Securely Verify Employees in the Age of AI and Impersonation
New research from over 1,000 security leaders reveals a growing gap between workforce identity risk and workforce identity assurance. This survey looks to share how organizations are approaching Know Your Employee (KYE) and workforce identity verification – and why traditional authentication measures are struggling to keep up.
- Workforce identity has become a board-level security concern
- Verifying identity once at onboarding leaves the moments leaders trust least, like account recovery and remote access, with no identity check at all
- Social engineering and AI-powered impersonation target the gaps where identity goes unchecked
Discover how security leaders are addressing workforce identity risk and learn practical steps to verify employees, contractors, and remote workers in the age of AI-enabled impersonation.
of security leaders say insider risk is a significant concern for their organization
are very confident verifying contractor, partner, and temporary worker access
of security leaders now consider KYE a key part of their modern identity security strategy
The Story Behind the Numbers:
Sometimes numbers tell a clear story. This is one of those times:
- Just about every security team sees the insider risk (at 96%).
- Most have already experienced an identity-related incident or near miss (91%).
- Only 31% are “very confident” in verifying contractor access.
- Meanwhile, 34% have investigated employee impersonation incidents, meaning attacks are happening now.
- And finally, AI is accelerating the problem faster than organizations can manage it – with 54% of organizations stating they’re monitoring AI impersonation threats, but only 39% are able to measure them.
FAQs
What is workforce identity verification?
Workforce identity verification is the process of confirming that employees, contractors, partners, and temporary workers are who they claim to be throughout the employment lifecycle. Unlike traditional authentication methods that verify passwords, devices, or credentials, workforce identity verification helps establish confidence in the actual person behind a workforce interaction. According to this research, confidence in identity verification never exceeds 46% at any point in the employee lifecycle and falls to just 31% for contractor and temporary-worker access.
Why is workforce identity becoming a growing security concern?
Workforce identity risks are increasingly driven by social engineering, employee impersonation, candidate fraud, and AI-enabled attacks. According to this survey, nearly all security leaders (96%) view insider risk as significant, while 91% report experiencing an identity-related incident or near miss in the past two years. As AI creates more convincing fake identities, deepfakes, and impersonation attempts, organizations find that traditional authentication methods alone are no longer enough.
Where are the biggest workforce identity verification gaps?
Security leaders report the lowest confidence in verifying identity during contractor, partner, and temporary-worker access (31%), remote and hybrid access (32%), and account recovery processes (37%). These high-risk moments often rely on limited identity assurance and are frequent targets for social engineering and impersonation attacks.
What is Know Your Employee?
Know Your Employee (KYE) helps organizations verify that employees, contractors, partners, and temporary workers are who they claim to be throughout the identity workforce lifecycle. It extends identity assurance beyond a one-time onboarding check by bringing verification into the moments when identity is tested, such as remote access, account recovery, and help desk interactions. By focusing on the person behind the credentials, KYE helps organizations reduce the gaps that social engineering, impersonation, and AI-enabled fraud can exploit.
When should organizations verify or reverify an employee's identity?
Organizations should verify identity during onboarding and reverify it at higher-risk moments when credentials alone may not provide enough assurance. These moments can include account recovery, remote or hybrid access, help desk requests, and access involving contractors, partners, or temporary workers. The goal is not to add friction to every interaction but to apply stronger identity checks where impersonation could lead to unauthorized access or fraud.
How does KYE fit into the workforce systems organizations already use?
Know Your Employee (KYE) isn't a separate system to stand up. It integrates identity verification into the IAM, HR, and ITSM workflows already running in your environment, so verification happens at the points where identity is actually tested – hiring and onboarding in HR, account recovery and help desk requests in ITSM, and authentication journeys in IAM. That integration matters because the biggest barriers leaders cite aren't belief or budget; they're tool sprawl (17%), complexity of existing tools (17%), and fragmented or homegrown identity systems (13%). Adding another disconnected tool makes those problems worse. Connecting verification to the systems you already run reduces complexity rather than adding to it and makes KYE a natural extension of existing identity workflows.
Workforce identity threats are growing faster than most organizations can manage. The era of trusting credentials alone is over. Read the report to discover what security leaders revealed about the risks, gaps, and strategies shaping the future of workforce identity security.