Exponential expansion of autonomous agents in the enterprise may expand enterprise threat surfaces to an almost unmanageable degree — especially given poor foundations for non-human identity oversight.

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Agentic AI adoption is expected to explode in 2026, potentially increasing non-human identities (NHIs) in enterprises from 8-10 million to 20-50 million by year's end. CISOs currently have visibility into only about 25% of NHIs, projected to drop to 12% or lower as autonomous agents proliferate. Security experts recommend abandoning attempts to fix legacy identity governance issues and instead focusing on strict identity strategies for new NHIs going forward, treating existing systems as compromised and contained. The core challenge isn't the volume of identities but the inability to assert ownership, intent, and accountability for machine actions operating at speeds that collapse detection windows.

Think agentic AI is hard to secure today? Just wait a few months