IAM vs IGA vs PAM vs CIEM: What Each One Controls

IAM, IGA, PAM, and CIEM are four identity-security capabilities with names so alike that they are easy to confuse, yet each answers a different question. IAM (identity and access management) manages who someone is and what they can reach. IGA checks that access was approved and is still needed. PAM protects accounts with powerful rights, and CIEM finds and trims the excess permissions held by cloud identities. This article compares IAM vs IGA vs PAM vs CIEM in a vendor-neutral way so you can decide where to start.

IAM is the umbrella; the other three are specializations

The NIST glossary describes identity management in enterprise IT as establishing and managing the roles and access privileges of individual network users (citing NIST SP 800-175A). AWS documentation splits IAM into two jobs: authentication (who signed in) and authorization (what they may do). In practice, IAM means the directory, sign-in including MFA and SSO, and the rules that decide permissions. IGA, PAM, and CIEM are category names used by the market, so their exact scope varies by vendor and analyst. Judge a product by what it actually does, not by its category label.

What question each one answers

• IAM: "who can reach what right now". The core work is the directory, authentication (including MFA and SSO), and authorization policy such as roles and policies
• IGA (identity governance and administration): "is the access that exists correct and still needed". Microsoft frames identity governance around four questions: which identities should have access to which resources, what are they doing with it, are organizational controls in place, and can auditors verify the controls work. The core work is the identity lifecycle tied to HR systems, access requests and approvals, recurring access reviews, and separation-of-duties checks
• PAM (privileged access management): "how are powerful accounts controlled". NIST defines a privileged user as one authorized to perform security-relevant functions that ordinary users cannot. PAM tools reduce the risk of these accounts with just-in-time access, approval before use, and an audit history
• CIEM (cloud infrastructure entitlement management): "what do cloud identities hold, and how much do they really use". Google Security Command Center describes CIEM as managing which identities have access to which resources across multiple cloud platforms, and it flags excess permissions

Timing is another useful difference. IAM runs on every access. IGA runs on events such as a new hire, a transfer, or a departure, and on review cycles. PAM runs at the moment someone uses elevated rights. CIEM runs continuously, comparing the permissions granted with the permissions actually used.

How the four work together

Follow the life of a single access right. A new engineer requests a cloud role. IGA routes the request to the system owner for approval. IAM authenticates the engineer with MFA and enforces the approved permissions. When administrator work is needed, PAM grants temporary elevation instead of standing rights. After a while, CIEM notices that some permissions were never used and feeds that back to IGA for review or removal. Cloud providers' own tools work along these lines: AWS IAM Access Analyzer reports unused roles, access keys, and passwords for IAM users, and Google Cloud's IAM recommender compares granted permissions with those used during an observation window of at most 90 days.

Where the lines overlap

• PAM and IGA: Microsoft treats privileged access as part of identity governance, and Privileged Identity Management (PIM) requires Microsoft Entra ID P2 or ID Governance licensing, which shows the boundary between categories is not fixed. Check what your existing licenses already include
• CIEM and cloud providers' own tools: AWS and Google Cloud ship permission-analysis tools for their own clouds, and CIEM adds one view across several clouds. Know the limits: Google's IAM recommender does not change permissions automatically and considers only IAM allow policies, not ACLs or Kubernetes RBAC
• The CIEM market moves quickly: Microsoft announced end of sale and retirement of Microsoft Entra Permissions Management in 2025, and the product's documentation now sits in the archive. Before choosing a product, ask about its long-term roadmap and how you can export your data
• Non-human identities: permissions held by service accounts, applications, and workloads must be inside the scope of your reviews. Microsoft's documentation says Entra Permissions Management covered permissions of both users and workloads. See Service Accounts and Non-Human Identities

PAM: how risky is your privileged access?

Microsoft PIM separates assignments into active (usable immediately) and eligible (the user must activate first, which can require MFA, a justification, or approval), and either type can be time-bound. Microsoft's best-practice guidance recommends fewer than five Global Administrators, fewer than 10 privileged role assignments, just-in-time access through PIM, MFA on every administrator account, and recurring access reviews. These numbers are one vendor's advice for its own tenants, not a universal standard, but the ideas carry over to other platforms. For more depth, see the article on PAM.

Which to start with

There is no fixed order. Start with the problem that is biggest in your organization.

• No SSO and MFA coverage yet: start with IAM basics. See Which MFA Is Safer?
• Administrators hold standing rights or share accounts: start with PAM
• Leavers' accounts still work, or you cannot show auditors who approved access: start with IGA
• Several clouds with many roles and keys: start with the providers' own permission-analysis tools, then consider CIEM when you need one view
• You would not notice a hijacked account: look at ITDR, a layer that complements all four

Common mistakes

• Buying tools before cleaning identity data: IGA and CIEM depend on correct owners, accounts, and employment status. If the HR source and the directory disagree, the output will mislead you
• Leaving standing administrator rights: an account that is always powerful is the most valuable target for an attacker. Use temporary elevation and keep separate, monitored emergency accounts (Microsoft recommends two cloud-only emergency access accounts)
• Rubber-stamping access reviews: without context a review is a ritual. Let system owners decide, with recent usage data in front of them
• Cutting permissions from analysis without testing: results rest on a limited observation window, and a task that runs once a year can look unused. Confirm with the task owner and test before revoking
• Forgetting non-human identities: service accounts and access keys with no owner tend to escape review
• Trusting the category name over real capability: ask vendors to demonstrate your own use cases

Start today

• Count your administrators: list high-privilege accounts across the directory, clouds, and key systems, and note who holds standing rights
• Compare the HR roster with accounts that still work: find accounts of people who left or changed jobs
• Read the unused-permission reports in the clouds you use: for example IAM Access Analyzer unused access or the IAM recommender, read-only, and check pricing first because AWS charges for unused access analysis
• Pick one important group of rights, such as domain admins or a cloud owner role, and run a first access review
• Name an owner for each capability: who is accountable for IAM, IGA, PAM, and CIEM. If they sit in different teams, agree on the handoffs

To see which gap matters most for your organization, try the self-assessment.

CIEM is one of the tools that combined platforms often bring together; see how a CNAPP differs from CSPM and CWPP.

References and further reading

• NIST glossary: identity and access management: the baseline definition of identity management
• NIST glossary: privileged user: the NIST and CNSS definition of a privileged user
• Microsoft Learn: Microsoft Entra ID Governance: an example of IGA covering identity lifecycle, access requests, and access reviews
• Microsoft Learn: What is Privileged Identity Management?: an example of just-in-time and time-bound access
• Microsoft Learn: Best practices for Microsoft Entra roles: administrator-rights guidance, including the recommended numbers
• AWS: What is IAM?: authentication versus authorization
• AWS: IAM Access Analyzer: unused access analysis and policy generation from real activity
• Google Cloud: IAM recommender overview: comparing granted with used permissions, and its limits
• Google Cloud: CIEM in Security Command Center: an example of defining CIEM across several clouds