IAM market to reach $26B by 2027 driven by SaaS applications

Global spending on identity and access management (IAM) solutions will rise from US$16 billion in 2022 to $26 billion by 2027, according to new predictions by Juniper Research.

The increase, representing an absolute growth of 62 percent over the next five years, will reportedly be driven by small businesses embracing the software as a service (SaaS) model and leveraging its benefits to deliver comprehensive suites of IAM services.

More specifically, the new Juniper report suggests that 94 percent of global IAM spending will be attributable to the subscription model by 2027, an increase of 60 percent from 2022.

Additionally, the research found that annual spending on IAM solutions by small businesses via subscription models will surpass $370 million globally by 2027, up from $178 million in 2022.

To prevent revenue losses as the enterprise adoption of cloud computing infrastructure increases, many of these businesses will also step up their demand for effective cybersecurity policies.

“Secure user access plays a key role in the exchange of data and information, while electronic data is becoming increasingly more valuable to a company’s operations due to the insight it can provide in improving operational efficiencies,” reads Juniper’s latest white paper.

“Access protection must therefore meet increasingly strict requirements – an issue that is often solved by introducing strong authentication.”

At the same time, the researchers added that with recent disruptive trends such as staff using their own devices for work (BYOD), cloud computing, mobile apps, and an increasingly mobile and geographically dispersed workforce, it is becoming increasingly difficult to manage identity and access.

“A common problem is that privileges are granted when needed, as employee duties change, but the access level escalation is not revoked when it is no longer required,” Juniper wrote.

This trend, also known as “privilege creep,” creates security risks in two significant ways, according to the research company.

“First, an employee with privileges beyond what is warranted may have access to applications and data in an unauthorized and potentially unsafe manner,” wrote the data experts.

“Additionally, if an intruder gains access to the account of a user with excessive privileges, he may automatically be able to do more harm. Both instances can lead to data loss or theft.”

To circumvent these and other security issues connected to access and identity management, Juniper has proposed a framework that classifies IAM components into four major categories.

The first of them is authentication, intended as the “module through which a user provides sufficient credentials to gain initial access to an application system of a particular resource.”

For context, modern authentication in many IAM systems includes multi-factor authentication (MFA), often paired with some biometric modality.

The second element of the Juniper IAM framework is Authorization as “the module that determines whether a user is permitted to access a particular resource.”

This module can also provide complex access control based on data or information or policies, which may include user attributes, user roles/groups, actions taken, access channels, time, resources requested, external data, and business rules.

The third module of IAM mentioned in the Juniper white paper is User Management, which comprises user management, password management, role/group management, and user/group provisioning, and defines the set of administering functions such as identity creation, propagation, and maintenance of user identity and privileges.

Finally, the Juniper report mentions Central User Repository, intended as the module that stores and delivers identity information to other services and provides service to verify credentials submitted from clients.

In terms of key players that will drive the adoption of SaaS IAM solutions over the forecast period, Juniper mentions AWS, CyberArk, and IBM, alongside Microsoft, Oracle, and Thales.

And geographically speaking, North America and China will be at the forefront of this growth, followed by West Europe, Central and East Europe, and Africa and the Middle East.

Article Topics

access management  |  biometric authentication  |  cybersecurity  |  digital identity  |  identity access management (IAM)  |  Juniper Research  |  market report  |  SaaS