Security | Threat Detection | Cyberattacks | DevSecOps | Compliance

Security leaders are under pressure to manage an expanding number of SaaS apps and shadow IT. Automation transforms the fight for visibility into a framework of continuous monitoring.

You’ve probably seen a file like this sitting in your project root.

IT and security leaders share a common goal: to empower teams to move fast without compromising security.

Poorly managed credentials are among the most stubborn problems for security and IT teams, and authentication is one of the areas where the Access-Trust Gap is widest. But even as credential-based attacks remain a major threat to security, there are positive signs that companies are moving toward a passwordless future.

We’ve all been there. You open your laptop, log in to your account, log in to your password manager, step away for a quick coffee break, and come back ready to get started on a project, only to be asked by your computer and password manager to log in to both all over again. It’s safe, sure, but it can also feel like one extra speed bump between you and getting work done.

When IT and security teams lack visibility and control over the SaaS apps employees use, the result is wasted spend, unsanctioned access, and compliance failures. Yet 1Password’s research shows that all too often, SaaS usage is evading the tools meant to govern it.

1Password surveyed 2,000 American adults to learn how people are protecting themselves from phishing scams this holiday season (“phishing” refers to all those scammy emails, shady texts, and fake ads, where hackers try to trick people into clicking a link that lets them steal money or information). What we learned is that holiday scams are getting bolder and harder to spot, thanks to the help of AI. Here are some of the other most eye-opening findings.

Unsanctioned AI tools. Patchy access controls. Unmanaged apps and devices. And of course, compromised credentials. These are the issues revealed in the 1Password Annual Report 2025: The Access-Trust Gap. The report is based on a survey of over 5,000 knowledge workers, IT and security professionals, and CISOs, and it captures a moment of profound technological and cultural transition.

Agentic AI is a fundamentally new paradigm. AI agents can interact with various tools and act dynamically and probabilistically as they encounter new inputs. That means they end up falling somewhere between an application and a user in terms of how they operate. Indeed, the interaction with other applications is what gives agentic AI its power; however, this also has implications for identity security and access management.

The new.env destination in 1Password environments makes it easy for developers to use and collaborate on.env files securely, right from the desktop app. 1Password environments provide a secure workspace to store, organize, and manage project secrets – the same credentials you would normally handle as environment variables. Each environment acts as a dedicated space for a project or app, helping teams manage and maintain consistent credentials.