciding where stronger authentication is worth the investment.

Go Deeper

Thales' 2026 Digital Trust Index examines how authentication, AI adoption, privacy, and user experience are affecting digital trust.

For security and technical teams planning passwordless deployments, Thales' 2026 guidance on passwordless authentication at scale provides a deeper look at passkeys, authentication architecture, risk, and deployment considerations.

How Pillar Can Help

Authentication decisions are becoming harder while budgets are getting tighter. 

The answer is not necessarily another tool.

Pillar helps security leaders understand where identity creates meaningful risk to the data and systems the business depends on, then prioritize investments accordingly.

That means looking across people, applications, machines, and AI to determine where access needs stronger controls, where existing investments are sufficient, and where gaps create real exposure.

The goal is a security program you can explain to leadership, defend in the budget, and trust when it matters.

For identity and access management guidance, call Pillar 678-304-9099.

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