As organizations race to digitalize, millions of customers are being left behind. While Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM) programs are built to make digital experiences seamless and secure, they often overlook a growing group of users: those who struggle to independently navigate digital services. This includes the elderly, the digitally inexperienced, people with disabilities, and others for whom “standard” identity proofing or authentication methods create unnecessary barriers.
Drawing from recent studies and real-world CIAM practices, this session explores how inclusive design principles can be embedded into CIAM strategies from the ground up - ensuring accessibility across onboarding, authentication, and consent journeys. We’ll discuss how to build empathy for all customer personas, the importance of cross-functional collaboration, and how to leverage modern CIAM capabilities like orchestration, behavioral analytics, and adaptive authentication to create more equitable digital experiences.
Ultimately, inclusion in CIAM isn’t just a compliance requirement - it’s a design philosophy that benefits every customer. This session challenges IAM professionals to rethink their “happy path” assumptions and embrace identity as an enabler of digital inclusion.
